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.
That was my first thought, too, but I am not a smart economist.
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.
Theyâre number 7 out of thousands? Obviously thatâs 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 Iâd go to Wendyâs [which Iâm not impressed with] before Iâd go to Chick-Fil-A.
Very, very rarely do boycotts work. When they do, itâs 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 Baptistsâ 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 werenât Southern Baptists and enjoyed dropping $300, $500, $800 or more a day at Disney theme parks, and (2) even some of the Southern Baptists didnât want to deprive themselves of some joyous fun with Mickey, Minnie, Goofy, the Seven Dwarves and all 27 princesses .
Theyâre 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 itâs not boring. Burger King is the worst. It pays darn near minimum wage and itâs 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 doesnât know anything, that it could be a solid place to work, if working there doesnât offend you (duh).
You said
âTheyâre number 7 out of thousands? Obviously thatâs 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.â
I didnât see any reference to âthousandsâ or â300+â in that article. In fact, I didnât see any indication of where they got their information. I did see a reference to âin your zoneâ, which I took to be a geographic area, but no indication which zone they were surveying.
That said, I can believe that Chick-fil-Aâs culture really does support higher wages. Just donât have any facts to back it up.
Mostly Iâm wondering if anyone has good data that would provide a time series for fast food wages over the past three years or so. Iâm not that interested in CfA vs. McDs, just trends for everyone.
So they pay better than McDonalds, Burger King, Wendyâs, Arbyâs, Taco Bell, KFC, Long John Silverâs, Subway, Dairy Queen, Sonic, Jimmy Johnâs, Popeyeâs, Jack In The Box, Hardeeâs, Carlâs Jr., Five Guys, Dunkinâ Donuts, and probably others Iâm not thinking of.
Weighted by volume of sales and adding the maybe implied word âmajorâ, thatâs close enough to âevery other fast food chainâ that Iâm not going to quibble.
That said, Iâm surprised to see McDonalds crack the top 10. When I was in high school the ones near me paid exactly minimum wage.
McDâs in my area has been offering health insurance and 401k for part-time employees. Not sure if thereâs a âtraining periodâ 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 âwagesâ in these sorts of comparisons.
Not many make a career out of fast food but one of my sisters worked at McDâs 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
They gave her a schedule that allowed her to be with her kids after school and
She didnât think she could do better since she didnât 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. Sheâs 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.
To be fair, from everything Iâve 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.
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)