Boycotting American companies that continue to do business in Russia

A conspiracy-theory-following family member recently shared with me a video that showed up on their social media feed that was raising the alarm that all the biggest companies are owned by Vanguard and BlackRock, whoever those Robber Barons are. :wink:

That was my first thought, too, but I am not a smart economist.

When I started tracking divestment campaigns a few years back, I noted a few know-nothings who did not understand the concept of index mutual funds.

http://stump.marypat.org/article/923/more-on-gun-divestment-go-for-it-if-it-s-your-money-and-that-s-what-you-want

TIAA’S GUN TIES

The New York Times reported on Monday that other states also have pension holdings via TIAA in gun companies. The Times reported:

OH NOES!

Oh wait, the gun company ties is that the TIAA funds are broad-based index-based funds. That is, they are essentially invested in all sectors. Would it surprise you that the broad TIAA mutual funds have investments in: oil, booze, gambling, movies, music, and all sorts of things that various people complain about being sinful?

By the way, TIAA has ESG funds, with both equity and bond options. Their fees range from 46 bps to 166 bps.

They’re number 7 out of thousands? Obviously that’s pretty darn good. Also where I live Panda Express and Panera Bread are the only 2 above them around. Meanwhile there are 300+ other franchises that pay less than them around Louisville. Sorry for not being super duper precise.

I think their product is … OK. Been twice, not impressed. Better than Shake Shack [which IMO is grossly overrated], better than In-N-Out Burger [also grossly overrated], but I’d go to Wendy’s [which I’m not impressed with] before I’d go to Chick-Fil-A.

:man_shrugging:

Very, very rarely do boycotts work. When they do, it’s because overwhelming numbers of people are outraged at something very company-specific. Coca-Cola in the 80s and Molson Brewing in the 70s are two great examples. The Southern Baptists’ boycott of Walt Disney World for years went nowhere because (1) even numbering several million people, they were dwarfed by the tens of millions of people who weren’t Southern Baptists and enjoyed dropping $300, $500, $800 or more a day at Disney theme parks, and (2) even some of the Southern Baptists didn’t want to deprive themselves of some joyous fun with Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, the Seven Dwarves and all 27 princesses .

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Where do you find those numbers? I didn’t think franchisees would make them public.

They’re in the article of the post I replied to. I just know all the teenagers at our church love getting jobs at Chick-Fil-A because it pays the best of all the restaurants and they stay busy so it’s not boring. Burger King is the worst. It pays darn near minimum wage and it’s slow. None of them ever stay there longer than a month or 2.

I will also add that from experience when I would go to CFA: the managers seemed present, identifiable, and competent; The crew always seemed fully staffed and kept busy; they seemed to have their logistics down. For the Sunday church going person, even better as there is never conflict. I can believe based on those surface observations of someone who doesn’t know anything, that it could be a solid place to work, if working there doesn’t offend you (duh).

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You said
“They’re number 7 out of thousands? Obviously that’s pretty darn good. Also where I live Panda Express and Panera Bread are the only 2 above them around. Meanwhile there are 300+ other franchises that pay less than them around Louisville.”

I didn’t see any reference to “thousands” or “300+” in that article. In fact, I didn’t see any indication of where they got their information. I did see a reference to “in your zone”, which I took to be a geographic area, but no indication which zone they were surveying.

That said, I can believe that Chick-fil-A’s culture really does support higher wages. Just don’t have any facts to back it up.

Mostly I’m wondering if anyone has good data that would provide a time series for fast food wages over the past three years or so. I’m not that interested in CfA vs. McDs, just trends for everyone.

Seems like it’s splitting hairs.

So they pay better than McDonalds, Burger King, Wendy’s, Arby’s, Taco Bell, KFC, Long John Silver’s, Subway, Dairy Queen, Sonic, Jimmy John’s, Popeye’s, Jack In The Box, Hardee’s, Carl’s Jr., Five Guys, Dunkin’ Donuts, and probably others I’m not thinking of.

Weighted by volume of sales and adding the maybe implied word “major”, that’s close enough to “every other fast food chain” that I’m not going to quibble.

That said, I’m surprised to see McDonalds crack the top 10. When I was in high school the ones near me paid exactly minimum wage.

McD’s in my area has been offering health insurance and 401k for part-time employees. Not sure if there’s a “training period” before eligible for the benefits; or what the employee costs are for the health insurance (or if dependents are eligible for an additional cost).

Not sure if that would be weighed in as far as “wages” in these sorts of comparisons.

Maybe. Not something on my radar at age 16. All I remember was McDonalds paid $4.25 an hour whereas nearly everyone else started you at $4.50.

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Gawd, it’s crazy to think that I ever worked for so little! Happily!!!

Another random thought.

In-N-Out Burger is #1 on the list. But aren’t like half of their locations in California where the minimum wage is $15 an hour?

Of course they’re going to have a higher average than McDonalds which is everywhere.

Or Chick-Fil-A which is disproportionately located in red states with low minimum wages.

I wonder what that list would look like if you listed it as a percentage of the local minimum wage for each location.

Not many make a career out of fast food but one of my sisters worked at McD’s for 30 years, with a break when she attended college for one semester. She managed for a while but later when back to a lower position when her location was closed. She worked there for so long bc

  1. They gave her a schedule that allowed her to be with her kids after school and
  2. She didn’t think she could do better since she didn’t finish college.

She did have health insurance benefits & maybe a small 401k.

Her experience was that as the entry level pay increased over the years it did not make much difference in her pay. She finally left for a call center job, started at the bottom, stayed there bc it is low stress. She’s happier and now making more than she would be in fast food. (Started out at a slight decrease bc insurance costs were higher.)

ETA: At this point she was an empty nester and did not need the flexibility of getting off work at 2:30 pm.

Random anecdote: one of my mom’s BFFs married this super rich guy and all of his kids got huge trust funds.

BUT… as a condition of getting their trust funds, they had to work at McDonalds for two years.

Not “fast food”… it specifically had to be McDonalds.

So now his kids are all multi-millionaires whose only job in life was working at McDonalds for minimum wage. Maybe slightly higher if they got raises.

He wanted them to appreciate what he was giving them, and apparently saw working at McDonalds as the lowest possible tier on which one could land.

He should have made mom’s BFF work at McDs for 2 years also!

To be fair, from everything I’ve seen and heard crappy people seem to find their way to management in fast food restaurants. If you can survive working there for a while, you can survive working in a lot of places.

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When I started at Starbucks in … 2009 I was paid $7.65/hr… I think by the end of 2 years I was at like $8.15 and then after an internship worked as a caddy and felt like I was rolling in money (comparatively)

you were a looper, a pro jock???

I’m not sure what a looper or pro jock is, but I was not a caddy for professionals, merely at a local country club.