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I laugh every time I hear about a bunch of fast food employees trying to unionize so they can turn a horrible job into a horrible job with a "livable wage". First of all, any wage is a livable wage if you budget your money properly. Most people can't accept the fact that they are on an employment level where they can't afford a nice car, a big house, and four children. Rather than study harder in school or work harder at their jobs, they think that their jobs should elevate them to a better status. I don't know when, as a society, people decided that they would do whatever they wanted to do and expect whatever results that they desired. It doesn't work that way.
Ask any struggling writer for a lesson in the adverse ratio of work/expectations/results. We all know that if you write a script, you don't necessarily sell a script. You may write ten scripts and make zero dollars. Still, people want a job where they show up late every day, take 95 minutes for lunch, leave early and make personal phone calls and get paid $200k a year and get a company car and an executive health plan. These are people who barely made it through high school. Maybe that's why they expect these things.
Crappy jobs are that way for a reason: you're not supposed to make careers out of them. If, however, this is it for you and your paycheck will forever be emblazoned with an imprint of a french fry boil basket, then this is Darwinism at its most functional. This is society's way of telling you that you shouldn't have children and you shouldn't rent a penthouse apartment. Or, this might be society's way of telling you to get a better job. It's called moving on.
This is how you know that it's time to go. If you've got enough initiative, energy and leadership skills to organize a union, you've got what it takes to get a better job. Don't sell yourself short, and don't waste your time. Just because you get paid twice as much to do the same crappy job doesn't mean that it is now a good job. You can't polish a turd.
So, absorb the abuse and the unappreciation and use that emotional energy to fuel your other pursuits in life. If you're creative, then you already know where that energy is going. You hate it here? Good. Work so that you don't have to stay here. It's the best motivator you'll ever have. |
