Rethinking Retail

All Fun and Cool Clothes? Youth Workers’ Consumer Identity in Clothing Retail

“…Improvements to clothing retail jobs would directly impact nearly a million employees, with potential for spillover effects into the wider retail industry. Our findings echo other calls for major interventions into retailer labor practices (Carré & Tilly, 2008; Cauthen, 2011; Luce & Fujita, 2012; Ruetschlin & Asante-Muhammad, 2015; Ton, 2009, 2012; Traub, 2014). The retail industry requires further research and recognition by policymakers, employers, and labor activists as the work-consumption nexus becomes increasingly prominent in the postindustrial economy.…”

“…Lance recalls that the worst thing about the job was: “The inconsistent hours, because I really needed the work going into college, like one week I’d get a lot, [but] the next I wouldn’t.” Such scheduling practices reflect strategic attempts to increase profits, where stores and managers increasingly try to attune staffing to match consumer demand (Cauthen, 2011; Henly et al., 2006; Lambert, 2008). Liz explains, “They’re like, ‘We just have a lot of people, so you’re not going to get that many hours’.” Low and unpredictable hours are a challenge for retail workers (CLASP/RAP/Women Employed, 2014; Ruetschlin & Asante-Muhammad, 2015; Traub, 2014).…”

“…Nearly 1 million U.S. workers—almost 1% of all workers—were employed in clothing retail in 2014, which pays less than most other retail positions (Bureau of Labor Statistics, 2015; Fiscal Policy Institute, 2008). This industry disproportionately employs people who are young, not unionized, women, and racial and ethnic minorities, making it a key area to study to examine vulnerable workers (Bronfenbrenner, 2005; Macdonald & Merrill, 2008; Macdonald & Sirianni, 1996; Ruetschlin & Asante-Muhammad, 2015; Traub, 2014).…”

,,,Shareholder Primacy and Worker Prosperity: A Broken Link

“…111 The scale is startling: As Catherine Ruetschlin and Amy Traub show, rather than spending $6.6 billion on stock buybacks in 2013, Walmart could have raised the wages of its 825,000 frontline employees by $5.13 per hour if it had chosen to invest in its workers. 112 William Lazonick shows that while McDonald's conducted the buyback program described above, it paid the 90,000 US workers that it directly employs one dollar over the legal minimum wage, bringing the average wage to $9.90 per hour. 113 Ken-Hou Lin documents how the rise in financial asset-holding, the substitution of corporate debt for equity, and shareholder value orientation impacts employment size, and specifically considers the disparate effects among different occupational groups: production employees, service employees, and professional and management employees.…”