• @CM400@lemmy.world
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    3036 months ago

    Pizza Hut made over $6 billion last year, you’d think they could afford to pay their drivers.

    • @0110010001100010@lemmy.world
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      2186 months ago

      Of course the can pay their drivers but think of the poor shareholders who may see 0.1% less profit or the CEO who may get only 99% of their usual bonus. Oh the horror!!

      • @remotelove@lemmy.ca
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        6 months ago

        The Pizza Hut corporation will be fine. These are franchises we are talking about. The franchises pay an initial fee of $25k and then 6% + 4.75% sales/marketing fees to Pizza Hut.

        It’s the owners of the franchises that are responsible for fucking over their employees. While Pizza Hut could reduce their fees, they won’t. Franchise owners could increase pay, but they won’t. It’s more likely that the franchise owners will offload deliveries to Uber and Door Dash and not have to worry about managing drivers anymore.

        The entire model sucks, so I am not blaming franchise owners over the corporation. They are both at fault for relying on the extortion of teenagers or other people who don’t have extremely profitable job skills.

        https://franchise.pizzahut.com/faqs/

        Edit: Also, these aren’t one-off mom and pop franchise owners anymore. These are franchise owning conglomerates that likely have more negotiable franchise fees.

        • @Albbi@lemmy.ca
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          166 months ago

          Won’t offloading the delivery to those services cost even more? They take a pretty hefty cut of the sale. Last I heard it was around 30% of an order.

          • @remotelove@lemmy.ca
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            186 months ago

            At least where I live, delivery food is extremely expensive for that reason. Restaurants have two prices: one for walk-ins and the other for delivery that they show on the apps. The restaurant business (especially for independent owners) has cutthroat margins already so the customer is always going to pay the fees, one way or another.

          • Jeff
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            46 months ago

            They just offload it on consumers by raising the price of the food and the ever present tip feature.

            So done with post Covid timeline here.

          • @eek2121@lemmy.world
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            -96 months ago

            They will likely make a deal with a delivery company, as they should. It is inefficient for every restaurant to have delivery drivers.

    • Ghostalmedia
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      306 months ago

      Technically it’s mega franchisees like Provender Capital Group’s “PacSun Pizza,” not PizzaHut that is going to be pocketing the cash from this move.

    • @Jimmycakes@lemmy.world
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      16 months ago

      It’s staggering how many people don’t understand the difference between franchises and corporations on wall street in the internet age

      • @CM400@lemmy.world
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        46 months ago

        It’s staggering how many people assume things without looking into them. In this case, it’s a corporation called Pac Pizza, LLC and makes over $25 million per year that’s doing the layoffs. I think they can pay their delivery drivers an extra $4 (according to the USA Today article linked above) per hour.

        If they had to pay all of their less than 500 employees (according to the Zoominfo page linked above) the extra $4 per hour, and they all worked full time, 40-hour weeks all year, the company would have to pay just over $4 million in extra wages.

        Assuming the franchises make the low end of the estimated revenue linked above, $4.5 million would be 16% of the total. Increasing prices by 16% to cover that cost is far less than the approximately 40% customers end up paying when using third-party delivery services.

        All in all, this sure seems like the franchise corporation (probably in cahoots with Pizza Hut proper) is just using these delivery jobs as a political stunt in opposition of the mandated wage increase.

        Here’s the takeaway, though. Any employer, including but not limited to mom-and-pop businesses, that can’t afford to pay its employees a living wage should not be in business.

      • @CM400@lemmy.world
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        16 months ago

        It’s staggering how many people assume things without looking into them. In this case, it’s a corporation called Pac Pizza, LLC and makes over $25 million per year that’s doing the layoffs. I think they can pay their delivery drivers an extra $4 (according to the USA Today article linked above) per hour.

        If they had to pay all of their less than 500 employees (according to the Zoominfo page linked above) the extra $4 per hour, and they all worked full time, 40-hour weeks all year, the company would have to pay just over $4 million in extra wages.

        Assuming the franchises make the low end of the estimated revenue linked above, $4.5 million would be 16% of the total. Increasing prices by 16% to cover that cost is far less than the approximately 40% customers end up paying when using third-party delivery services.

        All in all, this sure seems like the franchise corporation (probably in cahoots with Pizza Hut proper) is just using these delivery jobs as a political stunt in opposition of the mandated wage increase.

        Here’s the takeaway, though. Any employer, including but not limited to mom-and-pop businesses, that can’t afford to pay its employees a living wage should not be in business.

    • @ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de
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      -16 months ago

      There’s 19,000 pizza huts, but most all of them are franchises. It’s not “pizza hut” firing drivers over this. It’s franchise owners. Also, if you were to do some napkin math, 19,000 (I know. Just california, but that would hardly be fair to everyone else) pizza huts needing say…5 drivers each at 40 hours a week paid 20 means a cost of about 28 after insurance and such… that’d be 95 thousand drivers…$106,400,000 a week…$5,532,800,000 a year.

      Shit gets expensive.

      But face it. Delivery drivers make a lot in tips. People have been willing to do it using their own vehicles for decades while they make super low minimum wages. Making $20/ hour plus the tips will have the delivery guy out doing everyone else at the restaurant, which means their pay will have to go to like $35/hour which means a stupid pizza is gonna cost $30. Let uber eats handle the deliveries.

      • What pizza hut has 5 full time drivers? There’s only 1200 people affected by this and 560 locations so a little more than 2 per location. Now let’s look at the cost those delivery apps charge 30%. So if 35% of sales are deliveries now theyre paying Uber ~110k to deliver their pizzas. 28$/hr is high closer to 23-25$/hr for overhead. That’s roughly what the delivery drivers would have cost and now they’re getting way shittier delivery service and people are much less likely to buy pizza from them. Sounds like a dumb move.

        • @ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de
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          16 months ago

          5 too many? I just figured there’d be like 2 delivery people at any given time and trying to have 3 on Friday and Saturday night.

          But as to Uber, that’s the customers choice if they want to pay an arm and a leg to have pizza brought to their door. It won’t much effect the pizza hut. Store dedicated delivery drivers are a thing of the past now. They’ve been outsourced.

          • I don’t think you understand the business models of those food delivery apps. I used to own a restaurant and talked with many other restaurant owners at the time all those apps take 25-30% Uber was 30 the less known ones were 25%. This is outside of whatever the customer paid for the delivery. You also weren’t allowed to change the prices for delivery to compensate. So it does affect the pizza hut.

            • @ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de
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              16 months ago

              More than paying everyone on staff an extra $10 an hour, though? If the delivery guy is getting 20 an hour plus tips, the in house staff won’t be happy with making $22/hr.

              • States minimum wage is 16$/hr so it’s not as big a difference. That’s also not really an argument because then they could just leave and go to another pizza place that does do delivery if that made sense.

      • @yacht_boy@lemmy.world
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        86 months ago

        Pizza in Boston delivered by door dash is routinely right about $30 before tip. My credit card offers free door dash premium whatever it’s called and I usually choose places offering a promo and tend to order early when there are also promos. That brings things down to the $20s. But it’s generally about $30 with tip even doing all that. If I’m not paying attention it’s easy to order a $45 pizza.

        To be fair I don’t eat from pizza Hut or Dominos or other chains. Those might be a few percent cheaper.

          • @yacht_boy@lemmy.world
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            16 months ago

            Chase sapphire reserve. $595 annual fee seems crazy at first but if you use the perks it pays for itself multiple times over.

        • @ColeSloth@discuss.tchncs.de
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          06 months ago

          That’s half my point, though. You choosing to pay $30 through door dash or Uber eats is your choice. The restaurant isn’t charging way more for their pizzas because they have to pay everyone on staff a lot more. Delivery has been outsourced and so have the added costs that go along with it.

      • @eek2121@lemmy.world
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        16 months ago

        $20/hour is only part of employee compensation. It does not include benefits or taxes. Your employer pays a lot of taxes on your behalf.

        Don’t even get me started on the money and time taken to recruit, hire, and train new employees.

        Don’t misunderstand me. I support a higher minimum wage. I am a firm believer that minimum wage should be $25/hour and increases should be tied to inflation.

        • @CM400@lemmy.world
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          56 months ago

          Your employer pays a lot of taxes on your behalf.

          That’s money they would have paid you anyway, and you would have to pay in taxes. Your employer is not out any extra cash, they’re just saving you the trouble.

        • @FutileRecipe@lemmy.world
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          36 months ago

          Don’t even get me started on the money and time taken to recruit, hire, and train new employees.

          For delivery drivers?

          Know how to drive? If not, next. Here’s the pizza. Put it on a flat surface in the vehicle, don’t throw or flip it. Use Google maps to get to the house. Hand it to the customer. Come back. Done.

      • @dezmd@lemmy.worldM
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        06 months ago

        Delivery guys should always outdo nearly everyone else at pizza joint, you seem to lack a necessary depth of knowledge and experience to make your conclusions.

  • @PsychedSy@sh.itjust.works
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    2046 months ago

    They could have just focused on providing a better delivery experience, instead they’re going to let uber drivers deliver cold pizza with the wrong soda.

    • @frickineh@lemmy.world
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      1526 months ago

      With higher delivery fees! Why on earth would anyone even order Pizza Hut after this? If I’m paying obscene delivery fees and jacked up menu prices through doordash or whoever anyway, I’m getting better food than that. Or just eating at home like I end up doing every time I look at the total from one of those services.

      • @chitak166@lemmy.world
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        26 months ago

        Why on earth would anyone even order Pizza Hut after this?

        More money than sense.

        Businesses have long realized it’s easier and cheaper to rip off a smaller group of wealthier customers.

    • @SatanicNotMessianic@lemmy.ml
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      156 months ago

      Seriously. I don’t see why companies that were already paying for delivery drivers (eg, the chain pizza companies) don’t sell their delivery services as a value add. When I order a pizza from DoorDash, it doesn’t come wrapped in an insulated carrier and so often arrives cold. I’m not sure what else they could throw in but they’re just tossing it (no pun intended).

      I’m also curious as to the numbers on this. I don’t know if this was done after a full evaluation of raising delivery service fees or other ways of addressing it, but the fact that they’re doing it in all of California instead of keeping it in markets like SF or LA makes me think it was a petulant act rather than a rationally justified one.

      • @jawa21@startrek.website
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        6 months ago

        Just as a clarification (not a defense) from someone that drives for DoorDash - every time the driver picks up a pizza order, they are required to provide photo proof that they own a pizza bag. I’m not saying this forces drivers to use them, but they have to upload different pics of their pizza bags sometimes with every pickup.

        Edit: autocorrect

        • @Coreidan@lemmy.world
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          56 months ago

          The reason you have to do this is because you drivers are notorious for having absolutely zero standards and a solid “idgaf” attitude.

          • @jawa21@startrek.website
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            26 months ago

            Give them a low rating, then. Hardly anyone leaves ratings, and a 1 star could easily tank them below the 4.2 rating they need to avoid their account being deactivated. I’ve done over 600 runs and only 35 have left any kind of rating, for example. Super easy to tank the average.

      • Apathy Tree
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        This is so weird to me because pizza is one of the few things I actually order for delivery… there isn’t much around here other than 3rd party services, which I don’t use because I’m rural and the way it works here is just gross. Had 6 come in for the same failed order while I was out on Tuesday (menu wasn’t open for that item but it was ordered through another platform, and 6 people came asking for it for the same order because of how the platform works). I can’t imagine actually working there.

        But I suppose in more urban areas, pizza hut is competing with actually good food also on delivery (for a very steep markup people are apparently willing to pay or the services would die), so it’s no surprise they can’t compete on their own; and still also turn record profits. Heaven forbid they die in the region. 🙂

      • Jeff
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        26 months ago

        This is why I won’t order pizza from places that use a sub contracted delivery. It gets here like shite. No thanks.

    • @HootinNHollerin@slrpnk.net
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      6 months ago

      If it even comes at all. I had several just disappear driving all over town and never show. Last one I got a bag of soup. That’s the plastic bag, with spilled bowl of soup, leaking out of said bag. Never again

      • @PsychedSy@sh.itjust.works
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        26 months ago

        Right? It’s pretty bad. A lot of the food drivers don’t really speak English, either, so you’re kind of fucked in some way each time you order.

        (I don’t mind immigrant uber drivers, but it’s a pain when there are food issues and they can’t understand you.)

    • Wren
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      16 months ago

      Honestly, that’s not much difference from how it’s been

      • @PsychedSy@sh.itjust.works
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        26 months ago

        It has been getting worse.

        Out of curiosity, did you send that message recently or a day or two ago? My inbox says it’s been like 20m. Looking at the thread it says 2 days.

        • Wren
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          16 months ago

          Definitely at least a day 🤔

          I wonder if instances just take time to federate all content across to each other

  • Adderbox76
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    1936 months ago

    If your business plan can’t make a profit while paying your people a living wage, than it doesn’t deserve to be in business.

    Expecting people to live paycheque to paycheque in order to subsidize your desire to be a business owner is the Pinnacle of bullshit.

    • GladiusB
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      246 months ago

      Pizza Hut is a joke in the bay area and Sacramento area. There are just too many good pizza places. I think it’s messed up, but I also think they aren’t doing well for more than just the delivery process.

      • @toast@retrolemmy.com
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        16 months ago

        That’s good to hear. I left the bay area almost 20 years ago and I remember there being very little good pizza back then. Don’t get me wrong - there was some great food to be found, but the pizza wasn’t it

        • GladiusB
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          16 months ago

          I can always find a slice anywhere better than Pizza Hut.

      • @Harriet_Porber@lemmy.world
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        -116 months ago

        Look there is always better pizza, but I’m still going to have to buy Pizza Hut once in a while unless The Pizza Shop in SF starts selling stuffed crust

        • Zoolander
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          126 months ago

          This is exactly why we have the type of shit we have right now. Because stuffed crust is more important than principles. I swear people have no willpower anymore.

          • @DragonTypeWyvern
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            16 months ago

            Other places do stuffed crust too.

            Just a weird excuse to be shitty.

          • @Harriet_Porber@lemmy.world
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            06 months ago

            Wow you made a lot of assumptions about the type of person I am entirely off the fact that I genuinely enjoy stuffed crust pizza. You think me enjoying stuffed crust means I have no principles nor willpower? You might want to try not judging people so hard over incredibly unimportant things.

            • Zoolander
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              -16 months ago

              Wow… it took you 9 days to come up with that?

              And, yes…that’s exactly what it means. I didn’t assume anything. The topic is literally avoiding buying Pizza Hut because of bullshit like this and your response was “But muh stuffy crust!”. I didn’t assume anything. You laid it all out for everyone.

          • @TheGalacticVoid@lemm.ee
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            06 months ago

            1 guy isn’t going to change corporate America. Real change is only gonna come from execs and politicians, not from the 5 people who start a boycott.

            • Zoolander
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              06 months ago

              There can be no flood if there are no raindrops.

              • @TheGalacticVoid@lemm.ee
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                06 months ago
                1. That saying doesn’t work because non-water floods exist

                2. A water droplet ain’t gonna form with 5 hydrogen atoms

                • Zoolander
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                  6 months ago

                  Wow. The level of pedantry here while simultaneously missing the point is, quite frankly, staggering.

                  Way to argue semantical nonsense as opposed to the point.

          • @chitak166@lemmy.world
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            -26 months ago

            Pretty sure they aren’t $5 anymore.

            And little caesar’s sells cardboard, not pizza. Just eat the box your pizza comes in if you want the Little Caesar’s® experience.

              • @chitak166@lemmy.world
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                -26 months ago

                Sorry, you’re wrong.

                I think the only people who believe little caesar’s isn’t shit are those who were raised on it and got used to eating cardboard.

            • @shottymcb@lemm.ee
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              16 months ago

              They’re still charging $5 where I live. I can’t disagree about the cardboard, but it’s hard to beat the calorie/dollar ratio.

        • @Coreidan@lemmy.world
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          06 months ago

          You mean some gimmick no one gives a fuck about? Have you seen a real pizza restaurant sell stuffed crust? I haven’t. And if they did I wouldn’t order it.

          You’ll eat shitty pizza that tastes like ass purely because it has stuffed crust.

          Bullshit like this is why everything in this country is going down the toilet.

          • @stolid_agnostic@lemmy.ml
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            26 months ago

            lol someone else made a disparaging comment and was voted into oblivion. I never knew but it seems that people really like stuffed crust pizza.

    • @doctorcrimson@lemmy.world
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      16 months ago

      Honestly I learned how to make bread awhile back and haven’t ordered pizza ever since. I can make my own better than they can.

  • @some_guy@lemmy.sdf.org
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    986 months ago

    The new law, a modified version of the FAST Act proposing a minimum wage increase for fast-food workers to $22 an hour this year, has faced resistance from major chains such as McDonald’s, Chipotle and Chick-fil-A. These chains said they plan to raise menu prices to offset higher operating costs.

    Can’t trim executive pay or profits. Must cut out services. All hail the mighty dollar.

    Same reason my bank branch has tons of empty stations and only two tellers and a long line. Same reason they’re closing the drive-through lanes where my mom banks in the midwest. Convenience for customers is now the enemy getting in the way of higher profits.

    I recently introduced my partner to The Sopranos. It opens with Tony Soprano commenting that he feels like he got into the scene (the mob) at the end of its heyday. I feel that way about capitalism.

    • @books@lemmy.world
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      216 months ago

      Anecdotal for sure, but I can’t remember the last time I actually had to step foot in a bank. I’d argue that banks CAN cut staff as I can’t be alone in not really needing to go into a physical shop to bank anymore. All my banking requires an appointment.

      However, fast food, in particular pizza places, need delivery drivers. Especially pizza hut. I can’t for the life of me think that people are going to go in and sit at a pizza hut anymore… what is it, 1988?

      • @Crikeste@lemmy.world
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        36 months ago

        There’s a bunch of old dumbasses who refuse to learn any new skills. We’re still gonna need people at banks until uhhhh… they’re gone.

        • @douglasg14b@lemmy.world
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          I’m sure no one has needed to wire large sums of money or get cashiers checks these days, no one buys homes either anymore right? Fraud definitely doesn’t exist either 🤣

          Just because you don’t have a use for it doesn’t mean others don’t. I’m sure there are many reasons I can’t think of for wanting to go into a bank in person, if that works for the folks that do it, how is that a problem? Does that harm you?

          • @Mirshe@lemmy.world
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            36 months ago

            If you’re a small business, you very well might be at the bank at the end of every single day to deposit earnings for the day. I know when I was managing a cellphone shop, I’d be heading down to the bank across the street every Friday to drop off everything we made that week.

      • @douglasg14b@lemmy.world
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        To be fair, just because you may be out of touch with some part of business or society doesn’t mean it no longer exists or operates… That’s incredibly self centered. We are all out of touch with various industries, but that doesn’t mean it no longer operates as intended.

        Every pizza shop I’ve been to in the last 5 years has been bustling with sit down eaters. Just not pizza hut.

    • @ipkpjersi@lemmy.ml
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      136 months ago

      Can’t trim executive pay or profits. Must cut out services. All hail the mighty dollar.

      Well I mean yeah, how else are CEOs going to have 15 yachts? You think having only 14 yachts is acceptable? Yeah right!

    • @douglasg14b@lemmy.world
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      36 months ago

      To be fair, most of these are franchises. Meaning the restaurant itself makes money from the food sales and rats the costs of supplies and workers.

      The franchise, like McDonald’s, makes their money from the real estate.

      • @theherk@lemmy.world
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        266 months ago

        People generally should use the best option. Often expense is the metric. These are able to operate at competitive rates because they get away with shenanigans. They should be regulated properly, then their rates would reflect that and people would use them less.

        • @Lyricism6055@lemmy.world
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          116 months ago

          Already they are expensive AF. The menu prices on doordash can be like 50% more, then there are the service fees and more.

          • @Eccitaze@yiffit.net
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            66 months ago

            Yeah, last time I ordered through grubhub from a Chinese restaurant, by the time I paid the delivery fee, inflated menu price, service charge, and driver tip, I was looking at almost $90 for mid-tier Chinese food. I ordered by calling the restaurant up and ordering takeout and paid $40 instead.

            I literally could order from halfway across the state and make a road trip out of it and still come out ahead.

          • @theherk@lemmy.world
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            26 months ago

            100% agree. Too rich for me, or at least their local counterparts Foodora and Wolt, but that is highly subjective. I guess many just place a higher value on date night with PJ’s and a bed.

        • @Djtecha@lemm.ee
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          26 months ago

          Once they fully stop subsidizing them with VC capital we’ll probably see the return to traditional delivery

        • @whofearsthenight@lemm.ee
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          16 months ago

          Yeah, it’s this. The only thing innovated by DD or UberEats is avoiding regulation. This is the real cause of all of the enshittification that everyone is seeing. It’s been the plan all along; charge an absolutely unsustainable price, jack things up when you’re the only option. DD is already well along this pattern; it used to be much cheaper, and it’s still going to go up.

      • @whoisearth@lemmy.ca
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        166 months ago

        I look forward to the downvotes again because everyone has their heads so far up their asses but we are the problem. Fuck us.

        We are the reason we are racing to the bottom. We expect cheap & fast and we don’t care how it happens as long as it does.

        • prole
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          6 months ago

          That sounds like human nature. This is exactly why government exists, to regulate this shit because otherwise we will consume everything we can until the planet is dead.

        • @jjjalljs@ttrpg.network
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          66 months ago

          I think about this a lot whenever Airbnb comes up. People mention it and I’m like airbnb caused rents to rise a lot, and I just get deafening silence.

          Honestly I would respect “I know it has externalized costs I’m not paying for, but it’s convenient and I accept it’s not the best thing” more than awkward silence or clumsy justifications.

          I’m guilty too, sometimes. I should probably order directly from the restaurant instead of using seamless or whatever

          • @Lyrl@lemm.ee
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            16 months ago

            It’s not like housing is inherently capped. Cities choose to pass and enforce zoning laws that limit the number of housing units - shortages drive up prices, which homeowners love.

            Blaming AirBnB for taking up a fraction of housing units in a market that is profoundly short on housing because of the NIMBY greed of residents is missing the forest for a tree.

        • TheRealKuni
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          36 months ago

          I look forward to the downvotes again because everyone has their heads so far up their asses but we are the problem. Fuck us.

          We are the reason we are racing to the bottom. We expect cheap & fast and we don’t care how it happens as long as it does

          Yep. Some More News had a sobering bit in their video on the generation war about how Millennials are also responsible for fucking up the world for the people coming after us like the Boomers were (as in, the real problem lies with politicians but we do make it worse in some ways). The gig economy was one example of fucking shit up for Gen Z without us realizing it at the time.

          (Obviously the major problem here is that somehow DoorDash and Uber Eats get to pay people less, poorly written regulation that carves out concessions to make shit worse for everyone.)

          Been a while since I watched it and I don’t know how well it holds up but it was interesting.

          • @whoisearth@lemmy.ca
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            46 months ago

            I will challenge that the advent of the gig economy did exactly what it was supposed to do and it never benefitted worker. All it did was enable employers to further justify stripping benefits like a living wage and private healthcare and all those other things that full-time employees benefit from.

            Sharing economy is the same bullshit. Exploit our need for cheap and fast over all the rules and regulations that evolved in the industry they’re undercutting.

            Uber fought tooth and nail against providing rides for handicapped users “let the market sort it out”

            Airbnb did and does the same on all those things hotels have to do.

            Mark my words years from now those undercutting companies will die or morph into the industry they killed as costs go up because they will stop being able to skirt the decades of regulations that existed to benefit us all.

            This is what happens when you have a bunch of entitled techno bros thinking they can design a better wheel.

    • @smeenz@lemmy.nz
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      6 months ago

      For every else (like me) who had never heard the term ‘gig economy’ before:

      A gig economy is a free market system in which temporary positions are common and organizations hire independent workers for short-term commitments. The term “gig” is a slang word for a job that lasts a specified period of time. Traditionally, the term was used by musicians to define a performance engagement.

      • @SomeSphinx@lemmy.world
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        286 months ago

        The lock-downs definitely aren’t at fault for doordash and ubereats, they were there and gaining traction before covid was discovered.

      • @AquaTofana@lemmy.world
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        86 months ago

        Bruh, idk where you’re at, but in the major cities we were using Grubhub back in 2016. Though I think it was “Eat24” back then. And Door Dash had existed even earlier. This one isn’t on the 'rona.

      • @S_204@lemm.ee
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        26 months ago

        This is one of the most ignorant comments I’ve seen on the internet today.

  • @darkmarx@lemmy.world
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    796 months ago

    It would take a lot to convince me that they haven’t been discussing this for years and have been waiting for the right time. The market is now loaded with others to do the delivery, which was probably one of the considerations. I’m sure another was how to announce it where they can blame someone else; at least to the point of ensuring some will defend them.

    The minimum wage increase is their excuse. What they are doing is outsourcing their delivery to a 3rd party (GrubHub, Uber eats, etc). They wont have to pay them anything, the customer will. They are decreasing their head count, payroll, insurance, taxes, benefits, etc. They will lose some sales, but that wont even be close to their cost savings. They will easily make more money while selling their product at the same price. Any business would love to be in the same position.

    • @AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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      286 months ago

      Weird part is that San Diego increased their minimum wage to $15 an hour in 2016, $18 an hour in 2018, and $20 an hour in 2020. Papa Johns and Domino’s still have delivery drivers. I can’t actually speak to Pizza Hut, since I never order from them.

      Methinks this is just more corporate greed that will be masked as “inflation,” even though their costs just went down.

      • @Jimmycakes@lemmy.world
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        26 months ago

        Domino’s runs very tight delivery radius like 2 miles so they probably just get by with less staff and more locations

        • @AngryCommieKender@lemmy.world
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          16 months ago

          I’m not sure. I worked for all three chains, and it is true that all the Domino’s and Papa John’s locations strictly restricted their delivery to 2 miles, all the Pizza Huts that I worked for restricted their delivery to 2.5 miles.

          I cannot imagine that it’s better to give up 40-60% of your sales just because of an extra half mile delivery range, rather than simply reducing your delivery range.

          • @Jimmycakes@lemmy.world
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            16 months ago

            They will just use Doordash drive where you can summon a driver for $6 usually and charge a $6 delivery fee. That’s what my place does in Florida as insurance rates for the business to have drivers is insane. Those drivers are higher caliber and need to be the top few % of Doordash drivers to qualify to get summoned.

    • Nukken
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      246 months ago

      It’s such a short sited goal though. Those delivery apps are going to start dictating terms and extracting money from restaurants eventually.

    • Jubei Kibagami
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      126 months ago

      They will easily make more money while selling their product at the same price.

      😂 Come on, man, like they’re not use this to increase prices.

    • That’s not true that pizza hut won’t pay Uber etc to deliver. Uber takes 30%. Since it’s a large chain they might be able to negotiate something better. If you can make 2- 4 deliveries an hour depending on your rang and how busy the place is. I used to deliver in highschool and sometimes could do 6 an hour when it was real busy and deliveries were close to each other but averaged 2-4. Then with Uber eats the drivers aren’t reliable and drivers don’t have pizza warmers to keep it hot in the car. Sounds like this just means their delivery business will drop to near nothing.

    • @ArbitraryValue@sh.itjust.works
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      -36 months ago

      The minimum wage increase is their excuse.

      Why would they need an excuse? No one cares about the principle of the matter except anti-consumerist hipsters who weren’t eating their pizza anyway.

  • @Daxtron2@startrek.website
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    746 months ago

    Pizza hut is trash anyways, unless you live in the middle of nowhere, you’ve probably got a better local pizza place. Please support them instead of a chain.

    • TheRealKuni
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      86 months ago

      Shit, even Dominos is better than Pizza Hut these days. (Though yes, local is better.)

        • TheRealKuni
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          36 months ago

          I actually quite like Dominos, specifically their Philly Cheesesteak pizza. They really turned their brand/quality around a few years back.

          But there is obviously better pizza out there.

      • Coskii
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        156 months ago

        That heavily depends on location. Here in Philly competition among food places is so tight that a lot of places offer a better deal than the chains and have much better products.

        • @woodenskewer@lemmy.world
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          16 months ago

          I think they meant scams towards workers, which checks out in my area at some businesses. Obviously this is unique to each area and not every local place.

          • Coskii
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            16 months ago

            Exploited workers? In this capitalist hellscape? I don’t believe it!

            Though honestly most local places I’ve been in are doing much better for their workers than any of the corporate run chains. Most are either family run, or community local places.

  • Flying Squid
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    576 months ago

    I’m not in California, but if Pizza Hut thinks I’m ever going to go out of my way to get one of their shitty pizzas, they’re very wrong. There are plenty of other places that deliver.

    • @Nommer@sh.itjust.works
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      346 months ago

      I go out of my way to avoid them already. They changed their sauce or something like 10 years ago and it tasted awful.

      • @aesthelete@lemmy.world
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        76 months ago

        I think they removed the msg and it was game over for their pizza. Used to think of it as like premium pizza (but with heartburn) now I think of it as a more expensive version of dominoes.

      • @sighofannoyance@lemmy.world
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        56 months ago

        Do you know to what specific change in their recipe this is owed? I haven’t had pizza hut in 20 years, their ground meat looked like it was shaped to resemble small bones like you would for maybe dog-treats. idk, that was the last time trying their pizza.

    • Zoolander
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      106 months ago

      That’s not at all what they think. They know people will pay for delivery through DoorDash or whatever and also pay the tips and the service fees. It costs them less money and passes on the majority of what they were paying onto you so they can keep prices the same and make bigger profits.

      • @GlitzyArmrest@lemmy.world
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        6 months ago

        It’s insane to me that people are willing to pay the exorbitant delivery fees. Whenever I’ve checked, especially lately, it doubles the price even before tip (including things in my immediate area). Uber/Lyft/doordash all want to offset their costs onto both the restaurant and customer. I can’t see that it’s sustainable in the long term to do this.

        • @Coreidan@lemmy.world
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          16 months ago

          It’s not that insane. People pay for convenience. That’s all this is.

          If you’re broke as fuck then I get it but I would bet most people using DoorDash aren’t worrying about their finances.

          If you do it every day for every meal then ya you may have issues.

          Personally I’d rather just hop in my car and pick it up.

          • Flying Squid
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            26 months ago

            I used to game with a lady who ordered DoorDash constantly and was also constantly complaining about the price and how they were always late and how they could never find her apartment. I didn’t get it.

    • @RickyRigatoni@lemmy.ml
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      86 months ago

      Genuinely surprised pizza hutt still exists tbh. They were never good and now you can make better pizza at home from the frozen foods aisle at weis.

        • themeatbridge
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          86 months ago

          80s Pizza Hut personal pan pizza was the greatest dining experience available to anyone under the age of 12. You could earn one by reading books, or pretending to read them.

          • @Fixbeat@lemmy.ml
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            56 months ago

            Going to eat at Pizza Hut back then was a treat. The pan pizza was new and amazing. It took like 20 minutes to cook, which felt like an eternity. It was worth it. It’s a real shame it was ruined for corporate profits like so many things.

        • themeatbridge
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          36 months ago

          80s Pizza Hut personal pan pizza was the greatest dining experience available to anyone under the age of 12. You could earn one by reading books, or pretending to read them.

            • @Kanda@reddthat.com
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              26 months ago

              Usually the day when I can’t think of something for dinner, I suggest pizza to my wife. She’s yet to say no.

              • @sighofannoyance@lemmy.world
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                06 months ago

                So generally once a week you can’t think of something for dinner?

                I’m just curious, what would happen if you planned out dinner for the entire month ahead of time? would you stop eating pizza or would you schedule the pizza dinners on a weekly basis?

                • @Kanda@reddthat.com
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                  16 months ago

                  Once a week sounds about right for being out of ideas. I work a bit of an odd job where I’m gone for 24h at a time and after a work cycle I get 9 days off, so what day of the week isn’t as relevant for me.

                  Pizza is a bit of a treat, and it’s fairly lazy to make (I just make a quick dough and throw tomatoes on the boil, then wait until it’s time to assemble toppings).

                  If we planned out, I suppose we’d have it something like every other week. I see no reason not to, maybe do something slightly more healthy by adding some salad on the side.

      • @iegod@lemm.ee
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        16 months ago

        That deep dish is not something you duplicate at home with frozen options. I’m with you guys but let’s be realistic.

  • @sndmn@lemmy.ca
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    576 months ago

    FYI: They’re part of Yum! Brands : KFC Pizza Hut Taco Bell Banh Shop (minority investor) The Habit Burger Grill

    I will continue to boycott their “foods”.

    • @chitak166@lemmy.world
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      46 months ago

      Taco Bell was the last holdout with their $1 beef burrito (which was actually a double beef burrito)

      They removed it and added shittier $2 items with less beef and more bullshit. Idiots ate that shit up, so we’re left with expensive garbage.

      KFC, lol. So fucking overpriced and it’s shitty chicken anyways.

      Honestly, with all the grocery delivery options, eating out just doesn’t make sense these days. I haven’t eaten out in almost a year since I got Walmart+.

    • @oyo@lemm.ee
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      26 months ago

      Habit started out so good and now it tastes like ‘optimized supply chains’ like all the other shit places.

  • @AA5B@lemmy.world
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    536 months ago

    Is no one else going to blame an overly specific minimum wage? I couldn’t find anything too specific but in California, it looks like:

    • fast food minimum wage: $20/hr, going to $22
    • gig drivers: $15/hr

    Of course they’re going to outsource drivers, This looks like a nice Christmas gift to UberEats/DoirDash

    • @eltrain123@lemmy.world
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      236 months ago

      Customer still pays the raised wage price, but a new company gets injected as a middle man. That’s the true American dream. Same income for the business, but another layer of corporations cleans up instead of the people actually making the work happen.

      They should create incentive by taxing the shit out of businesses and offering tax breaks for actually offering living wages and benefits to their employees. If the “correct” answer in capitalism is to find the cheapest solution, make it expensive to make choices that are a detriment to the community the business operates in.

      • @SCB@lemmy.world
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        16 months ago

        They should create incentive by taxing the shit out of businesses and offering tax breaks for actually offering living wages and benefits to their employees. If the “correct” answer in capitalism is to find the cheapest solution,

        I think this is a novel idea and an interesting thought experiment.

        If we passed this federally, I think it’s most likely we see an outsourcing - to ourselves. With the market floor raised so high across the board, distortionary effects would then kick in and what I posit we’d see is a shitload of both business and consumer flight to rural areas.

        Prices for rent, obviously, would go through the fuckin roof. This would cause a mass exodus to surrounding areas, but I think business investment would actually beat them, because if you’re paying 60k/year anyway, you may as well put your facility in the cheapest possible location.

        Businesses are already shifting toward being physically close to their suppliers/major logistics hubs, to save cost elsewhere, so big “shipping towns” (which are, essentially, a few big wholesale distributors and nothing else) could see massive investment.

        What’s weird for me is that this may actually help our housing situation in the medium term, as explosive growth in these areas even out demand hotspots.

        Idk about high raises in labor market floors to predict much beyond that, but it’s something I’ll definitely check out.

        These aren’t completely pie-in-the-sky proposals, either. Simply tying maximum compensation for publicly owned companies would start this kind of a chain rolling, in a smaller way, I think. Labor prices would jump ludicrously just from the amount of low-skill labor employed by major companies.

        Inflation would be bonkers and you can’t raise interest rates too fast or you basically nuke your economy, so how this plays out for the average joe is anyone’s guess. Fun to think about tho

    • @books@lemmy.world
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      186 months ago

      I can’t for the life of me think that this will be good for them though. Food delivery services are notoriously shitty/slow. If I order a pizza and have to wait for an intendent person to come pick it up and deliver it when ever is convenient for them? Thats not gonna work for me… and I would be loud and boisterous to the company.

      • @jasondj@ttrpg.network
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        In an alternate timeline where restaurants never thought to offer delivery (or regulated against it…since objectively it is kind of strange how we do it now), but did offer takeout, I’d expect private food courier services would have thrived. Especially in denser areas.

        Even in an era before DoorDash and internet, it’d be a call-center/concierge style.

    • @Maggoty@lemmy.world
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      86 months ago

      But also gig drivers aren’t getting the minimum. Uber and Lyft promise you’ll make the minimum through the ride fares if you work a whole hour. But that doesn’t happen. Many people don’t notice because the pay is distributed across the rides but some have actually done the math with their daily totals. They also just lost a court case about paying mileage, so they not have to reimburse mileage they weren’t doing before.

      With a business climate like that it’s no wonder everyone else is jettisoning delivery drivers. The rideshare companies are getting away with murder by comparison.

    • @TheOriginalGregToo@lemmy.world
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      -96 months ago

      This is what’s so annoying. I had literal arguments with both people online and IRL about this massive jump in minimum wage and how it would have this exact effect. I was told over and over that it didn’t work like that, that people needed a livable wage, etc. My argument was that not all work has equal value and that minimum wage jobs aren’t intended as jobs you raise a family on. They’re a stepping stone as you enter the workforce and begin to develop/gain skills to be able to do work which has more value. With the insane increase in fast food minimum wage only one of two things will happen. Option one is that the price of the food shoots up and can no longer be competitive. Why would you pay $30 for fast food when you can go to an actual restaurant and get better quality for the same price? This leads many of these fast food joints to close and with it the jobs. Option two is that companies find ways to cut services and/or automate to offset the increased cost. The end result here is that once again the jobs go away.

      I would love to have a proponent of this explain to me how no jobs is preferable to lower paying jobs. As a highschool kid, I was grateful to have my minimum wage job.

      • @Mirshe@lemmy.world
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        76 months ago

        Except minimum wage should support you fully because, as you may have noticed in high school, NOT everyone working at your minimum-wage workplace was “a high school kid”. Walmart and a lot of other places that skate by offering minimum wage effectively outsource the rest of the money they SHOULD be paying to the government - what you may know as “your fucking taxes”. You wanna see less people using welfare? You should be out there demanding companies pay more - some estimates are that Walmart’s profits are effectively buoyed as much as 40% by taxpayer-funded welfare programs like EBT, SNAP, TANF, and various forms of rent assistance, and there are similar numbers for other minimum-wage retailers and workplaces.

        “BUT THAT MIGHT RAISE PRICES”, you cry? Well, here’s the good thing - by raising MINIMUM wage, you can go to your boss and say “hey I’m only making $17 an hour doing [highly skilled job], that’s only $2 more than minimum, could we work out a raise?” And if you get your whole workplace to do this, or enough of your fellow coworkers doing similar positions, they would definitely feel far more compelled.

        • @TheOriginalGregToo@lemmy.world
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          -26 months ago

          Actually everyone I worked with in high school was a high school kid. The only person older than that was the store owner, and she obviously was making more due to her larger investment/risk.

          Here’s the problem with your entire pitch, I’m going to be paying taxes regardless. They will never go down, they will only ever go up. If one problem is solved the government will simply use my taxes for something else. This is how government works. Additionally, increased wages get passed onto the customer. I know many people here like to pretend that they don’t, but prices either go up, or quality/quantity go down. That IS what happens, so I’ll be paying for it either way.

          Your whole argument about an increase in minimums allowing other workers to request raises also doesn’t work. Instead what happens is the increase in pay causes an increase in prices, negating the gains across the board. We just saw this exact thing play out during covid. Stores had to very quickly increase the wages they were paying, prices went up, negating the increase in wages.

      • @splonglo@lemmy.world
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        36 months ago

        My argument is that the jobs DIDN’T go away, they just became gig jobs. In the big picture the increase had no effect except for speeding up the transition from one form of delivery job to a different form of delivery job.

        Min wage has to cover living expenses because otherwise people are forced to make up the difference from wellfare. So in effect it is a subsidy from taxpayers to companies that pay low wages.

        Full time, min-wage workers cannot afford rent for a 1-bedroom flat in 90% of the entire country.

        • But that IS the jobs going away. You converted a full time job into an occasional time job. Say you were make $15/hr 40hrs/week. That’s $600/week. Now they convert your full time job into a gig job and you’re making $20/hr, but you only work 10 hours per week. You’re now making $200/week. You now need to try and make up that $400/week shortfall in your income. Good thing you got that massive pay increase though, right?

          • @splonglo@lemmy.world
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            06 months ago

            Not ‘part-time’ work , gig work. Ubereats, Deliveroo etc. A lot of these guys are working full time. Maybe you weren’t paying attention to those guys you said couldn’t argue with you.

  • Margot Robbie
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    486 months ago

    Didn’t Pizza Hut use to be a high quality sit-down restaurant that didn’t even do delivery and had a big salad bar? At least, that’s how I remembered it, because I don’t think I’ve thought about Pizza Hut in years.

    Also, it is worth noting that these are companies that franchises Pizza Hut, not Pizza Hut owner Yum Brands. This is more of a case of companies being horrible in general instead of a large company being horrible.

    The 20 dollar minimum wage is however well deserved, and probably should be higher considering the cost of living here in California.

  • @vermyndax@lemmy.world
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    426 months ago

    A few months ago I was suddenly craving a pan pizza… out of nowhere. In the 80’s, Pizza Hut pan pizza was the shit. I was pining for the nostalgia, I suppose.

    The pizza was got was awful. Truly horrible. Pizza Hut is dead to me.

    • Subverb
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      136 months ago

      It’s the old adage: You can make a pizza so cheap, nobody will eat it. You can make an airline so cheap, nobody will fly it.

      • Gordon Bethune
    • @blazeknave@lemmy.world
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      126 months ago

      That was such a big deal back then. Haven’t touched it since. Thanks for taking a bullet so the rest of us can keep on us memories in tact

    • @stolid_agnostic@lemmy.ml
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      66 months ago

      I worked there out of high school. They put in something like 5 pumps of oil into a large pizza pan, and the raw dough sits on top. A personal has a single squirt, the other sizes are somewhere in the middle.

      You liked it in the past because you had no developed palate as a child and your stomach handled the grease better, plus a good amount of nostalgia. It was always bad lol.

    • Kogasa
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      36 months ago

      I’m still a fan of Domino’s pan pizza. A lot better than their regular pizzas IMO.

    • Alien Nathan Edward
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      16 months ago

      had a similar experience a while back. our local pizza place was closed, so we ordered from pizza hut. twice as expensive for a shit pizza with a cardboard crust and boneless wings that were clearly pre-cooked frozen chicken that had been microwaved for a bit and then, rather than being tossed in sauce, were just put in a togo container and allowed to sit in the sauce. I’ll literally go to bed hungry before I buy another crumb of food from pizza hut.

  • @LifeOfChance@lemmy.world
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    366 months ago

    Damn for a company that’s been shutting down locations I’d think it be cheaper to pay their employees better than lose all those customers. My state alone has seen them shut down nearly every location.

    • @kromem@lemmy.world
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      56 months ago

      They aren’t the same people.

      Franchise owners are doing this, not the centralized brand they are franchising from.