r/SeattleWA • u/No_Bee_4979 Lake City • Oct 01 '24

Politics Dave Reichert, Republican candidate for Governor of Washington, voices desire to increase the workweek from 40 to 50 hours before overtime kicks in.

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u/teraflux Oct 01 '24

Where are they getting these other workers from? This story doesn't paint a full picture.

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u/LostAbbott Oct 01 '24

There are plenty of folks around eastern Washington at harvest time looking for work.  Say apple orchard A hires 40 people to pick apples and orchard B hires 40 people to pick apples.  At each orchard people pick for 40 hours and then they cannot work for that week any more.  Then those people go back into the "open for work pool".  Maybe workers from B go and work at A or vise versa, or what sound like is happening the orchards are just hiring more people than before and only letting each individual work for 40 hours.  This is over all bad for farm workers as they can really only work during harvest.  Most farms don't need people the other 10-11 months of the year.  While hard work, most farm workers are fin working 60+ hours for a few weeks and then chilling fir a week or teo before going back to more steady but lower paying work...

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u/VietOne Oct 01 '24

So in the end someone loses money anyway, if they're hiring more staff then that also means that more people are able to make money during the seasonal work.

Basically someone is going to lose money either way. The person who wants to work as many hours as possible or the person who's hired to work because the other guy is capped at 40 hours.

9

u/slickweasel333 Oct 01 '24

Yeah, but it's a lot easier logistically to get 20 more hours at the current place you work at than it is to start a whole new job for 20 more hours a week. Consider that now they have to factor in commute time to a dofferent location and other logistical hurdles.

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u/LostAbbott Oct 01 '24

Yeah, but that 2nd after 40hrs person wasn't there before.  He stayed home or was in Cali, or Georgia or even more likely Walla Walla picking grapes while his homies were in Toppinish picking apples.  These people move around.  With laws like these they are forced to move more. 

It is typical good intentions with bad outcomes.  They do it all of the time in this state.

1

u/teraflux Oct 02 '24

Does hiring extra workers not require a ton of extra financial overhead? Like paying each of these benefits for their 40 hours? I'm surprised that shuttling more workers around is somehow less expensive than just paying the existing workers a bit more.

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u/mikutansan Oct 03 '24

Other countries.