Been seeing lots of these sorts of postings on Craigslist, ones which seem to be written by unemployed people who have a high dollar figure regarding how much their time is really worth, and mocking employers who dare to offer wages for below their ideal mark. This person defines these rates for grades of skill in labor:
“Skilled labor $65 - $125 hr
Mid skilled $25 - $65 hr
Grunt labor $8 - $25 hr ”
And this is in response to another ad offering ten bucks for a skilled laborer:
what has this world come to that someone would even expect to get decent skilled work for the pay that a crackhead in baltimore wouldnt even take…hell they might have something better to do.
Please get real with your expectations and if your going to ask someone to work for $10.00 hr. then dont be suprized what quality of “SKILLED” labor you will get.
I’ve spent a lot of time in the past over-estimating the worth of my time, thinking that it was somehow “beneath me” to take any kind of job below such and such a figure. But let’s face it, that’s unrealistic. Especially in an economy which is on a severe downturn.
When I was living in Seattle around two years ago, I overheard an old boss of mine instructing a friend on the finer points of hiring out to Latino day laborers - the kind you can pick up in the morning along certain streets and intersections, or sometimes hanging around parking lots of places like Home Depot. This was two years ago, and this fellow was quoting his friend a figure of ten dollars an hour in cash being the going rate for undocumented day laborers. I don’t know how standard that is across the United States, but for me ten dollars has become about the benchmark of what makes something worth my while.
Let’s face it, picking up heavy stuff and moving it to a dumpster, or to another warehouse, or hammering a bunch of things in, screwing things together, etc - it’s not necessarily discriminating work. All jobs like this require in general are a warm body which can follow instructions within a reasonable degree of accuracy. While it might feel like your time as a human being is worth oh-so-much-more than that, in reality a man-hour of labor equals about a man-hour of labor no matter who’s doing it. I always think of the building of the pyramids in situations like that. Or the Transcontinental Railroad. Think of the numerous faceless laborers who lost their lives and worked for nothing. A similar fate awaits most of us, without even the knowledge that we’ve put our time into some kind of lasting monument, object of beauty or human usefulness.
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Another CL poster on this:
http://baltimore.craigslist.org/lbg/895642971.html
Here are some tips….
1) Skilled Tradespeople: (i.e Plumbing, Electrical, HVAC, Trim Carpenters) don’t get out of bed for less than 50.00 an hour.
2) Handyman: 30.00-75.00 an hour.
3) Painters: 1.00 per sqft.
4) Drywall hung and finished: 50.00 a sheet.
5) Carpet and Flooring: 4.00-5.00 a sqft.
6) Hauling: Figure 100.00 a load
Wake up, you’re all dreaming. If you’re in a union and in a strong union town (like Chicago) you may be able to make over $10.00/hr. $65.00/hr for MID-skilled?!?
Even then work is thin. Work hard while it’s there, save up for lay offs and pray that your coworkers’ drug/alcohol habit catches up with him before that day comes.
If you’re not in a union you are competing with disposable people from other countries. When residents in the halfway house I work at get upset at the racism they see I ask them if they would lose an eye or use of an arm if that meant they could buy a house for their family? They all say yes.
Preach on, sister.
One thing I’ve learned from doing manual labor is *EXACTLY* how expendable/replaceable I am. That, and how damned easy it is to get really badly hurt and completely lose my earning power for the rest of my life. That shit is very sobering.
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[...] After finding yet another posting on Craigslist about the subject of fair wages for skilled and unskilled labor, I decided to post something in the wrong category (I posted it as a “gig” when it’s really just a rant) since that’s where the conversation is happening on the ground. Here’s how mine went: I appreciate the comments of people who have been posting on the subject of going rates for various grades of labor. Buuuut it seems like people are being perhaps a tad unrealistic. [...]
[...] I’ve written about going rates for skilled and unskilled labor in the past, so I won’t rehash that argument. But I wanted to highlight this one for a common theme: “you should go into the ghetto and find yourself a drug addict laborer.” As if every person who works below a certain dollar-per-hour figure is a drug addict. The other common phrasing I’ll see is “crack addict,” as though only people with severe chemical dependencies are willing to work for reasonable rates. People need to get a clue! Articles With Similar Themes: [...]