Minimum Wage - How can you survive ?

Quitelife

Met two people this week working minimum wage both going packing in their jobs because they cant survive on the minimum wage plus their treated very poorly at best.

One works in a manufacturing factory where there was some issue with a machine which stalled production which meant they had to ring the boss in some corporate tent at Punchestown racecourse which resulted in them been fcuked out of it and threatened with their pay been docked this week over machine going down and wait till i get back to the office threats etc etc.

The other works in a well known fast food chain and burned her hand with cooking oil and was given a bit of spray to keep going or you'll be sacked plus you still owe us X Euro for your uniform.She sleeps on a couch in a friends house as she cant afford to rent anywhere presently.

How are people supposed to live renting on minimum wage? Is it any wonder some employers cant get staff. They could do what Keelings or meat factories do - go to the poorest most desperate part of Bulgaria or Latvia and put them in caravans or 6 to a bedroom . 10.50 minimum wage needs to increase significantly is the bottom line .

L1011

In a house share, and/or with significant state support (FIS, HAP).

Mrs OBumble

Minimum wage jobs are for kids who are still being partially supported by their parents, and students. Many student jobs now pay €11+

People with impairments which mean they will never obtain better jobs get long term support from HAP/social housing, medical card etc.

Aint Eazy Being Cheezy

I’m awaiting the comment stating that you’re not meant to be able to “survive” on minimum wage, that you progress your career & move up the ladder etc etc

Load of horseshyte. Poor Government policies over the past 3 decades caused this. Either vote for SF or learn a new language and then pack your bags, that’s the 2 options available to our college kids nowadays.

Quitelife

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992026#Comment_118992026

Would a single person get FIS, didnt think so?

if you get 400 euro net for 40 hours work would you rent somewhere ie a house share 200 a week ? leaves you with 200 to feed , clouth yourself and get to work? Dole cant be much less

Quitelife

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992040#Comment_118992040

Theres still a share of unqualified people in their 40s 50s and 60s who have no qualifications who work minimum wage jobs.

mickdw

You think a vote for SF will solve matters?

DarkJager21

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992057#Comment_118992057

What is horseshite about upskilling and bettering yourself to get a better paycheck? How is that anything to do with the government?

As for voting SF 🤣🤣 SF are not going to do anything for the working man (a.k.a the magic money tree that will pay for all the free houses and whatever else they are promising to give people)

Tow

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058243721/minimum-wage-how-can-you-survive

When I was young we had bedsits. They were the bottom rung on the property ladder. But the government banned them, with no replacement. Now days people cannot afford the bottom rung, find them selves homeless.

magicbastarder

many people don't realise either how expensive it is being poor.

Quitelife

Theres no doubt theres a lot of profitable Businesses that could pay their staff quite a bit more than minimum wage but prefer to make the top table incredibly rich rather than treat their staff more fairly . Greed and no morals is whats its called .

Some bosses enjoy looking at their staff knowing they've nothing and a weeks pay away from homelessness.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992057#Comment_118992057

Either vote for SF or learn a new language and then pack your bags, that’s the 2 options available to our college kids nowadays.

Voting SF would change nothing. They're part of the same political system as the rest of them. Big on words, soft on actually doing anything useful.

Secondly, you don't need to learn a new language. English is useful all around the world, and you can get your start with TEFL, which after a year or two, you can easily earn enough abroad, to finance your need for an advanced degree, which leads to other options.

But I agree.. the best option for anyone on min-wage, (and likely to stay there), is to go abroad where being a foreigner is an asset. All the same, there are a variety of options in Ireland for further education, based on your income (or your gender) to allow the move into better employment positions. Alternatively, the internet provides a lot of scope for anyone who has the dedication to stick at learning, which sets you up for better employment.

People are responsible for their own situations. Yes, Ireland is expensive, but there are a wide range of supports available if someone is willing to jump through the required hoops.

----

Still I'm curious to see the posts per the OPs question about how people survive on min wage. Ireland is an expensive country, and is going to become much more expensive as inflation seriously kicks in.

road_high

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992069#Comment_118992069

A very big share too. I know lots of them

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992250#Comment_118992250

There's also those middle aged who are qualified in general degrees like business, and have past experience, but the recruiters ignore them.. leaving them stuck with min waged jobs. I feel their pain.. as I've been looking for work for the last year in Ireland (I work online atm, and wanted to transition to living in Ireland) and it's bloody hard to find anything outside of Dublin. Plenty of advertisements, but no response from applications (I have advanced degrees, but my experience in that area is sadly out of date). After a year of it, I'm ready to give up, and go back abroad again.

L1011

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992061#Comment_118992061

Nothing is structured for single people on low wages. Was going to say "these days" but its been that way for decades if not ever really.

Until equal pay legislation it was common for a single man to be paid less than a married man (and a woman to be paid less than both) doing the same work in the same job. Even civil service pay scales!

Quitelife

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992269#Comment_118992269

An interesting story. Outside of your qualifications you'd imagine experienced , problem solving older staff who have a head on their shoulders would be in demand and they'd be more loyal to the employer.

Aint Eazy Being Cheezy

I didn’t mean that upskilling was horseshyte, just the notion that people shouldn’t feel entitled to a certain lifestyle even on the minimum wage.

If it’s necessary to live multiple to a room/house in order to survive, that’s a sign of a failed housing policy. It doesn’t take into account the needs of a whole section of society. Students, the unskilled and single adults who may also need to support a previous relationship/family in addition to themselves.

Folks scoff at Sinn Fein but I’ve yet to be convinced that the FFG duopoly are going to suddenly come up with the answers.

Jinglejangle69

Oh look another Ireland is a kip thread.

From someone who probably has never been outside of Ireland only to sunny Spain or Paris.

Ginger83

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992238#Comment_118992238

I fully agree with this and here's an example. A large food producer in the north east is the finest example of this. Major turnover of staff with majority on minimum wage. Sh1t hours where staff are just told randomly at 5.50pm that they are staying until 10pm. If an employee seeks a pay increase the reply is that they pay the position, not the person. One of the attitudes openly spoken by boss to others about the staff is you have to keep them down.

I don't think it will ever change in companies like this. They are rubbing their hands together with this war but what can you do, people want their super 6.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992367#Comment_118992367

So I've often been told (at least that was the logic years ago)... but Ireland marches to a different beat than other countries.

I've spoken to a variety of old friends who are established here, and the response tends to be "it is what it is" rather than any practical explanation of how to get around it.. it's like as if people don't really know what's accepted anymore.

El_Duderino 09

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992026#Comment_118992026

Isn't it interesting that we're so much more comfortable with giving corporate welfare than giving individuals welfare. The facts are that businesses need cleaners, people to work tills etc. Those people need to live so they need the money from either their job, or government support or a combination of both. We allow businesses to pay wages that are far below the cost of housing and living and then we make up the difference with benefits which are collected through tax. So we all help pay the wages of businesses we might never use.

So the fast food restaurant pays wages the staff can't live on to keep their costs down, customers get artificially low priced fast food and the tax payer makes up the rest of the worker's wages.

One option would be to let companies pay the actual cost of living to workers, charge the appropriate price for their food and let customers choose which business they want to use when the cost of labour is actually built in.

It seems that were happier to spread the cost around to taxpayers whether ot not they use the services, and have more people in employment and use government top up their wages.

I don't have a huge problem with companies needing to pay the actual cost of living to their staff and changing more for their services. We pay wither way.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992398#Comment_118992398

Dismiss and deflect without contributing anything. You're the first one to suggest Ireland as being a kip

Oh.. I've lived/worked in China, Japan, S.Korea, Germany... and travelled to a wide variety of other countries.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992381#Comment_118992381

id agree with most of this thread and mosy of yr post tbh but you think students should all have their own houses?

no doubt FG have done far too little about housing and they have seen the effects at the polls- staggering that they still drag their feet in taking action tbh

my faith in SF addressing it while running an actual country besides? zero.

Padre_Pio

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992398#Comment_118992398

Ireland is a fantastic country. One of the best in the world. The majority are doing quite well, own their own homes, have decent, stable jobs, and a positive outlook on the future.

However, a growing and sizeable minority do not have the same security and recent events have made things work. It was tough to rent in Ireland back in 2016. 6 years later it's near impossible. No sign of it improving at all in the short term. There are less than a thousand rental properties in the whole country on Daft.

Say what you want about Brexit and COVID and Ukraine, but these crises didn't start the problems in our country. They only made existing problems worse.

There are positive steps our government could take regarding the cost of living but vested interests and inaction mean they don't.

magicbastarder

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992189#Comment_118992189

this is worth a listen - jack monroe, the food poverty campaigner, on how inflation calculations often don't capture inflation for poor people.

TL;DL - inflation calculations on groceries usually focus on 'middle of the road' items, e.g. standard quality pasta or bread, etc.; but the 'essentials' items supermarkets stock, the very cheap ones, are rarely included in those standard baskets. however, there's been massive inflation on those cheap items, 100% in some of the examples she gives, so while a middle income earner might be spending say 10% more on food now, someone who had been depending on the cheap stuff will have seen a much greater jump.

(should mention that the focus is the UK in the piece, where brexit is a complication, but i imagine a similar effect is happening here, maybe not as pronounced)

https://www.bbc.co.uk/programmes/p0bk6dt4

dotsman

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992057#Comment_118992057

Not sure if trolling and trying to take the piss out of SF voters. But, if you are being serious, then you are the very definition of a SF voter. Absolutely incapable of taking care of yourself and insisting that everyone else wipe your ass for you.

P.S. The last 3 decades have been phenomenal for Ireland from an Economic term and have been the only 3 decades where, not only have we had a great quality-of-life/standard-of-living, but we have been amongst the top countries on planet for having so.

Does that mean things are perfect? No, far from it, but anyone that can't make a comfortable life for themselves in Ireland is going to struggle big-time in 95% of other countries.

If you are talking about the 30-year-old property crisis, then I'm afraid to inform you that Sinn Fein is the very epitome of the cause of the crisis.

cafflingwunts

By living off your family.

Nuts102

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992069#Comment_118992069

Also part time workers be it single parents or a two parent family needing extra income.

If we only had students working minimum wage jobs then the country would collapse and businesses would close.

Furze99

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992238#Comment_118992238

Bullsh*t and just shows that your OP is not a genuine query but just another Shinnerbot thread.

As for SF doing anything about the multiple issues they keep banging on about, forget it. They have one and only one item on the primary agenda - a border poll. All else is subservient to that ballot box strategy raison d'etre.

Quitelife

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/118992540#Comment_118992540

Excellent piece if rather sad.

Things are bad here for those in the UK things are very very bad, parents not eating to feed their children , going to foodbanks every week.

Restaurant workers eating what customers dont eat off the plate because they cant afford food after rent , are we going down that road to make the rich richer?

Wanderer78

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058243721/minimum-wage-how-can-you-survive

this is a difficult one, yes some businesses can afford to pay more, but many, particularly most sme's cant, pup should have remained in place for many of these employees, but reduced if returned to work, this would have reduced pressure on all involved, provided the economy with more money, maintaining a higher level of economic activities, but since it didnt happen, expect rising tensions, business failures and unemployment!