INC NEWS - other workers wages

[RW Pickle]

Chris, somewhere you missed the point. As it is right now, we are paying
twice for a service. Once to the people hired to do the job in the first
place and again when we pay temps and the same workers overtime to do the
job (when they are working only 28-32 hours of the time they are paid for
the work; they are paid for 40 hours on the current task system
arrangement of pay) that the full time workers just do not do.

It has nothing to do with if their service is needed, if they are overpaid
or underpaid, or if they even have an American Dream. We know we need
trash picked up, we learned last week from my posts that pay for other
jobs (like McDonals or a service position in a mall) is much less, that
CDL drivers (the special license required to drive the big solid waste
trucks) make about the same across any industry, and it's not a matter of
if they are underpaid; they aren't.

Just FYI, the gross wage of anyone making minimum wage is around $11K. I'm
sure these people who work for this have dreams as much as anyone else
does. What they do with their money and their dreams are there business.
I'd suggest that most of what one earns is tied to their educational
level. And in this country today, it is possible to get as much education
as you want. To start, a high school diploma is free for the studying.
Further education is possible through grants, loans, and scholarships if
one has the desire to get more education.

If you think solid waste jobs are important, lets just look at what others
 are paid in areas we know are necessary. For example, Police and Fire and
Safety jobs. Because Durham is a larger city, they are paid more here
(because the cost of living is more they say). But still, if you want to
be a policeman or fire fighter, after you pass all the training (which you
have to do in order to even get a job with these units), you start out at
$30K and $27K respectively. The same goes for a NC Highway Patrol officer.
A solid waste worker in Durham makes as much as a policeman in any of the
surrounding smaller towns like Hillsboro, Garner, or Oxford. Same for the
fire departments there. So you'd have to believe that these are essential
jobs as well. Yet the pay is not that much different. Take your postman.
You see them 6 days a week. The pay for a rural carrier is the same hourly
rate we pay the temp service for workers who pick up the trash. So we're
not talking about someone who makes less or more really. It's about
getting what you've paid for. Right now, we're paying for a service twice.

Everybody has their own thoughts I guess of what the American Dream is.
Who's to say all of the people mentioned aren't living it? It just may not
be the same as yours.

And to Paula, the newspapers have nothing over this list. More is being
discussed here than in the print media. But we have Solid Waste folks as
well as the City Manager on this list. They both have been receptive in
the past about commenting. Thanks for the homework you did.

RWP
27 Beverly