Preview

Is the Job in Fast-Food Restaurant Exploitative?

Powerful Essays
Open Document
Open Document
1487 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Is the Job in Fast-Food Restaurant Exploitative?
4. Is the job in fast-food restaurant exploitative? It yes, in what sense it is exploitative? Please also take into consideration the implementation of minimum wage when illustrating your argument.
Introduction
Exploitation is a term to describe person that are being mistreated. Karl Marx used it to explain the relationship between the capitalists and workers. It is claim that the value of a product is depended by how much labor has paid on it such as time, energy or ideas. Therefore the price of a product minus the cost and energy to produce a product or other sufficient usages should be equal to what a worker can earn. However, as the workers own nothing but their labor, they could only sell their labor to capitalists who own all other kinds of resources. Marx defined the value that capitalists take away from the workers as surplus value. It should be fair between “sellers” and “buyers”, but the capitalists refuse to pay a suitable amount of reward. In order to gain more profit, the capitalists would try as hard as they can to increase the surplus value, and lead to exploitation. In the paragraph below, I will first start with reason why Hong Kong fast food workers being exploited. Second I will focus on the current situation of exploitations in Hong Kong fast food restaurant. In addition, I will express my opinion on the implantation of minimum wage. It could only improve the situation of workers but could not solve the problem of exploitation.
Reason for being exploited Workers in fast food shop is being exploited mainly because of the supply of workers is far more than the demand of job opportunities. In general, the jobs in fast food restaurant are independent to the education level. It is because most of the job opportunities in fast food restaurants are being simplified and divided clearly. With the aid of machines, almost everyone could do the job well; no specific skills are needed in fast food restaurants. Therefore this kind of jobs will depend

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Satisfactory Essays

    In Michelle Chen’s article, “Five Myths About Fast-Food Work” she talks about misconceptions associated with people who work at a fast food restaurant. The first issue Chen addresses is the idea that only teenagers work fast food for little to nothing. However, Chen explains that the majority of workers are around twenty years old and some are single parents that are trying to provide for their families. The Next misconception associated with fast-food is the idea that workers can eventually work their way up to owning their own franchise. Chen explains that is highly unlikely because most of the employees are earning minimum wage or close to minimum wage and to start up their own business of the franchise they would need around $750,000. Chen’s…

    • 266 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    A wage as Karl Marx put it is the trading between a wage laborer and capitalist in regards to labor power for capital growth and basis subsistence for the worker (204). Wages should natural be competitive between workers, but that competition stems from the competition found between…

    • 443 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Being an employee at Publix’s I have seem surplus labor and exploitation up close and personal. Karl Marx said it right” exploitation is process by which workers are not fully paid for the labor they put in at the job.” In my words worker are cheated out of what they deserved. Marx also said” that surplus labor is the money we did not get paid.” The exploitation hours worked. Companies like Publix do this to increase their capital, their profit; it hurts a lot but the capitalists knows we need jobs to survive and provides for our…

    • 1723 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Unit 7 Sociology

    • 843 Words
    • 4 Pages

    This focuses on the inequality that occurs in a capitalist society. It suggests ways that this inequality can be overcome through revolution this theory was said by Karl Marx. Karl believed that the proletariat (working class) gets exploited by the bourgeoisie (ruling class). The statics show that 90% of wealth is owned by the bourgeoisie the rest of the society is suffering (being exploited). In order to end this exploitation in society there needs to be a revolution.…

    • 843 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The fast food industry is one of the fastest-paced industries in America, employing and having employed about one in every eight Americans. Despite making millions of dollars each day, fast food corporations pay the some of the lowest wages. Americans need to become aware of this and protest. This is pointed out by Schlosser in Fast Food Nation: “The roughly 3.5 million fast food workers are by far the largest group of minimum wage earners in the United States the only Americans who consistently earned a lower hourly wage are migrant farm workers," (Schlosser 14). The workers that prepare and make our fast food from the time it leaves farms and factories, as basic ingredients, to the moment it is handed to us are not being paid fair wages for the amount of work that goes into their jobs. Their jobs do not require extreme mental skill, but they do…

    • 374 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    He uses information that has obviously been aware to many. When Marx disagrees with the private ownership of property, such technique is fairly visible. He believes that “Property, in its present form, is based on the antagonism of capital and wage labour.” For the Bourgeois society, “the right of personally acquiring property as the fruit of a man’s own labour, which property is alleged to be the groundwork of all personal freedom, activity and independence.” However, Marx claims that in this Bourgeois society, the workers do not work the sake of themselves but for the sake of the bourgeois and that “All that we want to do away with is the miserable character of this appropriation, under which the labourer lives merely to increase capital, and is allowed to live only in so far as the interest of the ruling class requires it.” According to Marx, it is logic that a labour should work for the purpose of working. Thus, he believes that labours working for the Bourgeois lost their sole purpose of existence-work. He claims that in the Bourgeois society, the Proletarians are used to increase capital and the Bourgeois property only, and become useless after they have done their job. In the Communist society, “accumulated labour is but a means to widen, to enrich, to promote the existence of the labourer.” Through the use of reasoning concepts that were obvious to the readers even before it was ever reasoned in this document, Marx persuades the audience that the function of the Bourgeoisie society is…

    • 1130 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Marx describes the exploitation of the working classes/workers will always be in an inferior bargaining position to the owners when they contracting for wages and working conditions; the results are substance wages and brutal working conditions. “After labor has become not only a means of life but life's prime want; after the productive forces have also increased with the all-around development of the individual, and all the springs of co-operative wealth flow more abundantly -- only then then can the narrow horizon of bourgeois right be crossed in its entirety and society inscribe on its banners: From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs!” (Marx, “Critique of the Gotha Programme,” Section III, pg.3) Marx’s judgement on solely the proletariat being the oppressed and the bourgeois being the oppressors clouds the positive aspects of capitalism. The fact that one can have the potential to create upper development for oneself while benefiting others along the way is an outstanding idea. Marx misconstrues the idea of a capitalistic system, which is beneficial to both parties as being self-centered, when its actual intent is to keep everything in the workplace productive. I can agree that certain aspects of capitalism can affect those working at the ‘bottom of the chain’ per se, by limiting their ability to pursue leisurely activities when compared to those above them. Yet, there needs to be…

    • 1020 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Best Essays

    Schmitt and Jones. 2013. Slow Progress for Fast-Food Workers. Center for Economic and Policy Research. Washington, DC: CEPR. Retrieved December 6, 2013. (http://www.cepr.net/documents/publications/fast-food-workers-2013-08.pdf).…

    • 2752 Words
    • 12 Pages
    Best Essays
  • Good Essays

    The four characteristics of McDonaldization are: Efficiency, Calculability, Predictability, and Control. Efficiency is the key characteristic as it will determine the profit margin. Increased profits are gained by lowering costs. And the labor of workers are the chief cost to a company. To maintain efficiency in this manner, many companies deskill jobs. The product being a low-wage position that can be filled by anyone. Obviously, McDonaldization creates the “working poor” singlehandedly in only one…

    • 500 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Labban writes in his about how capitalism affects workers in the city of New York where in it he estimated that 84 percent of workers in fast food restaurants in New York City experienced one “instance of wage theft in 2012 and many have been subjected to multiple instances of wage theft” (Labban, 2013). Wage theft is not only restricted to fast food workers as it reaches a wide number of workers in a wide range of low-wage jobs across industries of all sizes. Individuals who work in factories are often exploited and paid wages that are insufficient enough to maintain a lifestyle that will bring them above the poverty line, this creates a surplus wealth for the capitalist class. A surplus value, as described by McNally is when the amount of work exceeding the value of wages paid which begins to generate an accumulation of wealth into the hands of the employer which is often then reinvested to continue to create more wealth. This value is always excess of their labor cost thus it is available to the capitalist (McNalley,…

    • 1649 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Good Essays

    Marxism is the theory of Karl Marx and Fredrich Engels, it’s based on the economical and social system. Marxism emphasizes on the importance of class struggle in society. They thought that economic processes and class struggles laid the groundwork for every important era and movement in history, and would lead to the downfall of the upper class and the rise of an egalitarian communist society. Under capitalism, the working class or “the people,” own only their capacity to work; they have the ability only to sell their own labor. According to Marx a class is defined by the relations of its members to the means of production. The worker is alienated because he has no control over the labor or product which he produces. The capitalists sell the products produced by the workers at a proportional value as related to the labor involved. Surplus value is the difference between what the worker is paid and the price for which the product is sold.…

    • 659 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The Communist Manifesto

    • 531 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The radicals discuss that the exploitation of one class by another is the major factor that motivates force behind all historical developments. The Manifesto argues that the development of the proletariat appropriating property is inevitable and that capitalism is inherently unstable. Throughout the four sections of the Manifesto, the reader gets to view the relationships between the Proletarians and the Bourgeoisie and the Communists and the proletarians. The reader is informed on the previous socialist literature throughout the third section. The final section discusses the relationship between the Communists and other parties. The source offers evidence by giving direct insight on the unjust actions that were taking place. For example, Friedrick himself observed firsthand the exploitation of blue collar workers under the ruling class in factories, as his father sent him to represent their family in its textile business. The authors, Karl Marx and Friedrich Engels, assume that the division of labor has exploited proletarians where they have been stripped of their identity due to the advent of 'extensive machinery' and so man 'becomes an appendage of the machine.' Marx and Engels also assumed that once the development of the industry has increased, the proletarians will unite and voice their struggles over reduced wages by forming a trade union. Throughout this source, we see the perspective of the proletarian…

    • 531 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    minimum wage

    • 1283 Words
    • 6 Pages

    This action creates what Karl Marx wrote in The Communist Manifesto as ”naked, shameless, direct, brutal exploitation”.…

    • 1283 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Marx commences his essay by maintaining that workers' miseries are directly proportional to their level of production; the more value workers attribute to their product, by virtue of their labor, the more miserable they become. Workers themselves are a commodity and the greater the value of their production, the cheaper a commodity they become. "The increase in the value of the world of things is directly proportional to the decrease in value of the human world." The end result of labor is its objectification into a thing, and the value of labor lies only in its objectification.…

    • 586 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    the fast

    • 302 Words
    • 1 Page

    there will be growth in the number of fast food restaurant which offer more job opportunities to people. “Many of today’s entry level workers will be part of the management team of fast food restaurants in just a few years.” As the teenagers nowadays can work faster and reach the management level quickly. As hiring can make fast food grow successfully is because hiring the right workers can help to grow the business. Workers are having cooperation when they are working and they build a team work.…

    • 302 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays