To feel like some jobs are a total con?

[Changeusern8me]

I'm not talking about sales or timeshare or multilevel marketing businesses which are obvious cons. I'm talking about low paid jobs where you slave away for low pay and have the carrot of promotion dangled in front of you which is even slightly more money for poor pay. I'm talking about care, shops, bakeries, fast food, childcare, telesales. I despise these companies which are such a con and prey on the weak, the vulnerable, the desperate, the kindhearted and innocent. They dress up these roles and oversell them but in reality it's hard work, huge time commitments for shitty poor pay. Am I completely paranoid or are these careers just a total con? My niece is thinking of leaving sixth form to get a job in carework and I worry she will end up trapped in hamster wheel of low pay. It just made me think that if she does decide to leave it will be a Sliding Doors moment she will regret. Sorry for the rant but am I being unreasonable in saying these jobs are a trap or am I in fact correct?

@PutMyFootIn I applied for a job as a carer because

1. I knew they would take anybody with a clean record.
2. I knew I'd only have to work 16 hours a week and tax credits would top up the rest.

So, care work was just a 'step up the career ladder' to you??

This is a great illustration of why care work will never be properly valued - people like you don't understand why carers and care work should be valued.

It takes a special skill set to be a good carer. Someone who actually cares about people and wants to make their life easier and better and who wants to actually help someone else in a vulnerable position.

' I knew I'd only have to work 16 hours a week and tax credits would top up the rest' ....... that's the best reason to go into care work?!!

I hope you never have to depend on a carer that has your mind set when you need assistance in your old age.

I'm just concerned my niece will have a limited quality of life financially speaking due to this

OP this is probably going to come as a shock - but she can decide to do something else in a year or two. She isn't committed to this for life.

I know - big shock right. Now have a nice hot cup of tea and work out how you can respect and value her current decision.

Why not just do her nurse training

I used to be a Band 1 hospital porter. One of my colleagues was Oxford Uni educated. Very intelligent.. just wanted a low stress job. He had things go on in his life that meant he wanted to take a huge step down.
A few of my other colleagues had degrees. They just wanted a job that paid the bills.

@Mademetoxic As long as people are working and are paying their taxes, NI etc, why does it matter what job they do?
They contribute to society, earn an honest living.
Not everyone wants to have a career or to 'climb' the ladder.

But, thinking dispassionately, why are some jobs valued more than others?? Why is a carer or a bin man - or any physical job really - valued less than an office worker / clerical worker in a non-physical job??

The average salary for a fast food manager is £28,800 a year. It is not a high wage for a lot of responsibility and managing staff.

Every job should be valued. Only shallow people think differently.

I completely agree with you. Warehouses, factories and the beauty industry should be on that list also.

I’ve read a thread on here where a lady was a band 4 nhs manager - made me so cross because there’s no fucking thing. Not criticising the lady because clearly they’ve got a nice cheap manager there and not her fault, but managers and leads are band 6 and above (very occasionally band 5 if responsibility is very low). That’s the whole point of the banding system yet organisations still take the p.

My eldest son walked out of school at 14 no uni no collage no qualifications.
He did two courses at the library.
Hes full time work £22.50 an hour it can be done.
As someone said above he worked his way up.
He dont work in care tho.

There’s too many chiefs trying to run the show and only a few make it to manager. Op is right the majority are being lied to, a lot of managers don’t want their minions to progress to higher levels as they’ll lose their good worker bees. It’s all been a lie why do you think people don’t want to work those jobs anymore, because it’s soul destroying that’s why not only does it cause bad mental health, working yourself to the bone and still having poor quality of life, but the physical jobs literally cause irreparable wear and tear on the body. Covid/lockdowns has changed the way a lot of people look at things. It has nothing to do with being lazy either people have just had enough of being mugs while other people get richer off their hard work.

@RubyRoss
"the point of low paid jobs is for those with no/little poor education"

I presume you've said this to stir things up, rather than because you actually believe it?? ...............

Delusional

I work in a call centre. Previously worked as a carer
I've even had a customer ask me if I actually have any GCSEs. When he pushed me to answer I told him my qualifications and he hung up on me
Decent qualifications and I'm pretty clever but I've never gone into a job which could become a career as such, add health issues into that which give me a bad sickness record and fatigue...

in the situation where I have qualifications but not that relates to jobs because they want experience. Can't find anything paying over 25k that I'm qualified for

During the 90s, a lot more care homes were under local government control. My dad was a trained social worker and ran an “old peoples home“. The training available was really good in those days. I know my dad used to really promote training to the women working there. There was one woman who came in as a care assistant, and he put her in every course going, and she ended up in charge of elderly care for the entire county. She still brings him a bottle of wine every year for being the person who really believed in her.

I just don’t think that would ever happen nowadays. Those routes for working class women have been shut down. Caring jobs have become more and more devalued. I remember when I worked for the local government caring for the elderly and I would be out on courses about back care, about respect and inclusivity, about talking to relatives going through bereavement, or about providing specialised care to rehabilitate clients coming out of hospital. We were highly trained and highly skilled and highly valued, and now those same jobs are minimum wage with no training. It’s just not right.

@Nellodee exactly!

Did you read my post? I very clearly argued that some jobs are devalued for economic reasons and has FA to do with education as another poster suggested. So why wouldn't I believe my own arguement?

The point of social media managers isn't to provide jobs for people with degrees in media studies and the competence required to care for someone v repurposing content on social media is not the difference of a university degree

I wouldn't call it a con as most people know certain jobs are just low paid and always will be.
Recently I heard a story about a man who retired, he'd be at the same company like 50 years, in the same role and was a great employee but had always made minimum wage. Never progressed expect the standard increases. Even if you are loyal, hard working and reliable there's no guarantee there will be more for you- you really do have to work at it and have personal drive.

Your niece could always do care work for a couple of years then pick up studies when she is ready.
I was eager to get to work I wanted to earn, I wanted to be in a workplace but quickly realised when I was working if wasn't all I expected and I'd be stuck there if I didn't do something else.

As a society, we seem to want 5 star service for 1 star prices.
Saying that 'anyone' can do these jobs, that some people aren't willing or capable of doing better, that they're vocations, that you don't want to pay them too well because it'll attract the wrong people is justification for keeping wages in those sectors low - "There's plenty of supply".

But, as people are all too fond of complaining about, not 'anyone' can do those jobs well to the level that is being demanded.
Look at all the 'customer service is shit' posts, the 'why can't my relatives in care homes have a shower every day?' complaining about the services we need and want posts, not providing an adequate service. They're being paid a wage that even the government recognises can't be lived on because they're topped up by tax payers money a lot of the time.

We're paying for it one way or the other, either through higher consumer and user prices or higher taxes to support lower wages.

These roles are important enough to kick up a fuss when the demand isn't met, but not important enough to respect the people working in them enough to pay them a decent wage.

They're important enough to demand they're done well, but not important enough to recognise the contribution financially or in any other way.

And yes, the companies providing these services and the low pay to do those jobs are also part of this, but then we idolise and aspire to those go getters as a society and hold them up as beacons of what can be achieved through 'hard work' and 'sacrifice', conveniently ignoring that it's usually other people's hard work that gets the actual work done and the profit in.

100% agree, I was in the care sector for 14 years, no promotions despite being highly competent. Hamster wheel is an accurate description.

Low skilled jobs you can do immediately from school pay less. No experience required and so the supply of workers that can do them is vast.

It's not a con at all. She can get some work experience and if she wants to apply herself and earn more, train, gain skills or qualifications.

It's simple supply and demand. Some people are fine with these jobs and that's ok but you're literally moaning that a school leaver will be on low pay lol - they can barely wipe their own ass at that point. If she wants to aim higher, great, get experience doing voluntary work in the relevant sector, do the prerequisite degree etc

Agree with many of the points about career vs jobs, but as a Sales Director, it’s disappointing to see sales roles immediately derided as ‘cons’ in the same breath as multi level marketing or timeshares.

Only the bad salespeople try to con people, and you get those people in in every walk of life, not just sales. good salespeople are problem solvers who recognise the value in good relationships with your customers.

Thanks, mini rant over.

The more rare your skill set the more you get paid for your skills. Conversely the more people able to do what you can do the less financially valuable your labour is
I’m continually puzzled why this simple fact of life is so difficult for some to comprehend. It is not that the care worker lacks value but that pretty much anyone could do that work

People seem shocked by this last sentence.
Of course not everybody has the personality and soft skills to be a good carer, the same way as not everybody has the personality and soft skills to be a good lawyer/doctor/IT engineer… but for these you also need a degree that you won’t be able to get without years of studying and a certain level of brain power - this drastically reduces the pool of people who can do the job, even before you get into soft skills.

Retail jobs aren't a con. The shop floor jobs are often low paid but in big retailers there is the chance to move up. I have worked with plenty of senior people in the big Supermarkets who started on the shop floor.

However it is also known that not everyone works in retail for a career. Mr Monkey works for a specialist running retailer. Lots of people do the shop floor jobs around other commitments - some are students, some are semi professional runners, some work in the arts. It is seen as a good job for people intertested in runnng as they get big discounts on kit, free entry to races the company is sponsoring and other perks.

You are coming across as a total snob. Of course they're not a con. They're entry level jobs.
Just because something doesn't pay you ££££££ doesn't make it a con. You're being very very rude to and about anyone who works these jobs. Vital jobs. That you need to be done as much as the next person.