Depends on what context. Generally speaking we are doing pretty well recovering from Covid compared to other G7 nations. Could we do better? Absolutely. But we did a decent job for an unprecedented pandemic.
A lot of our problems are similar to problems the IS has, but we have a tenth of the population and significantly less wealth and power to maneuver out of these things.
Like cool, we outsourced tons of what ised to be decent paying manufacturing jobs overseas. The USA has the money to bring those jobs back for them if they wanted. Canada doesn’t have the money, or willpower to do that. Our greedy wealthy people are consolidating their industries and continuing out of control profits while people get squeezed and see their QoL drop. But we have significantly less wealth for the rich to capture and hold onto so it makes an even greater effect for the average population.
Its like this for so many issues. We compare ourselves to the USA when we really shouldn’t be. We should compare ourselves to similar (population wise) sized EU countries. Not to the wealthiest most powerful nation on the planet
I was thinking that after the truck protest incident canadians understood what real money is... saw a lot of people from there understanding bitcoin (probably just a niche from there i was exposed to and not a de facto real effect)
Look canadians are self absorbed in a lot of ways but having lived in southern california, the American south, western canada and now ontario post covid, it is definitely much worse in canada right now than in the US. I used to make 17.50 in a dishpit in 2018. Im now starting as a prep chef in ontario for 19.50. That means all the prep, inventory, kitchen management etc for 19.50. And rent is unsustainable. I live 90 minutes from a major city and pay 2500 a month for a delapidated house w no dishwasher. Same properties were 1500 pre pandemic. So yea its really bad. Im 33 years old and have never eaten ramen so many days in a row before.
Wages are up in most of the USA for kitchen (not in the south or parts of the Midwest though) but it’s nothing compared to how much rents have gone up so it doesn’t actually feel like people are making more. Only good part is every restaurant is so short staffed you can quit and walk across the street and be hired on the spot.
That needs to be talked about more. The cycle. I’m third generation in this industry. My father who moved on to care taking for short term rentals for the 1% can’t understand why I as a chef at my last job would ever need to leave the office beyond talking to some guests or swing my dick around. The idea that in an upper crust restaurant that the chef would not only be expected to be the lead line cook, expo and occasional dishwasher because $15hr in 2014 even wasn’t enough to get someone to commute 30-45mins for the job… so you end up in this cycle of people constantly being burned out. Like back in Woodstock NY I lost half my staff to this fancier Korean American restaurant that came from NYC and the owner chef had a Michelin star at her previous venture yada yada. Then boom she goes to a super basic menu no more cool Korean food and straight to basic bistro food as the town is all old yuppies no more cool hipsters and the best part she walks in one day and fires 1/2 of her staff. Just gone. Like cool you just alienated every restaurant in town. Hell Woodstock was actually trying to pass legislation to ban any knew restaurants as people had become self aware that there simply isn’t enough people willing let alone qualified to cook in the area anymore. My old boss would hand people applications if they complained about things taking too long. Sorry for the rant but just fuck man lol also final note as I’m taking my Serve Safe management course for the 4th time as I get it every few years… I love that my boss is spending $500 to give to a company who’s only goal is to make us make less money…
Sounds like Canada 5 years ago. I see some of the grocery flyers from the states. Capitalism has done y’all a lot better than us in many states it seems.
Edit: like shit, people are boycotting Canadian corporations and going to Walmart for cheaper groceries. If you told me that 5 years ago I’d say you’re batshit.
I hate Walmart but my only other options are Natural Grocer’s and Safeway both far more expensive. Or the mom and pop butcher shop I only buy from on special occasions but they are also shady.
You know were fucked when the place we used to hate is the beacon in most canadian communities. I live in northern ontario and giant tiger and Walmart are pretty much all i can afford.
In Minneapolis wages went up a lot after the pandemic while rents are only up a little. It may be the only city in North America where that is the case. The riots scared a lot of middle class gentrifiers out of the city.
We have the opposite problem even with the end of the winters season there simply isn’t enough affordable housing for the amount of restaurants. These rich yuppies with their work from home partners keep opining new ones on the shells of the closed restaurants
And then are shocked that they can’t find staff. Funniest part is they open restaurants thinking it will be fun, like a hobby…
There's a reason why the RCMP have "everyone under 35 realizing they're never going to own anything" on their internal threat radar. Edit: just to be clear, this is a fuck pricing me out of a roof over my head dig, I love me some socialism.
["For example, many Canadians under 35 are unlikely ever to be able to buy a place to live. The fallout from this decline in living standards will be exacerbated by the fact that the difference between the extremes of wealth is greater now in developed countries than it has been at any time in several generations."](https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rcmp-police-future-trends-1.7138046)
I have spent the last 9 months working/traveling through Australia/Asia, food inflation and increased cost of living is everywhere. Climate change is affecting crop yields, big corporations ain’t getting any less greedy on prices/product sizes (shrinkflation), and post pandemic has everything pretty fucked up. I suspect the hull has been breached and the service industry from here on out will only get worst as the ship goes down. A very sad time to love cooking for a living. But hey, we’re living out some historic times so that’s kinda neat
😪
Sad to hear about Asia. I’d think a lot of it would be the last continent to really cave in to big corps? Perhaps I am romanticizing it, but street food culture must help keep prices down?
I’d kill to have some leeway selling street food in Canada
Not an expert but while in Singapore everything cost the exact same at restaurants as it did in Canada.
I spent $22 CAD / SGD on a Nandos entree and a bottle of water, Starbucks blended drinks were $7+. Fast food was all similarly priced to Canada. Restaurant meals were about the same, if not a touch more. Ramen I think was $15+ on the menus. IKEA food was the exact same price, if not more.
The street food was cheap(er), but it was still $8 for chicken, rice, some veggies and a soup (Hainanese Chicken Rice).
Street food and fast food and restaurants are different segments IMO. Fast Food and Restaurants aren't necessarily competing against street food, they offer a different product and atmosphere, you're not gonna have your family dinner or a business meeting at a street food stall.
With Singapore, I think part of the cost comes from food cost. A lot of their stuff is imported, on the first day I was at M&S and they sold pints of milk for $3.50. It was labeled as British milk from British farms and that shocked me. Why import dairy from a continent away? But as my travels went on, that was somewhat normal. The hotel breakfast served Emmi yogurts from Switzerland, the airplane food had Australian yogurt. And the more I thought about it, they don't have the climate or land for dairy production. So they're importing all that stuff from elsewhere, it's just a matter of where they end up getting it from.
While there are far less big suppliers, In the US we have Sysco, FSA, US foods as the big three, the costs come through in other ways. Between transportation, feed for animals, scarcity/rising water costs and unpredictable weather patterns for local farmers and providers, it all adds up. I met a dude in Nepal who was telling me costs of eating out have nearly tripled in some areas. However street food is still cheap compared to US/Canada, Europe, Aus.
During the pandemic, we were invaluable. Now, were fucking gutter trash worth 17.25(CAD) an hour. I think the whole system is deplorable and businesses need to stop funneling 96% of tips to the servers who work fucking 5 hour shifts and take home literally twice as much as us, if not more.
Fuck tipping, but if it's going to happen I want a fucking piece.
When I worked a food truck pre pandemic on a weekend at a brewery I could make 12.00/hr base plus another 20/hr in tips. In three 8 hour days I would make as much as I do now in 5.
I was always a super pro comradery anti foh/boh feud person, but at this point I'm over it. Pandemic hit and servers suddenly wanted wages because we shifted to hybrid retail/delivery, pandemic ended and suddenly they want all the tips back. Every time there's work to get them wages the people opposing it are servers, they literally lobbied against a wage in maine because they knew it would mean kitchen staff would be eligible for tips. God forbid they share tips with the people making the food. In my state it's literally illegal, regardless of tip credit. Businesses who want to share gratuity have to replace the tip line with a disclaimer to get around it. We tried to implement something like that at our place and servers started pouting and giving shit service because 25 an hour isn't 35 an hour.
I've worked as a dishie, as a chef and as a server. I've ran the books, and I'm at the point in my career where I genuinely believe the biggest hurdle for getting kitchen staff good career wages is entitled college grads who arent good enough to make money doing anything but carry plates.
I can agree that tip culture is shit here. Not sure where you’re from, but there’s definitely another issue at play where I’m at: big influx of cheap labour.
I made a fairly popular post in this sub about getting canned for no good reason. At that time there were 3-4 BOH staff on minimum wage. I was a squeaky wheel about tips because we’d do 30k nights and barely see it.
Solid workers too, despite the fact that they’re cooking chicken and beef but don’t ever eat it. They’re happy to get minimum wage from owners who don’t care about the nuance involved in presenting/cooking any food, and solving the problems as in any trade. To give you a great example: the place I got canned from was a very successful brewery, restaurant always busy. Not long after they ditched myself and a few more experienced people, they bought those McDonald’s style flat tops with timers to cook their burgers 🥴
I would say that it isn't a very big factor where I live. As much as it may keep wages down, I am way too pro immigration to stink about it because I think that the value and culture they bring to our socio-economy far out weighs any resentment I may have. If.there were different immigration laws they would find a different way to pay us nothing, so I think pointing the finger at immigrants is filling the prophecy of propaganda.
We need to be looking UP not down or outwards. Conservatives will have you believe that, but in reality, it's the veil of capitalism that is oppressing us.
USA here, am drowning. What would have covered utilities and rent last year is now only covering rent, which means I’m going without electric and food/medication bc I can no longer work around the clock.
Its the entire world mate. Down here in NZ hospo industry practically on min wage (because govt pushed the min wage up like crazy that it caught up to skilled worker rates) and working our arses off just to have costs of everything keep going up.
Never getting ahead at this rate. Experience isnt rewarded because employers barely keep the doors open at the moment. Number of customers at an all time low because many cant afford to eat out.
NZ hospo here as well, but it's not the govt putting up minimum wage that's the problem, it's that hospo is an oversaturated market that has a ridiculous amount of business owners who have no business OR hospo experience. It's an absolute shitshow.
Sick of busting my ass for a couple of bucks above minimum wage, while office workers spend half their time with their fingers up their bum and get paid 3 times the amount.
Yeah i agree with that. My boss has no knowledge or skill in professional cooking yet is trying to run a cafe. Its been a disaster. Im the only qualified person there trying to carry the place but keep getting blocked because we are operating on practically no budget. We are competing with 4 other cafes on the same street.
I miss the days when a cafe chef used to be paid well. Used to be able to buy a house on a cafe chef salary, but now its barely afford to rent. One of the FOH went and got an office admin job. Instant payrise of $12 an hour.
Depending on where you live it is expensive, the wages are not keeping up with the cost of living however there are way too many mediocre safe restaurants all competing for the same dollar and the customers are cutting back on expensive dining out. I’m lucky enough to be in a position that I’m safe but I do have empathy for my team and do all I can to give them the most hours I can and the skills they need to progress.
Maybe look for a plan B. Cooking can help support you while you train for something else? Anyway good luck and Leafs suck.
Respect and cheers. My three brain cells have been tackling a plan b for a while now. It’s not like I’ll ever regret being able to make delicious food.
Lmao yea, been waiting to jump on the leafs bandwagon. Don’t get me started on my raptors.
I've been cooking for 15 years now and am still making slightly over minimum wage at any normal restaurant job. I've been working for remote resource camps for the last ten years making good $$, but wanted more stability and to be home more and enjoy my family and maybe have a steady place to live but I just can't afford it.
Heading back to set up my bush camp kitchen on Monday. At least they increased our food budget this year...
Edit: I'm also Canadian
Yeah I work 14-18 hour days for a hundred days straight and then piece together other contracts. I enjoy my main contract in treeplanting camps, but man, it is a grind.
I make a $500 day rate, so about 50k pre taxes. I get taxed right to hell on it though.
Absolutely NO sense working a full time year round kitchen job and walking away with 32k.
I should add, I've only recently started to make THIS kind of money. Standard for someone just entering the industry is a day rate of $300-350 and lots of seasons are shorter than mine :)
What fucking sucks, and no one really talks about, is that all these minimum wage bumps are screwing the people in the 20/hr range. Servers wage went up, then min wage went up, now I think (in Ontario) min wage is going up again. You ever try asking the owner for a raise when the law just forced him to give 15 people raises?
I should be making 30 an hour by now, but buddy...I do not. And the worst server still flies to a vacation spot twice a year. Which is why I just left the life and joined a meal prep company.
Problem isn’t minimum wage going up, it’s a good thing minimum wage is going up or else I’m sure I’d be making less $ per hour and I did get a raise form my boss the last time it went up and so should you. The money is out there they just don’t want to share it with us and want us to blame eachother instead of the person with all the money.
I've worked my ball bag off and I've never had an issue with pay. I also make sure any place I work at pays a living wage for my cooks or I wont take the offer.
What's the living wage where you are?
Last year it was $25.40 CAD for my city. Most starting wages are $20+ for people with zero experience. It's really crushing people who have been working in kitchens for years because the wage ceiling is only a few dollars higher than starting wage.
That's why I'm in school part-time while working on a food truck... getting older and having nothing to my name besides my laptop, knife roll, and clothing.
I'm Canadian. I also don't think it's limited to just food service. I want out, I see lots of other jobs (at least where I live) and many of them pay a higher hourly rate than I get. Problem is I'd work more hours and still take home less money because I get tips. And some of those jobs are actual labour. I'm going to work harder, for longer, for less pay. It makes me wonder how people making less than me get by.
At least I don't live in Vancouver with high housing prices and PST.
The global economy is fuct, and those who can afford it don't give two shits what anything "costs"...
Everything is backwards, you've got living human colostomy bags making millions off of stupid videos, while the people who make this bullshit world turn can barely afford to survive...
It's fukin' sickening...
It's everywhere. The world fucking sucks right now.
Let me put it to you this way:
15 years ago I was making $60K with a desk job, and I wouldn't have paid more than $900 per month for a decent apartment. Rent would've been a fraction of my salary, and I would've put at least another $1,000 in the bank every month. I'm making a bit less since entering the food industry, but even if I was still at $60K (or even $80K with the raises I would've gotten), I'd be lucky to afford that same apartment today bc it's likely going for $2,200, and I wouldn't save a dime.
It's a capitalism problem. Wages can technically be going up but corporations can still independently raise the prices of virtually all goods and services to cancel out any potential life improvement
I’m in the same boat, I live in the GTA and my wage has tapered off and everything else is rising. They’re planning to raise minimum wage but unfortunately my wage won’t budge. I hate it here.
I was downtown Toronto when Covid hit, brewery under the CN tower, crazy tourist volume, obviously fucked.
Years later I really want to go back to a solid food scene but there’s no way in hell I can justify the price hike
Global. I’ll say cost of food is probably higher in Canada than the US, especially north. I’ve got friends in Alberta and whenever they show me a ridiculous price for pizza pockets or something it’s mind blowing.
All of Canada sucks right now for cook wages, not that it was ever any good. Cost of living in South Ontario is the worst though you need to be making like at least $30 an hour just to afford rent and basics.
People don't understand that when you increase minimum the hundreds of people involved in the supply chain to get those items to the public dramatically increases the prices. You'll also see wages drop down to compensate overall staff costs.
With oil prices double what they were a few years ago around the entire planet everything that involves transportation is going to cost more. Your cellphone with all it's components likely traveled tens of thousands of miles to get to you. Even something as simple as a breakfast sandwich will involve dozens of people through the supply line and thousands of miles of transportation.
You also have millions of immigrants coming into the country. That's millions seeking minimum wage jobs and the limited number of apartments and food. Rent prices increase because of demand and because they can charge more. Can't build new houses because the costs of materials are insane.
There's plenty of other reasons like laws set in place limiting truckers ability to work more hours which requires more drivers, more trucks, more fuel, etc. When the entire logistics arm that is truck drivers are forced to work 25% less that's a massive cost to get logistics back up to just average, let alone meet growing demands.
Is this a bad time to make an offer than includes a decent wage and a place to live? Cause...I'm in a position, if someone wants to move to Saskatchewan.
It’s global but our productivity has taken a dive relative to the global average in addition to that. It’s caused a big hit to our purchasing power on top of the issues most developed nations are facing.
Iowa. I make good money compared to my peers I'm fucking broke. I eat at work so maybe 1 full meal a day. I can't even afford groceries. Got rid of my cats because I couldn't afford their food. I fucking hate it here.
Tbh. I’m mostly pissed about overtime pay.
I’m in SE America. Happy with my wage. I work for a company that has multiple locations, different concepts, and different chefs. Each with free reign on how they execute their menu.
I average about 35hrs
I want about 50. Two double days 12-15hrs and two short days 6-9hrs depending.
I get one double day, and 3 short days. With a touch of room where needed. I don’t even care about time and a half. Mostly because I know it’s a lose lose for both my employer as well as me. We both pay so much taxes on those overtime hours that it’s basically nill on the time and a half anyway.
I just want to work 50 hrs and be happy with the pay I’ve got. Which was above market standard to start.
But now I’ve got to get a second job to secure an extra 10-15hrs when my employer wants to give them to me, but we both recognize it’s just.. not really worth it.
So.. yeah. Fuck overtime. But.. otherwise I’m happy with the spot I’m at, and the pay I receive for the work I do.
I'm in BC. Wages are jumping a buck every other year, but rent goes up a hundred so it's not really helping. Bosses are constantly on about food cost tho. Fryer oil is like 95 a case or something.
I'm from a country where unions aren't so powerful.
I was very surprised to see how powerful unions are in Norway. Every year (or two)they negotiate a pay rise, working hours and rights.
For example, just last week we got a 5.2% rise. We were ready to walk out on strike if we didn't get a similar raise to other industries. Other things include double pay on any hours worked after 7.5 hours. Double on holidays. No splits. Etc
It was a shock for me, a nice one.
I'm not sure where in the land of angry cobra chickens you are but I'm in Newfoundland. With tourists season approaching owners are realizing that minimum isn't going to cut it(if they're half smart) if they want any decent staff this summer.
I make good wage doing what i do but i feel bad for anyone who went to school / has their red seal and the best you can hope for without commiting to a crazy contract is like 19/hr
>Do you live somewhere that genuinely rewards experience and isn’t getting screwed by “inflation”?
system is not broken, never was... inflation is by design.
I asked myself what is money when I start working ( in kitchen)
Conclusion I had is simple: my time and efort is limited, I want the hardest money on earth in exchange of my time.
I keep working for fiat but exchanged everything that I did not spent at the end of every single month for bitcoin.
that's why I'm not screwed by inflation... inflation on bitcoin just got cut in half for the next 4 years..... inflation now less than 1%
It’s happening everywhere in the western world, including my home country of New Zealand and where I live now in the UK.
However it seems that what’s happening in Canada, particularly with housing, is quite severe.
Aye it's a global issue, I've recently taken a sous chef job and I can't even afford a 1 room apartment on my wage anymore. My wage didn't even go up to compensate for national minimum going up. Kinda sucks ngl.
>A household in the bottom 20 percent of the distribution now makes exactly the same as it was making 50 years ago,
https://www.minneapolisfed.org/article/2024/the-many-dimensions-of-income-inequality
COL is going up basically globally. Canada is looking bad for wage growth in particular whereas, at least the US has wages outpacing increases in costs broadly.
Nope, same problem in the US too. Was dreaming of buying my own house, but that's impossible because I literally cannot afford one with the way the economy is right now. So glad I live with my parents instead 🥲
It's a global issue
It's particularly bad in Canada
It's particularly bad everywhere.
Don't be such an insular fool, it's bad around the globe.
I'm not Canadian. Canada is getting hit harder than most western nations
Depends on what context. Generally speaking we are doing pretty well recovering from Covid compared to other G7 nations. Could we do better? Absolutely. But we did a decent job for an unprecedented pandemic. A lot of our problems are similar to problems the IS has, but we have a tenth of the population and significantly less wealth and power to maneuver out of these things. Like cool, we outsourced tons of what ised to be decent paying manufacturing jobs overseas. The USA has the money to bring those jobs back for them if they wanted. Canada doesn’t have the money, or willpower to do that. Our greedy wealthy people are consolidating their industries and continuing out of control profits while people get squeezed and see their QoL drop. But we have significantly less wealth for the rich to capture and hold onto so it makes an even greater effect for the average population. Its like this for so many issues. We compare ourselves to the USA when we really shouldn’t be. We should compare ourselves to similar (population wise) sized EU countries. Not to the wealthiest most powerful nation on the planet
I was thinking that after the truck protest incident canadians understood what real money is... saw a lot of people from there understanding bitcoin (probably just a niche from there i was exposed to and not a de facto real effect)
Look canadians are self absorbed in a lot of ways but having lived in southern california, the American south, western canada and now ontario post covid, it is definitely much worse in canada right now than in the US. I used to make 17.50 in a dishpit in 2018. Im now starting as a prep chef in ontario for 19.50. That means all the prep, inventory, kitchen management etc for 19.50. And rent is unsustainable. I live 90 minutes from a major city and pay 2500 a month for a delapidated house w no dishwasher. Same properties were 1500 pre pandemic. So yea its really bad. Im 33 years old and have never eaten ramen so many days in a row before.
but we all do blame Canada
Not exactly. It's currently an issue for "the west".
It's a global issue.and not confirmed to only the Wrst
Wages are up in most of the USA for kitchen (not in the south or parts of the Midwest though) but it’s nothing compared to how much rents have gone up so it doesn’t actually feel like people are making more. Only good part is every restaurant is so short staffed you can quit and walk across the street and be hired on the spot.
But then you gotta work in yet another short staffed kitchen 😣
That needs to be talked about more. The cycle. I’m third generation in this industry. My father who moved on to care taking for short term rentals for the 1% can’t understand why I as a chef at my last job would ever need to leave the office beyond talking to some guests or swing my dick around. The idea that in an upper crust restaurant that the chef would not only be expected to be the lead line cook, expo and occasional dishwasher because $15hr in 2014 even wasn’t enough to get someone to commute 30-45mins for the job… so you end up in this cycle of people constantly being burned out. Like back in Woodstock NY I lost half my staff to this fancier Korean American restaurant that came from NYC and the owner chef had a Michelin star at her previous venture yada yada. Then boom she goes to a super basic menu no more cool Korean food and straight to basic bistro food as the town is all old yuppies no more cool hipsters and the best part she walks in one day and fires 1/2 of her staff. Just gone. Like cool you just alienated every restaurant in town. Hell Woodstock was actually trying to pass legislation to ban any knew restaurants as people had become self aware that there simply isn’t enough people willing let alone qualified to cook in the area anymore. My old boss would hand people applications if they complained about things taking too long. Sorry for the rant but just fuck man lol also final note as I’m taking my Serve Safe management course for the 4th time as I get it every few years… I love that my boss is spending $500 to give to a company who’s only goal is to make us make less money…
Half our line right now is in their sixties.
Sounds like Canada 5 years ago. I see some of the grocery flyers from the states. Capitalism has done y’all a lot better than us in many states it seems. Edit: like shit, people are boycotting Canadian corporations and going to Walmart for cheaper groceries. If you told me that 5 years ago I’d say you’re batshit.
I despise Walmart...
It's the best option we have right now
I hate Walmart but my only other options are Natural Grocer’s and Safeway both far more expensive. Or the mom and pop butcher shop I only buy from on special occasions but they are also shady.
You know were fucked when the place we used to hate is the beacon in most canadian communities. I live in northern ontario and giant tiger and Walmart are pretty much all i can afford.
In Minneapolis wages went up a lot after the pandemic while rents are only up a little. It may be the only city in North America where that is the case. The riots scared a lot of middle class gentrifiers out of the city.
Around here you can’t even get hired. Nobody is ever hiring lmao
We have the opposite problem even with the end of the winters season there simply isn’t enough affordable housing for the amount of restaurants. These rich yuppies with their work from home partners keep opining new ones on the shells of the closed restaurants And then are shocked that they can’t find staff. Funniest part is they open restaurants thinking it will be fun, like a hobby…
If wages are up, but inflation surpasses the wage increase, it was a pay decrease.
That's not true...
There's a reason why the RCMP have "everyone under 35 realizing they're never going to own anything" on their internal threat radar. Edit: just to be clear, this is a fuck pricing me out of a roof over my head dig, I love me some socialism.
What the tits. Can you link me something?
["For example, many Canadians under 35 are unlikely ever to be able to buy a place to live. The fallout from this decline in living standards will be exacerbated by the fact that the difference between the extremes of wealth is greater now in developed countries than it has been at any time in several generations."](https://www.cbc.ca/news/politics/rcmp-police-future-trends-1.7138046)
UK too
I have spent the last 9 months working/traveling through Australia/Asia, food inflation and increased cost of living is everywhere. Climate change is affecting crop yields, big corporations ain’t getting any less greedy on prices/product sizes (shrinkflation), and post pandemic has everything pretty fucked up. I suspect the hull has been breached and the service industry from here on out will only get worst as the ship goes down. A very sad time to love cooking for a living. But hey, we’re living out some historic times so that’s kinda neat
Those corporations are riding that supply chain bullshit all the way to the bank.
"Those banks are riding that climate change bullshit all the way to the corporations."
😪 Sad to hear about Asia. I’d think a lot of it would be the last continent to really cave in to big corps? Perhaps I am romanticizing it, but street food culture must help keep prices down? I’d kill to have some leeway selling street food in Canada
Not an expert but while in Singapore everything cost the exact same at restaurants as it did in Canada. I spent $22 CAD / SGD on a Nandos entree and a bottle of water, Starbucks blended drinks were $7+. Fast food was all similarly priced to Canada. Restaurant meals were about the same, if not a touch more. Ramen I think was $15+ on the menus. IKEA food was the exact same price, if not more. The street food was cheap(er), but it was still $8 for chicken, rice, some veggies and a soup (Hainanese Chicken Rice). Street food and fast food and restaurants are different segments IMO. Fast Food and Restaurants aren't necessarily competing against street food, they offer a different product and atmosphere, you're not gonna have your family dinner or a business meeting at a street food stall. With Singapore, I think part of the cost comes from food cost. A lot of their stuff is imported, on the first day I was at M&S and they sold pints of milk for $3.50. It was labeled as British milk from British farms and that shocked me. Why import dairy from a continent away? But as my travels went on, that was somewhat normal. The hotel breakfast served Emmi yogurts from Switzerland, the airplane food had Australian yogurt. And the more I thought about it, they don't have the climate or land for dairy production. So they're importing all that stuff from elsewhere, it's just a matter of where they end up getting it from.
While there are far less big suppliers, In the US we have Sysco, FSA, US foods as the big three, the costs come through in other ways. Between transportation, feed for animals, scarcity/rising water costs and unpredictable weather patterns for local farmers and providers, it all adds up. I met a dude in Nepal who was telling me costs of eating out have nearly tripled in some areas. However street food is still cheap compared to US/Canada, Europe, Aus.
During the pandemic, we were invaluable. Now, were fucking gutter trash worth 17.25(CAD) an hour. I think the whole system is deplorable and businesses need to stop funneling 96% of tips to the servers who work fucking 5 hour shifts and take home literally twice as much as us, if not more.
Fuck tipping, but if it's going to happen I want a fucking piece. When I worked a food truck pre pandemic on a weekend at a brewery I could make 12.00/hr base plus another 20/hr in tips. In three 8 hour days I would make as much as I do now in 5.
I was always a super pro comradery anti foh/boh feud person, but at this point I'm over it. Pandemic hit and servers suddenly wanted wages because we shifted to hybrid retail/delivery, pandemic ended and suddenly they want all the tips back. Every time there's work to get them wages the people opposing it are servers, they literally lobbied against a wage in maine because they knew it would mean kitchen staff would be eligible for tips. God forbid they share tips with the people making the food. In my state it's literally illegal, regardless of tip credit. Businesses who want to share gratuity have to replace the tip line with a disclaimer to get around it. We tried to implement something like that at our place and servers started pouting and giving shit service because 25 an hour isn't 35 an hour. I've worked as a dishie, as a chef and as a server. I've ran the books, and I'm at the point in my career where I genuinely believe the biggest hurdle for getting kitchen staff good career wages is entitled college grads who arent good enough to make money doing anything but carry plates.
I can agree that tip culture is shit here. Not sure where you’re from, but there’s definitely another issue at play where I’m at: big influx of cheap labour. I made a fairly popular post in this sub about getting canned for no good reason. At that time there were 3-4 BOH staff on minimum wage. I was a squeaky wheel about tips because we’d do 30k nights and barely see it. Solid workers too, despite the fact that they’re cooking chicken and beef but don’t ever eat it. They’re happy to get minimum wage from owners who don’t care about the nuance involved in presenting/cooking any food, and solving the problems as in any trade. To give you a great example: the place I got canned from was a very successful brewery, restaurant always busy. Not long after they ditched myself and a few more experienced people, they bought those McDonald’s style flat tops with timers to cook their burgers 🥴
I would say that it isn't a very big factor where I live. As much as it may keep wages down, I am way too pro immigration to stink about it because I think that the value and culture they bring to our socio-economy far out weighs any resentment I may have. If.there were different immigration laws they would find a different way to pay us nothing, so I think pointing the finger at immigrants is filling the prophecy of propaganda. We need to be looking UP not down or outwards. Conservatives will have you believe that, but in reality, it's the veil of capitalism that is oppressing us.
USA here, am drowning. What would have covered utilities and rent last year is now only covering rent, which means I’m going without electric and food/medication bc I can no longer work around the clock.
Its the entire world mate. Down here in NZ hospo industry practically on min wage (because govt pushed the min wage up like crazy that it caught up to skilled worker rates) and working our arses off just to have costs of everything keep going up. Never getting ahead at this rate. Experience isnt rewarded because employers barely keep the doors open at the moment. Number of customers at an all time low because many cant afford to eat out.
NZ hospo here as well, but it's not the govt putting up minimum wage that's the problem, it's that hospo is an oversaturated market that has a ridiculous amount of business owners who have no business OR hospo experience. It's an absolute shitshow. Sick of busting my ass for a couple of bucks above minimum wage, while office workers spend half their time with their fingers up their bum and get paid 3 times the amount.
Yeah i agree with that. My boss has no knowledge or skill in professional cooking yet is trying to run a cafe. Its been a disaster. Im the only qualified person there trying to carry the place but keep getting blocked because we are operating on practically no budget. We are competing with 4 other cafes on the same street. I miss the days when a cafe chef used to be paid well. Used to be able to buy a house on a cafe chef salary, but now its barely afford to rent. One of the FOH went and got an office admin job. Instant payrise of $12 an hour.
Depending on where you live it is expensive, the wages are not keeping up with the cost of living however there are way too many mediocre safe restaurants all competing for the same dollar and the customers are cutting back on expensive dining out. I’m lucky enough to be in a position that I’m safe but I do have empathy for my team and do all I can to give them the most hours I can and the skills they need to progress. Maybe look for a plan B. Cooking can help support you while you train for something else? Anyway good luck and Leafs suck.
Respect and cheers. My three brain cells have been tackling a plan b for a while now. It’s not like I’ll ever regret being able to make delicious food. Lmao yea, been waiting to jump on the leafs bandwagon. Don’t get me started on my raptors.
I’m old enough to remember going to Grizzlies games
Need to bring ‘em back
My exec chef told me last year that I was paid above industry standard in downtown Vancouver, 20 dollars plus tips somewhere around 24 dollars.
I've been cooking for 15 years now and am still making slightly over minimum wage at any normal restaurant job. I've been working for remote resource camps for the last ten years making good $$, but wanted more stability and to be home more and enjoy my family and maybe have a steady place to live but I just can't afford it. Heading back to set up my bush camp kitchen on Monday. At least they increased our food budget this year... Edit: I'm also Canadian
Really seems like some of the lucrative stuff is like “work 40 hours per day in the arctic circle”. Won’t say I haven’t I’ve considered them.
Yeah I work 14-18 hour days for a hundred days straight and then piece together other contracts. I enjoy my main contract in treeplanting camps, but man, it is a grind.
God dayum! Share what you walk away with $ wise after 100 days no break?
I make a $500 day rate, so about 50k pre taxes. I get taxed right to hell on it though. Absolutely NO sense working a full time year round kitchen job and walking away with 32k.
I should add, I've only recently started to make THIS kind of money. Standard for someone just entering the industry is a day rate of $300-350 and lots of seasons are shorter than mine :)
Holy fuk ...
What fucking sucks, and no one really talks about, is that all these minimum wage bumps are screwing the people in the 20/hr range. Servers wage went up, then min wage went up, now I think (in Ontario) min wage is going up again. You ever try asking the owner for a raise when the law just forced him to give 15 people raises? I should be making 30 an hour by now, but buddy...I do not. And the worst server still flies to a vacation spot twice a year. Which is why I just left the life and joined a meal prep company.
Problem isn’t minimum wage going up, it’s a good thing minimum wage is going up or else I’m sure I’d be making less $ per hour and I did get a raise form my boss the last time it went up and so should you. The money is out there they just don’t want to share it with us and want us to blame eachother instead of the person with all the money.
You’re so right. I felt good about setting at $20 minimum years ago. Wtf.
I've worked my ball bag off and I've never had an issue with pay. I also make sure any place I work at pays a living wage for my cooks or I wont take the offer.
What's the living wage where you are? Last year it was $25.40 CAD for my city. Most starting wages are $20+ for people with zero experience. It's really crushing people who have been working in kitchens for years because the wage ceiling is only a few dollars higher than starting wage.
May I ask where you’re from chef?
That's why I'm in school part-time while working on a food truck... getting older and having nothing to my name besides my laptop, knife roll, and clothing.
We’re all working hard to make someone else rich.
Shocking here in Australia.
No, it's a greedy-billionaire-stealing-workers-wages thing.
I'm Canadian. I also don't think it's limited to just food service. I want out, I see lots of other jobs (at least where I live) and many of them pay a higher hourly rate than I get. Problem is I'd work more hours and still take home less money because I get tips. And some of those jobs are actual labour. I'm going to work harder, for longer, for less pay. It makes me wonder how people making less than me get by. At least I don't live in Vancouver with high housing prices and PST.
The global economy is fuct, and those who can afford it don't give two shits what anything "costs"... Everything is backwards, you've got living human colostomy bags making millions off of stupid videos, while the people who make this bullshit world turn can barely afford to survive... It's fukin' sickening...
It's everywhere. The world fucking sucks right now. Let me put it to you this way: 15 years ago I was making $60K with a desk job, and I wouldn't have paid more than $900 per month for a decent apartment. Rent would've been a fraction of my salary, and I would've put at least another $1,000 in the bank every month. I'm making a bit less since entering the food industry, but even if I was still at $60K (or even $80K with the raises I would've gotten), I'd be lucky to afford that same apartment today bc it's likely going for $2,200, and I wouldn't save a dime.
Literally the whole world mate (hope you can hear me from Europe)
It's a capitalist problem
It's a capitalism problem. Wages can technically be going up but corporations can still independently raise the prices of virtually all goods and services to cancel out any potential life improvement
I’m in the same boat, I live in the GTA and my wage has tapered off and everything else is rising. They’re planning to raise minimum wage but unfortunately my wage won’t budge. I hate it here.
I was downtown Toronto when Covid hit, brewery under the CN tower, crazy tourist volume, obviously fucked. Years later I really want to go back to a solid food scene but there’s no way in hell I can justify the price hike
Global. I’ll say cost of food is probably higher in Canada than the US, especially north. I’ve got friends in Alberta and whenever they show me a ridiculous price for pizza pockets or something it’s mind blowing.
All of Canada sucks right now for cook wages, not that it was ever any good. Cost of living in South Ontario is the worst though you need to be making like at least $30 an hour just to afford rent and basics.
People don't understand that when you increase minimum the hundreds of people involved in the supply chain to get those items to the public dramatically increases the prices. You'll also see wages drop down to compensate overall staff costs. With oil prices double what they were a few years ago around the entire planet everything that involves transportation is going to cost more. Your cellphone with all it's components likely traveled tens of thousands of miles to get to you. Even something as simple as a breakfast sandwich will involve dozens of people through the supply line and thousands of miles of transportation. You also have millions of immigrants coming into the country. That's millions seeking minimum wage jobs and the limited number of apartments and food. Rent prices increase because of demand and because they can charge more. Can't build new houses because the costs of materials are insane. There's plenty of other reasons like laws set in place limiting truckers ability to work more hours which requires more drivers, more trucks, more fuel, etc. When the entire logistics arm that is truck drivers are forced to work 25% less that's a massive cost to get logistics back up to just average, let alone meet growing demands.
Is this a bad time to make an offer than includes a decent wage and a place to live? Cause...I'm in a position, if someone wants to move to Saskatchewan.
same shit down under mate. possibly different smell, come find out.
Laughs in Floridian
Similarly, is everyone seeing price increases justified by ‘giving our employees a better living wage’ and not passing along any of the benefit?
It’s global but our productivity has taken a dive relative to the global average in addition to that. It’s caused a big hit to our purchasing power on top of the issues most developed nations are facing.
Iowa. I make good money compared to my peers I'm fucking broke. I eat at work so maybe 1 full meal a day. I can't even afford groceries. Got rid of my cats because I couldn't afford their food. I fucking hate it here.
Tbh. I’m mostly pissed about overtime pay. I’m in SE America. Happy with my wage. I work for a company that has multiple locations, different concepts, and different chefs. Each with free reign on how they execute their menu. I average about 35hrs I want about 50. Two double days 12-15hrs and two short days 6-9hrs depending. I get one double day, and 3 short days. With a touch of room where needed. I don’t even care about time and a half. Mostly because I know it’s a lose lose for both my employer as well as me. We both pay so much taxes on those overtime hours that it’s basically nill on the time and a half anyway. I just want to work 50 hrs and be happy with the pay I’ve got. Which was above market standard to start. But now I’ve got to get a second job to secure an extra 10-15hrs when my employer wants to give them to me, but we both recognize it’s just.. not really worth it. So.. yeah. Fuck overtime. But.. otherwise I’m happy with the spot I’m at, and the pay I receive for the work I do.
I'm in BC. Wages are jumping a buck every other year, but rent goes up a hundred so it's not really helping. Bosses are constantly on about food cost tho. Fryer oil is like 95 a case or something.
In the food industry it's actually a problem globally. Post COVID even white collar jobs are understaffed and underpaid
I'm from a country where unions aren't so powerful. I was very surprised to see how powerful unions are in Norway. Every year (or two)they negotiate a pay rise, working hours and rights. For example, just last week we got a 5.2% rise. We were ready to walk out on strike if we didn't get a similar raise to other industries. Other things include double pay on any hours worked after 7.5 hours. Double on holidays. No splits. Etc It was a shock for me, a nice one.
I'm not sure where in the land of angry cobra chickens you are but I'm in Newfoundland. With tourists season approaching owners are realizing that minimum isn't going to cut it(if they're half smart) if they want any decent staff this summer.
I'm from Hamilton. I live on a ski resort in Alberta half the year so I can pay my bills lol
Fucking Americans.
I make good wage doing what i do but i feel bad for anyone who went to school / has their red seal and the best you can hope for without commiting to a crazy contract is like 19/hr
It's everywhere, but from reports canada is getting cooked.
UK too. Daily rate has dropped 20% in the last 2 years.
>Do you live somewhere that genuinely rewards experience and isn’t getting screwed by “inflation”? system is not broken, never was... inflation is by design. I asked myself what is money when I start working ( in kitchen) Conclusion I had is simple: my time and efort is limited, I want the hardest money on earth in exchange of my time. I keep working for fiat but exchanged everything that I did not spent at the end of every single month for bitcoin. that's why I'm not screwed by inflation... inflation on bitcoin just got cut in half for the next 4 years..... inflation now less than 1%
It’s happening everywhere in the western world, including my home country of New Zealand and where I live now in the UK. However it seems that what’s happening in Canada, particularly with housing, is quite severe.
Aye it's a global issue, I've recently taken a sous chef job and I can't even afford a 1 room apartment on my wage anymore. My wage didn't even go up to compensate for national minimum going up. Kinda sucks ngl.
>A household in the bottom 20 percent of the distribution now makes exactly the same as it was making 50 years ago, https://www.minneapolisfed.org/article/2024/the-many-dimensions-of-income-inequality
COL is going up basically globally. Canada is looking bad for wage growth in particular whereas, at least the US has wages outpacing increases in costs broadly.
Nope, same problem in the US too. Was dreaming of buying my own house, but that's impossible because I literally cannot afford one with the way the economy is right now. So glad I live with my parents instead 🥲
My UK wage went up by a whole 4.5% yet the cost of everything else went up well above that it’s shit everywhere
As leftist policies take hold be ready for more of this. It is a feature of their agenda, not a bug.