Grocery Store Protesters Arrested

Blown · Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2004 8:38 pm Post subject:

Costco meat is > Safeway meat anyhow. LOL

I'm shutting my mouth now since I'm basically a business owner and I sit on the other side of this discussion.

[HALO]cpt._Keyes · Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2004 8:43 pm Post subject:

blown ur a buisness owner...answer these two questions...you are losing money...do you cut back your employee pay and benifits?

you want MORE money faster...do you cut back on your employee pay and benifits?
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Blown · Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2004 9:27 pm Post subject:

I dunno, guess it would depend on all things involved. I dont think we would ever cut back pay and never have. Benifits have been cut back where I work though.

Insurance has gone thru the roof, so we went to a plan with a higher deductible to keep cost in reason. If we were on the same plan we were on about 4 yrs ago it would be costing the company about 600 dollars a month per employee on average, compared to 200 on this plan. Times that by 20 or so employees that adds up pretty quickly over a yr. Right now we are on a plan that the employees still have to pay 60 bucks a month to, but that money goes into a savings account that us, the employeer doesnt touch. Its to cover some things that the old plan did cover.

401k, no never. Its handled by my dad and all investments are done by him.

Vacation/sick pay, nope, not cut and never has been.

Heck we have hardly ever layed anyone off due to slow times. Usually we just tuff it out and make up for it during the busy times.

BUUUUUT

It takes a long time to train someone at what we do, teaching someone how to fix Heat Pumps, air conditioners, well pumps, water treatment systems take time. The heating installers are a bit easier, but it still takes time with them also. So ya, in our line of business Id have to say I would look elsewhere if possible not to lose our employees cause they arent easily replaced.

We are not alone with these insurance problems, why do you think these medical savings accounts all of a sudden started poping up not too long ago. Maybe they were around for a while, but not used nearly as much like they are starting to be used now. Insurance premiums are just out of hand. Thing is, ppl go to the docter for the stupidest reasons because they think, hey, its only 20 bucks. Well so many ppl have that line of thinking its killing the insurance industry so they raise rates to counter it. If things dont change with all these increases it may just happen that we discontinue insurance coverage, or the employee will have to cover a greater portion of it.

bobins · Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2004 11:10 pm Post subject:

readin whats been written.. all this 'seems' to be based on health insurance.. either it costing more.. not being free or being taken away.. different ppl seem to be bringing it accross differntly... i dont see why it cant be free... it is in the uk. we dont pay a penny for our health treatment..

ok admitedly the NHS has been underfunded for the past decade or so.. so you have to go on quite extensive waiting lists for general surgaires and stuff... but its free. if you have an accident.. its free. and you get treatment on the spot. sort of extends the waitin lists for others.. but its free.. and its 'supposidly' getting more funding now.. like it used to.. so waiting lists will be down again...

i thinks its completely wrong to charge ppl for treatment... health care should be a basic human rite..... and shouldnt cost you an arm and a leg on insurance every month..

this is all just my opinion.. i konw if you did have free health care companies like safeway's would find other ways of cost cutting.

im not going to get into the argument of wether its skilled or not... i worked in a supermarket for over a year, at tesco's, and all i can go by is my experience of it. ok it doesnt take a genious to spot where you place the flora butter.. or the sausage rolls.. but i do konw that new people trying to do it on there own take about 4 times as long to do the same amount of work as an experienced employee.. which has to be effecting the supermarkets in some form or another.. as all there workforce at the moment are replacments... and from my experiene in tesco's. it only took about a 4 hour breifing and a few tests on health and safety with a few weeks supervision by the head butcher and fishmongerer before i could work on the fish counter prepearing fish and then i got upgraded onto the meat counter and we dont use basic slicing adn wrapping machines for most things on the meat counter just the hams and that... .. for some of you who think its just the slicing machine that gets used. thats normaly on the deli counters anyways...

anyway i dont want to fan the already fairly heated veiws of some of the people here who work for safeways. personaly i would never work for them here in the uk. i've got some friedns who used to work there nad had some bad experiences.. they just walked away... in the uk Tesco's and ASDA are the main supermarkets.. safeways almost compeltely colapsed.. i know someone who lost tons cos there shares plumeted. lol. and he owned a sh** load. all i know from my experience is that just taking ppl off of the streets to work in a supermarket wouldnt make it run very smoothly at all. and here in the uk anyway. customers would get very pi**ed off about almost empty shelves and the such. ok u dont need to be a genius but still

o and what i got paid in tesco's when i worked there was £5.30 an hour... thats... $9.70 an hour... i dont know what safeways pays in the uk. but i know its not that much lower than tesco's. tesco's is the best paid supermarket for the work.. i belive.

well im not going to write anymore. just giving a pictuer of what its like in a supermarket her ein the uk. i hope i havent offended anyone, if i have im sorry wasnt intended at all.
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MuLiShA · Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2004 11:41 pm Post subject:

You said it only took a couple of months to master...compare that to jobs where you go to 6+ years of college to train for. Who's going to have the better job secruity/pay/benefits?
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MuLiShA · Posted: Fri Jan 23, 2004 11:42 pm Post subject:

Azrael · Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2004 8:00 am Post subject:

but you forget that their taxes are adjusted to pay for the health care

I'm not sure by how much, but I think I remember reading that the Americans pay alot less in taxes than most in Europe and elsewhere. THe reason is that there are things that those countries give to their citizens for free, such as healthcare, higher education, etc etc (actually, I can't think of any other ones, so that's why the etc went there

). In the U.S., we are so opposed to paying higher taxes that we automatically preclude ourselves from getting these things as a basic right for citizens.

Follow this linky to see how taxes are done in Sweden (and you will see that they are damn near 50% of earned income, and you will see why, too) Clicky!! <<====
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Vicoden · Posted: Sat Jan 24, 2004 2:58 pm Post subject:

1st cutter at your store made 75 + for 11 months work? I can't imagine why your boss can't afford to keep you guys around.

Sorry I don't know the legacy behind safeway, it doesn't matter who owns it, a single person or a group of investment bankers. INVESTMENT BANKERS, pretty much means they are in it for the money. DUH!! just like you! So tell me again why they should care if your getting paid enough and have decent benefits. Their job is not to make sure your top butcher makes more than alot of lawyers, their job is to make the most money they can. If they can find people that can do it for cheaper, they in turn make more money.

BTW the grocery store union going down is never going to affect the construction industry. My union is only getting bigger, while yours is going down the drain. That isn't a rip on you, thats a fact! The way you stay employed is to offer something that others can't. Its pretty easy in the construction trade, there aren't too many non-union shops that have the man-power or skills to build a stadium or an office building. Not only that, but are employees are certified in a variety of things: CPR, Welding, Heavy-machinery, Saftey. We work under OSHA regs, which gets rid of about 90% of non-union competition right there. So if you think I should give a rats ass about the grocery union because you think its going to affect my job...laugh.

Its too bad people are losing their jobs, but thats the way the world works. 75,000 seems just a "tad" high for a meat cutter, I'm not saying its not true, but I mean come on.

bobins · Posted: Sun Jan 25, 2004 11:17 pm Post subject:

Bright Red Nipples · Posted: Mon Jan 26, 2004 12:16 am Post subject:

Just because the government would get the money for health care does not mean it would be used for it. Our government has a funny way of finding other things to spend our money on. How much would health care deminish if it went to this kind of plan?

I am happy paying for my own health care insurance. At least I know the quality of insurance that I have is top notch.
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Blown · Posted: Mon Jan 26, 2004 1:27 am Post subject: