Income up in Tulsa

[cannon_fodder]

US Federal Reserve:  $62bil
European Central Bank (EU): $213B
The Bank of Canada: $1.55B
Bank of Japan: $8.39B
Swiss National: $2.2B
The Reserve Bank of Australia : $4.18B
The Monetary Authority of Singapore: $1B


Where is the other $700,000,000,000.00 from?

Enlighten me.  My numbers are from the WSJ, search "Central Banks React to Liquidity Crisis."  And in spite of the potential for damage, I do not think most people in the world that pay attention are too surprised that the sub-prime mortgage lenders are finally boiling over.  Perhaps non-economic types are surprised by the sucking sound in the liquidity markets and the run on bonds, or perhaps the small scale panic... but its not a crisis.  Not yet.  

Certainly the potential is there if another run of bad news, a disaster, or an agitator steps in (China sells Dollars, Tehran or North Korea default on foreign debt, or countries begin un-pegging their currency rapidly).

wait, watch and see where money can be made.

[TheArtist]

This was in the Sunday TW concerning Key Personnel and Whirlpool.

WHIRLPOOL SEEKS EMPLOYEES WITHOUT DIPLOMA

(   "Key Personnel and Whirlpool Corp's Tulsa division are launching a new program, offering individuals without a high school diploma the opportunity for a promising career.
Through the program, candidates will be hired as Key employees and assigned to work full time at Whirlpool. To remain in the program, candidates must attend a free once-a-week General Education Development class on site at Whirlpool before their shift begins. Once theat cadidate completes the class and receives a GED certificate, he or she is eligible to be hired full time by Whirlpool.

"The available labor force in Tulsa is dramatically impaced by the local drop-out rate of 30 percent," said Deb McCaskey, regruiting specialist at Key Personnel.  "Many people are limited in their opportunities for a promising career. This program gives people another chance to get a quality job."   )

We often hear about the low test scores some of our schools have and where we rank with other schools. But one thing we often dont consider is the drop out rate. Sometimes schools "don't strongly encourage" students to stay in school, especially if they are ones who "bring down the mandated test score averages". Many students arent even considered drop outs but "in transition" or other terms to decrease the appearance of their drop out rate. If a student who is leaving is asked whether or not they may go back to school some day and they say yes, then they can also not be counted as a drop out. Regardless, 30 percent drop out rate is not good and to have income up in Tulsa under such circumstances is notable.

It seems interesting to note how many companies are going out of their way to educate employees or try and recruit them into the area (welding companies, whirlpool and many other people I have heard complain about the lack of quality workers and difficulty in attracting quality people to live in Tulsa) because they are having a hard time getting qualified workers otherwise. We have a low unemployment rate in the city. We may see it go lower and find the building trade having a harder time finding workers as well, if many in our hispanic work force end up leaving.

What this brings to mind to me is that we should definitely as a city focus on education both at the lower levels and college, and do what we can to make our city attractive to young educated people.

[USRufnex]

quote:Originally posted by AMP

Back in the infancy of staffing, it appeared to many some of the agencies were just slinging people and filling orders. Those were the fast growing and exlosive need driven industrial halls.  Operating in the background and out of sight were the skilled, clerical, legal, medical and professional staffing services. Many were located downtown, in high rise buildings and out of sight with no signs or street entrances.  Manpower, and Kelley Girl, were among some of the first ones.   Since then that industry has moved along very quickly and adapted with the modern age of digital processing.

Staffing Industry is much more complex than many people precieve from the outside.  Back when Tulsa was smaller and dependent on just a few Industries for jobs, there was not much need for services such as staffing.  However, as the city grew and other industries opened here and jobs became available there were more needs.  

Then as the oil bust hit, there were displaced workers that needed to locate other jobs and quickly. That was the Staffing Industries forte' and they helped thousands of Tulsan located jobs that fit their skills in the crunch times.  

-------------------------------------------
That is the American dream.  

I worked for Manpower after quitting "Anybody Anytime."  I enjoyed working for Manpower... the difference between those two outfits was night and day... to the point where I told anyone I spoke with who said they needed a job as a temp to NEVER work for "Anybody Anytime."  Strange that they eventually changed their name to "Labor Ready"... maybe they were getting a bad rep around town...  Too bad "2 News works for you" wasn't around back then... I still consider them some of the creepiest people I've ever worked for... insisting on working a 12 hour day after being  told we'd be scheduled for 8... nobody I knew got paid OT because these folks had a way of playing a little shell game that enabled them to work some people over 50 hours per week, but under different employers, thus no OT... may have been legal at the time, but very unethical...

Once again, this was 25 years ago, and your gripes about the rise in minimum wage from 3.35 to 4.25 AFTER TEN YEARS FROZEN IN TIME doesn't ring true... I worked retail jobs at or slightly above min wage as a college student...

From 1997 to 2007 minimum wage was again raised AFTER TEN YEARS FROZEN IN TIME.  All entry level low-wage workers who annually watch their rent, food and gas prices go up are screwed slowly over the course of a decade... an 18 or 19 year old working at minumum wage in 2006 had much less buying power than the 18 or 19 year old working the same job in 1997... is this fair? ...while management in the restaurant and daily-cash temp worker industries, etc. get their cost of living raises, don't they?

I always hear how low-wage employers insist that a higher min wage causes the workers who've been with them to suffer... yet those workers who make a paltry $6 - $7 per hour regularly reject that argument, and are almost unanimous in their support for a higher min wage...

Express Temp Services has made millions upon millions of dollars for Bob Funk... enough money to for him to start his own little sports management arm that runs minor league hockey and baseball teams and some bull-riding tours... Express Sports was established off the profits from temp workers who far too often are taking extra hours to pay off predatory lenders.... always thought Rent-a-Center should have a daily-cash temp agency in the back of their stores...

I assume most temp agencies are on the "up-and-up."  And I can sympathize with both small businesses and low-wage earners who are part of a political tug-of-war between Dems and Repubs that could be resolved with some simple annual cost of living adjustments on the min wage...

Nobody should be working 40 hours a week in this country and remain under the poverty line... nobody.

These people are a tiny percentage of the workforce... others who just need part time temp work for the $$$ are another small percentage of the workforce...

The big story is how the rest of us are living in a city with a strong economy, low unemployment, affordable housing and higher wages... good news, for sure.



 

[AMP]

When I first started in the Staffing Industry we spent hours explaining the concept of staffing to business owners, managers and supervisors.  It has been many years since sales reps did that, as the majority of industries in the US began using used temp help at one time or another in by the 1980s. Today the clients seek service such as on site management, PEOs, Payroll Service, Professional consultative strategic planning for upcoming projects.  

PRE & POST HIRE POLICIES

Regarding hiring policies in the modern day, there are many new procedures and laws regarding pre and post hiring interview questions and forms to sign.  That entire process is an entire class in itself. With that said, newspaper advertising has gone out of sight, so wording in help wanted ads, and display ads are at a premium.  Being brief is required if one wants to stay in budget.  Also most positions may have minimum number of years experience requirements, and if one candidate excels above all others for a position they are typically chosen. In addition, orders come in daily and as one position is filled, another may appear the same week.  Typically not every applicant is hired at any company.  

Being offered an assignment for a position similar to one's field is an opportunity to: 1. Earn some money while still conducting your job search. 2. Get your foot in the door of a potential employer that may need your skills or know of others that do. 3. Demonstrate your abilities and willingness to do what ever it takes.  Keep in mind that many companies hire from within or from referrals made from other companies similar to theirs or referrals from their suppliers.  

MINIMUM WAGE RASING FLOOR OR KEEPING UP?

Is the main problem with raising minimum wage is it raises the floor for everything?  Say a person was working last month after being with a firm for over a year, and was earning $6.00 per hour.  New hires may of come in at $5.15 at the existing minimum wage. Now with the new minimum wage, the new hires are starting at fifteen cents an hour less than the person that worked for over a year and was earning $6.00 per hour.  Now that person feels they need an additional raise of 70 cents up to $6.70 or even $7.00 per hour.  Another employee in another department may be earning $7.00 and when hearing of the new hires getting the 70 raise the floor of expectation raises for that employee also.  Keep in mind the legals on those positions are additional, and are a percentage. For this discussion say legals are 35% of the payroll.  Legals = legally required fees and taxes on payroll, Work Comp, FUTA, SUTA, FICA, etc.

Based on $5.15 x 35% = $ 6.95
Based on $5.85 x 35% - $7.88
So based on the $6.00 x 35% = $8.10 per hour
Based on the $6.70 x 35% = $9.04
On $7.00 x 35% $9.45

The employee earning $5.15 may only receive a 70 cent raise to $5.85, but it cost the business 93 cents to provide the additional 70 cents to the employee.

The employee earning $6.00 going to $7.00 cost the employer 1.35 additional for the one dollar raise as the legals are 35%

That 93 cents or 35% of the pay increase, is passed on to the consumer in one manner or another in most cases.  Thus raising the floor once again, and repeating over and over.  Goes back to the age-old question of "Which Came First the Chicken or the Egg".  

Keep in mind the employee also pays 7.65% to FICA and another percentage in State and Federal taxes of the total gross on thier check.  So the employees take home is, at times up to 60% or greater, far less than what it costs to make the payroll for that individual.

This is the reason I feel all the legals and fees should have a box on the payroll stub so everyone understands how payroll taxes, fees and other legals effect their rate of pay, and the overall cost to the business that they are a part of.  
 
It may be difficult for many to comprehend the use of temp help from the owner/management perspective, if one has not had to make a decent size payroll or managed a large number of employees, and I can understand that.  Many small and mid size businesses operate on narrow profit margins and must use all available resources at their disposal to help them manage their expenses.  Other cost is that of advertising, recruiting, hiring and training new employees.  Many sources place that cost at $3,000 and more per employee.  

COST OF LABOR - FIXED OR VARIABLE

Labor can be a fixed or variable expense.  It makes much more sense to operate a business with variable labor costs than fixed. Just as with companies that depend on material, as it is needed, the majority of businesses work on a "Just in Time" basis.  They order the material as needed to avoid warehouse space and damage in storage.  

By using temps it is similar to the water faucet.  A large pool of labor or water sits in holding tanks, when water or in this case additional labor is needed one turns on the faucet.  When not needed one simply turns off the faucet, or in this case returns the inventory of labor back to the pool where another company may need them. No penalties, no additional charges, no obligation, no issues with having to tell someone they are no longer needed or laid off.  Saves all the stress on the supervisors, managers and people in direct contact with the additional laborers, as in the beginning their is an up front contract that is known by all that this is a temporary position and may end at any time without notice.  And at the same time the temp may also be needed to work longer than the original assignment.  

MINIMIM WAGE TEN YEARS OR MORE @ $3.35  
1979 2.90
1980 3.10  
1981-1989 $3.35  

1991-1995 4.25
1996 4.75  
1997 -2006 5.15  

I stand corrected, there was one year when it was only $2.90 per hour in the first ten year run. Then the second long run at $5.15 ran for nine years.  

OVERTIME HOURS
Many or our employees would become angry that they were not allowed to work at different companies during weekends after obtaining 40 hours of work, overtime or not and it did not matter if they were earning minimum wage or $15.00 on a prevailing wage construction job. They just wanted to work and make money.  

Many that wanted additional work on the weekends after working 40 hours at one or more assignment for one agency, would sign on with two or more temp services for additional assignments, thus avoiding the overtime problem by only working at one service. Not sure if that describes the "shell game" you are referring to, but that was done by the employees and not the agencies.    

Most wanted extra work to earn more money.  They could not understand why they could not work at a totally different location/assignment for straight pay no overtime.  That was very hard to explain to many.  When the business they were assigned to requested them to work over 40 and approved the overtime, they were billed and paid at that rate.  

Majority of the time the business would exchange anyone that had 40 hours for new additional help that did not have overtime, to avoid the extra expense.  That was one of the main reasons for businesses using temp help, to keep from having unnecessary and fixed labor expenses. It also provided fresh employees that were far less suseptable to job related injuries caused from working too many hours.        

As they were our employee, any hours over 40 hours per week had to be paid and billed as overtime.  Very difficult to send an employee that had not worked at a company prior to that day, and bill them 1.5 times their pay rate plus legals and markup.  

There are companies that request specific people to return.  Some would agree to and pay the overtime for those individuals versus having to depend on a new person and re-train them what to do.      

OVERTIME LAW  
Many people mistake the federal labor laws concerning Overtime.  Some think anything over 8 hours, in a 24-hour day, is overtime.  Law is anything over 40 hours in a workweek.  In some Collective Bargaining contracts, overtime may indeed be over 8 hours in a 24 hour period, and that could be where some of that information comes from.

The payroll work-week is established by the company that is handling the payroll of the employee. It may vary from the payroll work-week of the business where that employee is assigned.

I never knew of any service that did not follow those basic laws. The Wage and Hour division of the Department of Labor investigates and handles all complaints of that nature.  One of the main people at the Tulsa Wage and Labor office was Ben Furlong.  They attended many meetings we held and worked  with the staffing industry and all businesses in this area.

[USRufnex]

I wish nobody had to go through an unchanged Reagan-era min wage at the same level I had to  from '81 -'89 trying to work while going to college from '84 onward with no parental help.... but my grandparents dealt with the great depression in Oklahoma and I completely understand life ain't fair-- anybody who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something... but I wouldn't wish on a human being what I saw going on at "Anybody, anytime" back when I was in high school.

Sir, PLAIN AND SIMPLE, you do NOT know what my experiences were with that company, experiences that happened over 25 years ago... don't preach to me about work gloves and pretend you knew what happened back in the day... you are not psychic.  Yet you continue to act as if these people were innocent and blameless... they weren't.  I cannot go back in a time machine and press charges on behalf of my co-workers or inform the friggin' Wage and Hour division of the Department of Labor... I was 17 years old at the time.  And the people that I believe to this day were taken advantage of were folks who would never have made waves, and THAT STAFFING COMPANY KNEW IT... Geez.

You refuse to even vaguely admit that there were/are bad apples in your industry... remarkable.

Once again, I have worked on the employer/HR side that screens applicants as a recruiter, and have worked many different "day jobs" over the years and understand enough to know the temptation for low-wage employers and their staffing companies to put the squeeze on employees desperate for jobs and/or needed cash to pay bills, etc... or those losers who are inevitably gonna use that daily-cash for booze, etc...

If anything, these days in Tulsa, I'm guessing the opposite could currently be true and that there is pressure on temp agencies who will lose their businesses due to the good job market for workers here...

But sometimes, you have to judge an industry or even a society based on how it treats its most vulnerable.

Did you honestly think $5.15 per hour would go on forever... never change... while cost of living expenses get higher and higher...?

[AMP]

True, I was not there in your situation.

Keep in mind I have not worked in that Industry since 1998.  

Your description sounds as if they may not of followed the rules and regs as closley as we did, but that was in the early days of labor halls and many were just starting up.  So they may not of had proper training or by your description it sounds as if upper management, who was from out of state, may not of even cared.  

They went out of business as you indicate, so that pretty much explains it. I didn't see any reason to throw them under the bus anymore than you already have. You did a pretty good job of it.  I could add a lot more but what is the purpose as you say it was 25 years ago. Plus i still know three of the people that worked there, and I have lunch with two of them on occasion, so I didn't want to beat up on them too much. I am sure if they came on here they could tell you much more horror stories about that company, I have heard tons of them believe me.  That was a national chain, and the owners were from the East Coast and wore pin stipe suits,  so one does not want to say too much bad about those folks if you get the picture.  Like Rodney Dangerfield's line in Back Too School, those aint the Boy Scouts hauling the trash.

Waht you describe is one of the main reason we formed the Oklahoma NATTS Association to help educate people in the Industry of the labor laws in Oklahoma, and keep everyone on the same page and informed of the laws and regulations.  Many of the Industrial agencies were also members of Associated Builders and Contractors, a national organization who provides training in construction safety and management among other things.    

Supprized you were allowed to work Industrial positions at 17, most agencies require the employees to be 18 to work Industrial, but as you say that was back in the early 80s and that service may of not followed that policy.  It has changed quite a bit since then regarding age limits operation of machinery, moving vehicles etc.    

Actually I agree with you on many points.    

We were then constantly trying to get wages up, so we could move away from work comp problems and earn more on our margins.  I never liked the minimum wage jobs, but they were what was in demand at the time and we had lots of competition then trying to service those companies to keep our foot in the door for brighter times in the future.  

Most the agencies progressed with time or closed up. We began screening all employees as required by our clients.  We performed drug and alcohol screens for companies that requested them.  We did criminal background checks for positions as required.  We facilitated company provided safety training, job training, job orientation, and testing.  We moved into weekly pay and away from the cash draw business.  Stopped running our vans and hired people with their own transportation.  Moved into skilled and licensed trades placement.  Focused on machine operators, welders, metal fabrication, electronic assembly.   We opened additional departments for Clerical and Legal positions.  Although the massive numbers were and still are in the lower wage positions, the higher margins and profit are in the skilled market, and there are far less work comp claims.  

While I don't think you will ever see the demand for day labor deminish, I have seen the training and education of the employer and employee improve tremendously since the early 1980s, and I trust it will continue to move away from the unorthodox type of dealings you describe.    

And with this new law on immigration you may see it increase in need.  I keep hearing ads on KMOD constantly for Industrial positions from numerous companies including personnel agencies.  

The availability or lack thereof of labor drives the pricing in most markets.  Lack of labor, supply normally causes the pay rates to increase, demand.   Will be interesting come November to see what unfolds with the contest of the law and the outcome and results of the other side of the first week in November if it stays active.

A few companies are finding themselves behind the proverbial eight ball with this new law coming into effect if they have not already made pricing adjustments to combat the higher wage costs that are on the immediate horizon both with the increase in the minimum wage which was predictable coupled with the HB 1804.  This occured each time the minimum wage increased in prior years, which raised the floor for many other positions.  This time around having both occur near the same time is a double hit.   Up side is it increased wages almost immediatly for savvy owners that planned for it coming and adjusted their pricing accordingly.  Down side is it increased the cost of living along with it in a time delayed reaction.

Without doing some job resume and salary history phising quickly, one could be blind sided by labor and get caught in the musical chair game of employees moving from one company to another for higher wages, while in reality there may be bodies to fill those jobs that are unaware their are avaiable.  Advertising in this market is very expensive and there are way too numerous TV channels on cable, too numerous a number radio stations, and the poor newspaper, not sure if that is read much by the level of candidates needed currently.

I would not want to be trying to replace orphaned positions left open by musical chair employees in this current market.  Plus if you have a business, you run the risk of loosing some of your better help to businesses that can pay higher wages.  This is getting good.

[AMP]

.. Sorry double post..

[sauerkraut]

quote:Originally posted by recyclemichael

Some of the best jobs are temp jobs.

Look at President of the United States.

yep, and some temp jobs can turn into a perm job. Look at the congress we have some life long "workers" there. Some of those guys have been there for decades.

[mr.jaynes]

quote:Originally posted by USRufnex

I wish nobody had to go through an unchanged Reagan-era min wage at the same level I had to  from '81 -'89 trying to work while going to college from '84 onward with no parental help.... but my grandparents dealt with the great depression in Oklahoma and I completely understand life ain't fair-- anybody who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something... but I wouldn't wish on a human being what I saw going on at "Anybody, anytime" back when I was in high school.

Sir, PLAIN AND SIMPLE, you do NOT know what my experiences were with that company, experiences that happened over 25 years ago... don't preach to me about work gloves and pretend you knew what happened back in the day... you are not psychic.  Yet you continue to act as if these people were innocent and blameless... they weren't.  I cannot go back in a time machine and press charges on behalf of my co-workers or inform the friggin' Wage and Hour division of the Department of Labor... I was 17 years old at the time.  And the people that I believe to this day were taken advantage of were folks who would never have made waves, and THAT STAFFING COMPANY KNEW IT... Geez.

You refuse to even vaguely admit that there were/are bad apples in your industry... remarkable.

Once again, I have worked on the employer/HR side that screens applicants as a recruiter, and have worked many different "day jobs" over the years and understand enough to know the temptation for low-wage employers and their staffing companies to put the squeeze on employees desperate for jobs and/or needed cash to pay bills, etc... or those losers who are inevitably gonna use that daily-cash for booze, etc...

If anything, these days in Tulsa, I'm guessing the opposite could currently be true and that there is pressure on temp agencies who will lose their businesses due to the good job market for workers here...

But sometimes, you have to judge an industry or even a society based on how it treats its most vulnerable.

Did you honestly think $5.15 per hour would go on forever... never change... while cost of living expenses get higher and higher...?

My thing is, I take a look at some (not all, just some of them) of these recruiters for temp services and instictively, I can usually size them up fairly accurately. Some of them are fairly honorable and well-intentioned people, and some of them (and not all of them) can be real scuzzbuckets, not to be trusted, and they are the ones I like to stick it to.  

While staying in the Tulsa area for a brief time back in 2005, I'd meet with them, discuss signing on with them, listen to them try to sell me on this bill of goods that often sounded too good to be true-because it usually was too good to be true.

One well-known firm in the Tulsa area discusssed "marketing my resume" after signing on with them-only to find out later from the receptionist (a squirrelly individual in her own right) that my application wasn't even processed yet (and this was nearly two weeks after I'd signed on with them!). There was another firm there, where I caught the recruiter lying her tail off about having tried to call me (I was staying with family, and they not only had Caller ID but also an answering machine: I'd have gotten her call if they were really trying to reach me), then saying that there'd been no assignments for the past few days-then backtracking like crazy when I showed her a newspaper classified ad her firm put out that Sunday (our little confrontation took place on a Monday, the very next day after the ad ran in the local paper). Meanwhile, another that I'd tried to sign on with sent me a letter only 24hrs later after doing the paperwork, stating that they were unable to consider me for employment (you know it's pretty bad when a temp service won't hire you!).

But I ultimately managed to find one that utilized my talents while I was staying there in Tulsa and it paid me well, and those are the guys I chose to go with. They were a little more honest.

But like i said in my previous post, the fun was in meeting with these people face-to-face, shooting them the tough questions and watching them come unglued whenever I cut through their hype and their dishonesty. Perhaps when I move back to Oklahoma in the next 2 years, a career change is in order, such as investigative journalist? I don't mind returning for that next degree and Journalism may be tailor-made for my instincts, personality and comportment.

[kakie]

The report below also helps illustrates the point I've been making - although it is for the state of Oklahoma as a whole and was released at the end of last August:


Census Data Reveals Declining Median Income, Rising Poverty Rates in Oklahoma:

Current Economic Gains Failing to Benefit Many
(Tulsa): New data released today by the U.S. Census Bureau reveals that the state's current period of economic growth is distributing benefits very unevenly across the state's population and leaving many Oklahomans behind, according to an analysis by Community Action Project (CAP), a Tulsa anti-poverty agency.

The Census Bureau's Current Population Survey found that Oklahoma's median household income declined slightly to $39,292 for the most recent two-year period of 2004-05 from $39,519 in 2003-04. The state's poverty rate jumped from 11.8% in 2003-04 to 13.2% in 2004-05. This represents roughly 50,000 additional Oklahomans living below the poverty line, which in 2005 was just under $20,000 for a family of four. During the same time period, overall state personal income grew 6%, according to previously-released data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

I'll be on the lookout for an updated report that may be coming out at the end of this month(?) August.  Do you see my point?  State income was up up 6% but it was uneven with many people falling behind.  Hopefully the new report will show some improvement for many.  That is what I'd like to see.

http://www.captc.org/newspdf/pubpolpovertyrates_0806.pdf

[cannon_fodder]

Interesting report.  I wonder what accounts for the discrepancy.  Clearly, the rich getting richer would have an impact, but to actually have negative household income and the positive personal income numbers at the same time seems very odd.  A hand full of rich people struggle to skew the statistics in light of the masses of middle class and poor.

Also, I really don't pay much attention to 'poverty" levels.  Its a number that is invented by a government official and has little or no bearing on actual poverty levels.   You want to reduce poverty?  Just make the number smaller.  I once had a cost of living gage that gave approx. cost of living for each adult and then for added children in several regions... seemed a better gage to me.

Nonetheless, interesting report.  Thanks for the info.

[swake]

The Tulsa metro is only about a little more than 25% of the state's population so we are in no way talking about a comparable dataset.

Also, median household income and average per capita income are two very different statistics. Oklahoma (and especially Tulsa) always does worse on household income data than on per capita income due to our high divorce rates. A family of four with two wage earners has a combined income of $100,000 but after divorce there are two households with a average of $50,000. Same amount of per capita income, but radically lower household income.

I agree that per capita income is a better measure of overall health of the economy. The gap between per capita income and household income is more an indicator of a social ill here in the buckle of the Bible belt than of anything to do with the economy.

[AMP]

quote:Originally posted by mr.jaynes

quote:Originally posted by USRufnex

I wish nobody had to go through an unchanged Reagan-era min wage at the same level I had to  from '81 -'89 trying to work while going to college from '84 onward with no parental help.... but my grandparents dealt with the great depression in Oklahoma and I completely understand life ain't fair-- anybody who tells you otherwise is trying to sell you something... but I wouldn't wish on a human being what I saw going on at "Anybody, anytime" back when I was in high school.

Sir, PLAIN AND SIMPLE, you do NOT know what my experiences were with that company, experiences that happened over 25 years ago... don't preach to me about work gloves and pretend you knew what happened back in the day... you are not psychic.  Yet you continue to act as if these people were innocent and blameless... they weren't.  I cannot go back in a time machine and press charges on behalf of my co-workers or inform the friggin' Wage and Hour division of the Department of Labor... I was 17 years old at the time.  And the people that I believe to this day were taken advantage of were folks who would never have made waves, and THAT STAFFING COMPANY KNEW IT... Geez.

You refuse to even vaguely admit that there were/are bad apples in your industry... remarkable.

Once again, I have worked on the employer/HR side that screens applicants as a recruiter, and have worked many different "day jobs" over the years and understand enough to know the temptation for low-wage employers and their staffing companies to put the squeeze on employees desperate for jobs and/or needed cash to pay bills, etc... or those losers who are inevitably gonna use that daily-cash for booze, etc...

If anything, these days in Tulsa, I'm guessing the opposite could currently be true and that there is pressure on temp agencies who will lose their businesses due to the good job market for workers here...

But sometimes, you have to judge an industry or even a society based on how it treats its most vulnerable.

Did you honestly think $5.15 per hour would go on forever... never change... while cost of living expenses get higher and higher...?

My thing is, I take a look at some (not all, just some of them) of these recruiters for temp services and instictively, I can usually size them up fairly accurately. Some of them are fairly honorable and well-intentioned people, and some of them (and not all of them) can be real scuzzbuckets, not to be trusted, and they are the ones I like to stick it to.  

While staying in the Tulsa area for a brief time back in 2005, I'd meet with them, discuss signing on with them, listen to them try to sell me on this bill of goods that often sounded too good to be true-because it usually was too good to be true.

One well-known firm in the Tulsa area discusssed "marketing my resume" after signing on with them-only to find out later from the receptionist (a squirrelly individual in her own right) that my application wasn't even processed yet (and this was nearly two weeks after I'd signed on with them!). There was another firm there, where I caught the recruiter lying her tail off about having tried to call me (I was staying with family, and they not only had Caller ID but also an answering machine: I'd have gotten her call if they were really trying to reach me), then saying that there'd been no assignments for the past few days-then backtracking like crazy when I showed her a newspaper classified ad her firm put out that Sunday (our little confrontation took place on a Monday, the very next day after the ad ran in the local paper). Meanwhile, another that I'd tried to sign on with sent me a letter only 24hrs later after doing the paperwork, stating that they were unable to consider me for employment (you know it's pretty bad when a temp service won't hire you!).

But I ultimately managed to find one that utilized my talents while I was staying there in Tulsa and it paid me well, and those are the guys I chose to go with. They were a little more honest.

But like i said in my previous post, the fun was in meeting with these people face-to-face, shooting them the tough questions and watching them come unglued whenever I cut through their hype and their dishonesty. Perhaps when I move back to Oklahoma in the next 2 years, a career change is in order, such as investigative journalist? I don't mind returning for that next degree and Journalism may be tailor-made for my instincts, personality and comportment.

Once again, I am not familer with those incidents. I will offer this for those in a job search currently or in the future.  

Pre and Post Hire Process
Keep in mind that as with any employer, one applies for a position with the company. That is only the first step in the hiring process. That does not mean they are hired at that point in the process. As I stated above the Pre-Hire and Post-Hire process since the change in the law is a University level class in itself. Lawyers and legal minds wrote this process in labor laws. Our labor law firm trained 40 of our staff members for three eight-hour days straight on the new employment processes, and that was only the introduction. Additional training took several months in the evenings, with follow up seminars held every quarter.

Typically the hiring process, if done properly and following all the new rules and regulations should take more than 48 hours if the employee lived and worked only in one state. If they came from out of state, depending on the state they came from, the reports can take up to two weeks or more to arrive. If one lived in or worked in a state such as Florida and in a few of the high crime counties, those reports are at times backlogged for up to a year or longer. Add in the time for performing the USCIS Employment Authorization checks for applicants.

There are numerous reasons applicants are turned down for employment, depending on what type of job it is and the requirements set by the employer. Not every applicant is hired at any company. Most of the higher quality personnel agencies perform screening, and contact previous employers to verify salary, job classification, and re-hire status. It is typically much more difficult to pass the screening processes at Personnel Agencies, than many other businesses. This is for many reasons, but mainly because it is in their best interest to provide the best-qualified and highest quality of employees that are available.

I am not sure what your questions were to the recruiters so I cannot answer that directly.  I can offer this.  With the new laws they are not allowed to ask certain questions, and if you ask a question that the answer would be the same as them asking an illegal question in the interview, they may not answer it directly as it would be in violation of pre-hire discussion laws.  

I would suggest reading the laws on pre and post hire questions and procedures for anyone conducting a job search.  Knowing the proper procedures and what is allowed to be discussed during a pre-hire interview may provide a quicker avenue to being chosen for the position you are applying for.  

If you are not comfortable with the initial interview at any company, I would suggest moving on to the next one on your list. There are different levels of quality and people in all businesses. That is why Baskin Robbins has 31 Flavors. Businesses are made up of people and sometimes a person does not fit in with the people working there. That is pretty common in the World.

If you are turned down at one agency, I would suggest applying with another. Some have more stringent hiring standards than others. I would not hold that against them or worry about why you were not hired. You moved on and found another agency that hired you and worked an assignment or more. That is what you were seeking to do, and you found it.

These agencies are like Banks, not everyone qualifies for loans at specific levels at all banks. May find one that will accept your application with a smile, while others may turn you down for the same amount.

[TheArtist]

quote:Originally posted by kakie

The report below also helps illustrates the point I've been making - although it is for the state of Oklahoma as a whole and was released at the end of last August:


Census Data Reveals Declining Median Income, Rising Poverty Rates in Oklahoma:

Current Economic Gains Failing to Benefit Many
(Tulsa): New data released today by the U.S. Census Bureau reveals that the state's current period of economic growth is distributing benefits very unevenly across the state's population and leaving many Oklahomans behind, according to an analysis by Community Action Project (CAP), a Tulsa anti-poverty agency.

The Census Bureau's Current Population Survey found that Oklahoma's median household income declined slightly to $39,292 for the most recent two-year period of 2004-05 from $39,519 in 2003-04. The state's poverty rate jumped from 11.8% in 2003-04 to 13.2% in 2004-05. This represents roughly 50,000 additional Oklahomans living below the poverty line, which in 2005 was just under $20,000 for a family of four. During the same time period, overall state personal income grew 6%, according to previously-released data from the Bureau of Economic Analysis.

I'll be on the lookout for an updated report that may be coming out at the end of this month(?) August.  Do you see my point?  State income was up up 6% but it was uneven with many people falling behind.  Hopefully the new report will show some improvement for many.  That is what I'd like to see.

http://www.captc.org/newspdf/pubpolpovertyrates_0806.pdf

We have been hearing for decades now how if you are not a skilled worker your wages are going to stagnate. The more skilled and educated you are, your wages are going to go up. Do we want to be a country or city of mostly skilled or unskilled workers? True there will always be some jobs that are not skilled that are required. But if the majority is able to afford it, those people will have to get paid more. The city will pay the trash man more because they can afford it. If you have a huge pool of uneducated workers there is no push to raise wages for them. If there were fewer then those companies that wanted them would have to pay more to get and keep them. Then the costs would be transferred to the wealthier consumers etc.  But even still, it must be that the more skilled some people are the more desirable and thus more paid they will be. That alone will create wage disparity between them and the unskilled. 100 years ago there wasnt a need for highly skilled computer and tech people or whatever. The general educational and skill disparities werent as great or numerous and thus neither were the general wage disparities. (especially if you were in one of those "one industry" industrial cities) There is more to it than that, but that still has to have an influence. Plus as there are more people than ever a single person can invent or sell a product to ever more people. Even selling a one dollar product to a billion people can make you quite "disparigingly" wealthier than the average person.

Wage disparities will continue to increase. However there is still the opportunity to pull more people than ever up the ladder. Course if they would reach up and grab the next rung of education for themselves, that would help too. And it behooves us to make that rung as easily reachable and cost affordable as possible.

[AMP]

After the initial shock in the early 80s, the cost of energy was not a big issue concerning travel to work for several years. The cost of driving from outlying towns into Tulsa was not a major expense, and many people did it every day.  

With today's energy costs, folks that commute to a job are faced with the balance of taking a job that pays less in their home community, or finding a cottage industry need to fill from their home, or accepting the fact that they are taking a loss in the cost of transportation if they continue to commute.  Many are financially ahead to change jobs and work at a local outfit, versus the difference between their cost of driving for higher pay.

There may be low unemployment, but there is even a greater lack of mobile labor, skilled and un-skilled that was created when the price of fuel exceeded the $2.00 per gallon mark.

The diameter of the circle where one lives and where one works shrunk with every raise in gas prices that are not complimented with a raise in the pay rate for that person's job.