What's been your biggest "Fuck this shit, I'm outta here" moment?

In the specific case of tipped employees, a lot of the times the employees themselves prefer to rely on tips because it can be pretty lucrative, and also people don't typically report every dime of their tips to the tax man.

In many other cases, we actually have a better welfare state than I think we get credit for: earned income tax credit, food stamps, WIC, etc, all of which can combine to make low-paying jobs a better lifestyle than you might expect.

I've personally known people who quit relatively decent modest-income jobs (or declined to move up) because they'd lose EITC or Medicaid or food stamps if their incomes went up. I think those people are making a terrible longterm choice that will make them poorer than they otherwise would be long term, but that's how our system is structured, so I understand why they do it.

I'm a pretty die liberal person and a LOT has to do with unchecked corporate greed and racism, too, and American employers really are bad about burning employees out with pretty much zero reciprocal loyalty: the feeling is that you can't even depend on your employer not to lay you off two weeks before Christmas.

but this is part of why wages in this country are low, imo: social benefits help take the bite out of how bad it would REALLY suck to make 8 bucks an hour for a long period of time, and some programs have asset tests that discourage people from saving even modest amounts of money. Then it's a real struggle politically to get people to mobilize around raising wages/unionizing when they see retail clerks and line cooks blowing tax refunds and small windfalls on new cars/trips/booze/weed/iPhones etc.

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