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A_Man_Who_Writes OP t1_j59xnpc wrote

Reply to comment by Bobbydadude01 in Why did Sunday pay go away? by A_Man_Who_Writes

Yes, but why?

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THevil30 t1_j5a11yl wrote

They didn’t sneak it in, it was a deal. The minimum wage was 8.10 an hour, with time and a half at 12.15 on Sundays and holidays. The deal was that minimum wage would be raised to $15 over the course of 4 years and the time and a half for Sundays would go away. You might argue they should have done both, which fine I don’t disagree.

But if a compromise was needed, this was a pretty good one. I remember having to fight over Sunday shifts for that extra cash. Now you just earn more than you ever did back then on any day of the week.

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Healthy_Pay9449 t1_j5a1y1s wrote

This would be better if inflation didn't exceed the raises

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THevil30 t1_j5a2n85 wrote

Well yeah but that’s a separate issue.

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A_Man_Who_Writes OP t1_j5abl17 wrote

How is that a separate issue? No one is any better off at 15 than they were at 8 many years ago. Inflation has been crazy.

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THevil30 t1_j5adgc8 wrote

Well okay first of all that statement is just false. The minimum wage went up in like 2014 or so. Inflation this year has been pretty bad at around 8% but inflation from 2014 has NOT been 80%. $15 now is just factually more than $8 in 2014 when you adjust for inflation. You can look at the CPI statistics to clearly see this.

But it’s a separate issue because the issue of “what should the minimum wage be” is separate from “should you get paid more on Sundays just because it’s Sunday.” It makes perfect sense to me to say that the minimum wage should be higher in order to account for inflation. It makes NO sense to me to say that minimum wage should be higher on Sundays and not other days in order to account for inflation. My point here is that Sundays are not special, and the inflation rate does not make Sundays any more or less special. It is simply a separate issue.

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Tacoman404 t1_j5b1n52 wrote

Sundays are special in that typically the businesses that operate the most on them are retail hence why the wage increase was given to those workers. Weekends are factually busier at these establishments requiring more work as M-F workers are shopping at them.

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ak47workaccnt t1_j5a4fqx wrote

Is it though?

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THevil30 t1_j5a57fh wrote

I mean, yes? I’d be totally down to peg the minimum wage to inflation. But adding time and a half on Sundays is def not the way to deal with it.

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A_Man_Who_Writes OP t1_j5abntp wrote

But we all know that minimum wage is going to be stuck at 15 for years.

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THevil30 t1_j5adujd wrote

The other point here is what was possible at the time. You have to remember that while we are a pretty progressive state overall we still elected Charlie Baker twice and would have done so again had he run. There is a level of “too progressive” at which point the average MA voter does get annoyed. The bargain that was struck was what could pass, and all in all it was a good bargain and one of the highest minimum wage increases in the country.

At the end of the day the politicians have to account for the will of the voters, and in MA we have a pretty good progressive base. But there are limits. This was a good deal, I’ll take the W.

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Bobbydadude01 t1_j59xrcw wrote

Because it saves companies money in the long term.

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A_Man_Who_Writes OP t1_j59xvun wrote

Was there a problem before with companies not being able to save enough?

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hour_of_the_rat t1_j59z5ky wrote

Fucking hilarious.

No, companies were plenty rich before. They just wanted to be richer.

Fuck you, Baker.

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A_Man_Who_Writes OP t1_j59zvi0 wrote

That’s what I’m trying to understand. Clearly the extra pay was and is good for workers. So, if companies aren’t losing out because of it, why take it away?

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hour_of_the_rat t1_j5a1cav wrote

Enough so-called "small business owners" (but, really all businesses) complained about it to Baker, and the legislature.

The "compromise" was to raise the minimum wage, and eliminate time and-a-half on Sundays.

At the time, the argument here on reddit, was, "Why should you get paid 1.5x on Sundays just because its Sunday?"

And the answer is that Sunday was historically recognized as a 'Day of Rest', because it was church day--a day to pray, be with family, read the bible, and in the before times, laborers worked six days a week, went to church on Sunday, and then sometimes worked the latter part of Sunday after church was over, too.

As the economy transitioned from agrarian to manufacturing, and the labor movement pushed for eight-hour work days, weekends, and other labor rights, enough politicians felt that if someone till had to work on Sunday, that was time away from their family, and they should be justly compensated for it.

As church attendance waned, corporate propaganda increased, and local communities atrophied, Sunday became less and less a sacred day / automatic day off, and eventually the time came when corporations felt they were able to make the move to strike time and-a-half from workers' rights.

The End.

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fuzzypickles34 t1_j5a1gnh wrote

Because they want more money, even if it screws over employees.

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The_Pip t1_j5a0ieg wrote

The business lobby won. We can still fight back. It does not have to be gone forever.

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