It's Beginning to Feel a Lot Like...

...Nothing, really. Maybe it's just the weather here, since it's only just gotten cold in the last week. Maybe it's because I work retail. Maybe 'cause I don't watch much TV, so I don't get the onslaughts of ads and specials. Maybe it has to do with hearing people complain about the "War on Christmas" (though that's been quieter this year), while religious hymns are playing over the overhead music in every retail store.

And I've hardly done any shopping for anybody, either.

Department of Bullshit

(As an aside, the whole login thing for news sites is also total bullshit. Thank goodness for http://www.bugmenot.com/)

From the New York Times,

"With energy prices now sharply lower than a few months ago and the improving job market forcing employers to offer higher raises, the buying power of American workers is now rising at the fastest rate since the economic boom of the late 1990s.

The average hourly wage for workers below management level — everyone from school bus drivers to stockbrokers — rose 2.8 percent from October 2005 to October of this year, after being adjusted for inflation, according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics. Only a year ago, it was falling by 1.5 percent"

So, what's the fed's reaction to this news? Let's see!

"Wages have risen so swiftly that some economists worry that they could push inflation up on their own, by forcing companies to raise prices. Last week, the Federal Reserve chairman, Ben S. Bernanke, warned that the central bank might have to raise interest rates again. “One factor that we are watching carefully is labor costs,” he said."

Ah. "Labor costs". Can't have THOSE going up, now CAN we? That might mean the companies could only give 10 cents a share in dividends to stockholders, rather than 20. And THAT, we all know, would be a disaster. Especially after YEARS of real declines in most people's wages.

Fuckers.

A Stunning Revelation of the Obvious

I had a moment of enlightenment, or something today at work. You see, sales have been slow this holiday season, so the managers have been cutting hours to meet the sales-per-hour dictated by the head office. And I had a thought. So I asked one of the managers if sales for other stores were slow too, or it was just us.

Unsurprisingly, it wasn't just us. Most of the other stores have been cutting hours and sending people home early. So, this led to the question. If it's everybody, then it's not us floor monkeys sucking, it's that the numbers were wrong. So why is it, I asked, that we get our hours cut, instead of the people who made the numbers and obviously got it wrong?

And the managers said the numbers were made up by the district managers, and the regional managers, and some people in payroll, and so on. Which isn't really an answer. I don't care who they are, they screwed it up, they should be the ones who get paid less. But on the other hand, it is an answer of a sort. There's not just one person doing it. The responsibility is spread out over several people, so there's not one person who's easy to fire. And they're all management so they'd be the ones doing the firing. And their own raises are all dependent on making the numbers in this column higher than the ones there last year.

I wonder how much consternation it would make if I sent an email to the CFO and asked him that. Probably none, 'cause I doubt any of them give a shit. If they did, they wouldn't be in management. I don't think I'd get fired or anything, either. Basically all I'd get is the satisfaction of doing it. And probably an awkward conversation with my manager after they kick it down the chain of command.

And what makes this even stupider? The employees are the customers who buy the stuff. Not just at our store, at any store. So when the stores don't sell as much, and pay their employees less because of it, then the employees don't have the money to go buy stuff, so the stores sell less, so...

House of sand again.