I"m getting really tired of hearing about how my generation (I'm a gapper btw, between Gen X and the Millenials) is lazy and can't commit and complains too much. I'm especially tired of hearing this from baby boomers who have no idea the working class world they've created in their many years of terrible policy making.
I work retail at the moment. I have a B.S. in Science and this is in the only job I could find in my city. That's ok though, I'm willing to work and I typically advance in organizations quickly, so I'll do my best. In my particular company I have experienced the worst series of trickle down, money saving policies I have ever come across. To be trained for something, you read a worksheet, write down a few answers to questions and then must sign a form declaring you are an expert on the material. Then you are expected to perform said task perfectly with little to no supervision, because having extra staff to train would cost more. Any in person training (registers only) is completed within about 20 minutes and the new person is left to flounder with the remaining hundreds of (very serious) policies they didn't have time to learn while memorizing the process. Employees are quizzed daily on things like the loss percentage and the yearly trends of loss, but not on standard register policies (guess which one is more useful?). When policy changes employees are informed at meetings at the beginning of shifts, unless it's too busy for a meeting or you're not there that day, in which case you're screwed. Employees are castigated at meetings for refusing to come in on days off (which the company is not entitled to and perhaps is a symptom of how awful the job is) and then castigated for working too many hours. All part time employees have been cut to a maximum of 25 hours per week so the company doesn't have to pay health insurance, despite this making it hell as there are no longer enough people working on any given day to finish all the work when there are stock deliveries. Raises are given once a year only, despite me having taken on managerial duties I will not make anymore for scheduling breaks and running the front end cash registers. I will not get a raise related to extra duties until I become an assistant manager, which is two ranks, and a myriad of duties away. I am at minimum wage and getting ulcers from the stress of my position.
Also consider that productivity has gone up 25% in the last 30 years but minimum wage has stagnated. So I am doing 25% more work for less pay, while having to have assumed skills in many more areas (computer literacy is a big one), with the crazily heightened expectations of the entitled consumer public. I get to absorb the blows from customers who are upset with corporate policy and want to feel like a big shot by yelling at someone about it, conveniently forgetting that these policies were made by men who do not care about customer experience. People are mean to me all day, because I have to repeat that I can't return underwear, because I have to collect ID information to do a return without a receipt, because the store won't allow employees to search for items on the floor when a customer calls asking for it, because the company won't allow us inventory access so customers have to come in and look. Doing any of these things may result in me getting fired. When a customer dithers about whether to get something in the middle of a sale this actually harms me. Most companies track the productivity of their cashiers by measuring how long it takes them to do a specific action. When someone deliberates or can't find their payment, or refuses to move from the counter to reorganize their wallet so I can call someone else up, they are dropping my productivity scores, with results in lectures from management over things I cannot control. This is why cashiers hurry you, because their employment may be in jeopardy.
To cap it off I get to spend all day walking on concrete floors and lifting and bending in repetitive ways. I get backaches, and sore knees and am currently limping on both feet from the cumulative pain of long shifts (and before you start in, yes, there are 'anti-fatigue mats', which in my extensive experience do nothing but create trip hazards. But I don't deserve health insurance.
When I do my job brilliantly I am beneath notice by the customers and just barely meeting expectations of the company. When I make a single mistake I am treated as criminally stupid (I had a customer loudly claim that the reason ID was needed for certain returns was because all employees were thieves) and then made to feel by management as though my job is in danger. Contact with management is limited to being told off about mistakes. This includes being marked down on scores because saying "Hi there!" is not an acceptable substitute for saying "Hello!" when greeting someone approaching the register.
You wonder why store staff act like they don't care? If they did they'd die from the stress.
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