6mo ago

Restaurant in NYC offshores cashier job to Philippines so they can pay below minimum wage ($3/hr in Philippines)

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291 comments

If my initial reaction is “that’s too bad”, does it make me greedy?
Like, I don’t think US workers are more deserving as human beings than anyone else… but a part of me knows hardcore globalization would hurt people geographically close to me… I’m like some national relativist or something?
I feel like I should want everyone to win regardless of where they were born. And $3/hr is huge vs. the $6/day min wage in parts of PH. Know friends’ friends are farming rice for six bucks a day.
- the problem is it circumvents minimum wage laws. They're employing a person so they should be paying them the appropriate wages to do business in new york or the US. They're also benefitting from payroll/income taxes but not paying into the programs.
  
  Good point!
  Are call centers the same way? And any company relying on Business Process Outsourcing (BPO) firms?
  Would be a lotta layoffs overseas if we restricted all foreign labor making less than local minimum wage. Is that a fair trade off? (Not being facetious, genuine question again)
  Oh one thing that’s kinda messed up is when tech companies go through consultancies to hire workers in India, the consulting companies take HALF!! Wild!
  
  Yes it is a fair tradeoff. Any time we make a law we're raising the cost of goods and services here. If there's no regulation or import taxes to balance prices with outside the jurisdiction, then the "race to the bottom" de facto negates the law in question.
  So if we ban XYZ here, but allow untaxed imports from countries with XYZ, then we haven't really banned it - we just moved it.
- Everything in the US is already expensive, that "great wage going to a Filipino/a" is at the expense of a person in their own hometown not having a job.
  Too bad? Put the shoe on your other foot. If we in the US ban imported rice to protect our farmers, would you and friends feel comfortable in that time things take to adjust? The loss of income?
  How far does $6/day go in the Philippines? I can tell you how far it goes in NYC.
  
  Things in america should be more expensive. We do not pay for the full cost of what all of our goods and services cost, mainly due to exploitative measures like in this post.
  You can double down all you want but the real answer is that we just shouldn't be able to buy nearly as much stuff as we do. We love being consumers anf watching the trash heap grow, while we take advantage of anyone smaller than us in any remote corner of the Earth.
  
  At no point have I ever said our excessive consumerism is good, only that people shouldn't be competing internationally for an in-person job.
  Having been raised in NYC, I can tell you directly that the job market is a bit fierce, and I think offshoring basic service jobs is terrible for everyone involved, owner included.
  
  I agree with your post but wanted to add that I think we are starting to realize the effects of cutting out relationships with people in our community.
  I suppose thats just another aspect of offshoring that is problematic.
  
  It's a race to the bottom, which I'd call a systematic bug.
  Who's buying anything fun when nobody has a job? So yeah, I agree with what you're saying too.
  
  I don’t know what to think because I want everyone to win, but it’s hard to deny I’m biased towards my countrymen here stateside.
  Re-reading my comment, did it sound like I meant:
  it’s too bad this job is being outsourced
  or
  psh, too bad, this is the reality of a global world!
  I did mean the first one.
  I should want everyone to win but I’m biased towards Americans in situations like this - and I don’t know if I can justify it, if I can universalize the maxim.
  
  I understood you meant the first one. I'm also biased towards the people of my former home city.
  There are several sources that collude to raise prices for the average New Yorker, rent and food amongst them. I'm not at all blaming the lady taking the job remotely, there is pain in financing & operating the business, for the employees in getting to and from, and getting paid close to what their work is actually worth.
  The removed is that none of this system is voluntary. Work or starve, how inhumane.
- What you shluldve wanting is some Phillipino employer to pay the lady what shes worth, and the American business to hire an American

291 comments