Recently, a Starbucks barista shared a video of themselves having a meltdown and it has become the center of attention on the internet.
The clip shows the employee sharing their thoughts on management and rude customers, but it was what the person said about their schedule that divided the online crowd.
The barista — who is also a student — said that a 25-hour week and 8-hour shifts during the weekend were too much for them to handle.
Immediately, one group of Twitter users started calling them soft and spoiled, while the other defended them saying that worker exploitation has many faces.
This Starbucks barista has accused their employer of poor working conditions
In a now-viral video, they complained mostly about the schedule and management
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And highlighted the need to unionize
Getting a degree in the US is expensive. Even the locals underestimate its cost. According to the 2021 Fidelity Investments survey College Savings & Student Debt, 38% of high school students and 1 in 4 parents believe that attending one year of college will set you back $5,000 or less, but this number is way smaller than what they’re likely to pay at public and private four-year colleges. (In addition to tuition and fees, students must also pay other expenses such as housing, food, and books, which can run into thousands of dollars a year.)
Of course, it depends on what college you go to. The average cost of tuition and fees to attend a ranked public in-state college is about 74% less than the average sticker price at a private college ($39,723). But that’s still $10,423 for the 2022-2023 year. And the average cost for out-of-state students at public colleges comes to $22,953 for the same year.
So it should come as no surprise that many, just like the person who made this video, have to work if they want to graduate. In 2020, the percentage of full-time undergraduate students who were employed was 40 percent (additionally, the share of part-time undergraduates who were employed was 74 percent).
But that usually gets you only that far. In fact, there are 42.8 million borrowers who have federal student loan debt and the average balance is $37,787 (although the total average balance (including private loan debt) may be as high as $40,780).
Student loan debt in the United States totals $1.745 trillion.
As the student loan forgiveness plan is making headlines, many Americans are praising the government for granting relief. However, drained by years of financial crises, many more are still devastatingly unable to afford to pay for gas and buy essentials, let alone afford repayments of a five-figure debt.
After surveying 2,000 Americans, the team at ELVTR, an online education platform, told Bored Panda in a statement that this is how people in the country are impacted by their student debt:
The results are staggering. Roman Peskin, CEO of ELVTR, said: “The United States higher education system is broken following decades of decline. Students give up years of their life and enormous sums of money in pursuit of the American Dream: a well-paid job, and the means to enjoy life and live comfortably. It turns out that those desires remain merely a dream for the vast majority of graduates. They end up learning an assortment of potentially useful skills and subjects, yet master none… and at a significant cost to their financial and mental health. With the cost of college rising faster than inflation, the situation is only getting worse. Loan forgiveness, while a great initiative, is really just a Band-Aid — before we dress the wound, we need to stitch it up first.”
So while everyone is entitled to their own opinion about the way this particular person is handling the pressure, I hope we all can agree that looking down the line and seeing such hardship can put an enormous amount of stress on you.
At first, the barista received a fair share of support
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Lately, Starbucks employees have been really vocal about their jobs. Earlier this month, for example, workers at over 100 locations went on strike in the next stage of the chain’s union effort. The walkouts coincided with Starbucks’ Red Cup Day, one of the company’s busiest days of the year.
CNN reported that over 2,000 employees took part. The union said it was striking to protest the retaliation taken against union supporters nationwide. It was also protesting what it characterizes as the company’s refusal to bargain with the union on a first labor deal.
There are 264 stores that have voted in favor of union representation, but no contracts have yet been negotiated even at stores that voted nearly a year ago.
“This is to show them we’re not playing around,” said Tyler Keeling, a 26-year-old union supporter who has worked at a Starbucks in Lakewood, California — near Los Angeles — for the last six years. “We’re done with their anti-union retaliation and them walking away from bargaining.”
In the past, the company has denied it has retaliated against any employee for their support of the union, and it has blamed the union for the lack of progress at the negotiating table. Starbucks has defended the firings of union supporters that have taken place as proper enforcement of rules that apply to all of its employees, who it refers to as “partners.”
But the National Labor Relations Board — which oversees union representation votes — filed in federal court for a national cease and desist order to prevent Starbucks from retaliating against union supporters.
The NLRB filing said that there had been a “number and pattern of Starbucks’ unfair labor practices … particularly discharges” against union supporters at its stores.
But as time went by, they got plenty of negative reactions and people started having heated arguments about today’s state of customer service
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Which has brought even more positive remarks
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