I make about $17/hr, my car payment is exactly $222.00 every check (I have it set to automatic payments because FUCK interest rates) , I pay about $200 for my cellphone bill, and $120 for car insurance. This doesn’t go to my medical bills if my insurance doesn’t cover me, and food.
This is $700 a MONTH. Mind you, that is just bills. This doesn’t go into groceries, dog food, entertainment, anything of the sort. This is just bills and only bills.
The cheapest place that I found in my town to rent costs around $750 a month.
I don’t have savings. I’ve had to cut back on a lot of shit just see my bank account in the positives this check.
The American Dream wasn’t made for the likes of us. It’s only for the top 1%.
A bartender in the US has highlighted how essential tipping is by sharing that she took home less than $10 for 70 hours work.
‘This is why you tip’, says bartender
A bartender in the US has highlighted how essential tipping is by sharing that she took home less than $10 (€9.30) for 70 hours work.
Aaliyah Cortez uploaded a video of her paycheck on TikTok, explaining how she ended up being paid such a pitiful amount for so many hours.
“This is why you should always tip your bartenders and servers, anyone who waits on you or provides a service for you” she said.
Cortez explained that she gets paid just $2.13 (€1.98) an hour. After taxes, social security and health insurance are deducted, it means she took home less than $10 (€9.30) for 70 hours work.
“Of course, I got tips, but this is what I got for my hourly,” Cortez said. “This is why you tip.”
Since she uploaded the video to TikTok, it has received more than 110,000 likes and almost 1m views.
Speaking to BuzzFeed, Cortez said she shared her payslip to let people know what the reality is for people who work in the service industry.
“It’s not right that we have to do this, but I wanted to shed some light on the issue and inform the public about the importance of tipping,” Cortez said.
Although the minimum wage in the US is $7.25 (€6.74) some state laws in the US mean that employees can be paid as little as $2.13 (€1.98) an hour, as long as tips take their average income up to the minimum wage.
This helps to explain why tipping is a much bigger thing in the US than it is here in Britain, so bear this in mind next time you’re across the pond.
Meghan Markle has been advocating for paid family leave, following up an open letter to Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Chuck Schumer with phone calls to other politicians, including Senators Susan Collins and Shelley Moore Capito, thanks to an assist from Senator Kirsten Gillibrand
A 2019 survey from flexible office-rental company Hana included responses from 1,000 US workers about what they value most in an office. It showed that only 26% of people considered using shared space a vital aspect of work, and just 30% enjoyed using office amenities. “What Covid-19 has done more broadly has exposed existing fault lines” in the workplace paradigm, says Rob Briner. “If you look at the uptake of flexible working, people were already starting to vote with their feet” prior to the pandemic. Perks are “mostly symbolic and mostly about image”, adds Briner. “I think it was more of an image thing to look attractive, to look cool.” They may have helped with recruitment, but other measurable benefits are less concrete – and, in some cases, detrimental as some companies used these perks to try to keep workers at the office longer. And for some employees, it took the pandemic to help them realise that many perks could be superfluous. And, according to Briner, falling back on some of those traditional perks after workplace restrictions are lifted could be seen by workers as “even more superficial, a waste of money and tokenistic”. Post-pandemic, the best office perk may be somewhat ironic: the ability to spend more time outside the office than ever before.
Sam Blum, ‘What happens to workplace perks when no-one’s in the office?’, BBC
