I worked retail/food service for years. Going to places on Christmas tells employers that they need to be open those days, and that their employees don’t need the day off.
Frankly i find it inconsiderate to the social contract to go out on holidays, and sometimes around them.
Its frankly why i always found Black Friday and the “scope creep” of this festival of consumerism partially so repulsive. I mean its repulsive on its own just in the way people act, but doubly so in that it runs right through a national holiday.
I lost years of Thanksgivings with family due to the scope creep of black Friday. Some years family could work around it, like we would have dinner at noon so I could be at work by 6 - but even then you feel terrible for forcing that.
To be fair, not everyone celebrates Christmas. As long as employees are getting a certain number of holidays in a year for whatever tradition they follow, I think it’s fine to be open on Christmas. But not to force anyone to work on Christmas, only if the business can sustain itself on non-Christmas-celebrating staff
that’s fair, but my experience was unfortunately the latter. Retail was very much “we need you to work today”, and any response other than “okay” was pretty much a reprimand. “Show up or don’t show up again” was said to me when I wanted to have Thanksgiving with family. Now I avoid anything non-essential on holidays.
It’s kind of a paradox really because people can’t go to the establishments if they’re not open. So how would the owners know whether or not people want to go there if they simply stay closed?
That’s how it works already, Chinese culture doesn’t care about Christmas, they make great money being open for their culture and others that don’t celebrate Christmas and want a normal day.
I love having Chinese coworkers because they will work extra shifts during Thanksgiving and Christmas. But it’s my responsibility to work extra shifts for Chinese new year.
When I was working for a video rental place on Thanksgiving, people would always say “I can’t believe you have to work today!” While renting movies. I wanted to yell at them “if you didn’t come in, I wouldn’t have to!”
Hypothetical loser: “Oh look Dollar General is open! Hurr-durr I’m bored, let’s go in there and throw off their statistics to make every future Christmas employee miserable because they have to be there because of losers like me.”
I would argue that then they should just stay closed, for their employee’s sake. Even non-christian, Christmas is a national holiday, and I don’t know many things that need to be open. (Hospitals and emergency unfortunately of course excluded)
This is the way. For people who really want to have other days off for their cultural holiday, they can swap shifts with other employees who will be happy to work those days.
Legit question, no? You are suggesting places should be closed because it’s a national holiday, so when it’s their cultural holiday they have to be open so you can go shop since it’s not a national holiday?
It’s hypocritical. Thats a hostile reponse.
They should be allowed to choose to be open because it’s a free market.
Your exceptions are strange, they should be allowed to be closed too, if that’s truly how you feel that it should be. It’s a national holiday after all.
Nope, obviously I do not have a binary yes/no opinion, there is obviously nuance, but you’re being very hostile in your responses and I’m not interested in having an all-out argument here.
Didn’t leave the house.
I worked retail/food service for years. Going to places on Christmas tells employers that they need to be open those days, and that their employees don’t need the day off.
Frankly i find it inconsiderate to the social contract to go out on holidays, and sometimes around them.
Its frankly why i always found Black Friday and the “scope creep” of this festival of consumerism partially so repulsive. I mean its repulsive on its own just in the way people act, but doubly so in that it runs right through a national holiday.
I lost years of Thanksgivings with family due to the scope creep of black Friday. Some years family could work around it, like we would have dinner at noon so I could be at work by 6 - but even then you feel terrible for forcing that.
To be fair, not everyone celebrates Christmas. As long as employees are getting a certain number of holidays in a year for whatever tradition they follow, I think it’s fine to be open on Christmas. But not to force anyone to work on Christmas, only if the business can sustain itself on non-Christmas-celebrating staff
that’s fair, but my experience was unfortunately the latter. Retail was very much “we need you to work today”, and any response other than “okay” was pretty much a reprimand. “Show up or don’t show up again” was said to me when I wanted to have Thanksgiving with family. Now I avoid anything non-essential on holidays.
It’s kind of a paradox really because people can’t go to the establishments if they’re not open. So how would the owners know whether or not people want to go there if they simply stay closed?
Other way around. Places default to open, then if people don’t come, they stay closed next year as acost saving measure.
That’s how it works already, Chinese culture doesn’t care about Christmas, they make great money being open for their culture and others that don’t celebrate Christmas and want a normal day.
I love having Chinese coworkers because they will work extra shifts during Thanksgiving and Christmas. But it’s my responsibility to work extra shifts for Chinese new year.
I wonder which establishments have experienced this.
When I was working for a video rental place on Thanksgiving, people would always say “I can’t believe you have to work today!” While renting movies. I wanted to yell at them “if you didn’t come in, I wouldn’t have to!”
Hypothetical loser: “Oh look Dollar General is open! Hurr-durr I’m bored, let’s go in there and throw off their statistics to make every future Christmas employee miserable because they have to be there because of losers like me.”
I would argue that then they should just stay closed, for their employee’s sake. Even non-christian, Christmas is a national holiday, and I don’t know many things that need to be open. (Hospitals and emergency unfortunately of course excluded)
This is the way. For people who really want to have other days off for their cultural holiday, they can swap shifts with other employees who will be happy to work those days.
So fuck the other places that would need to stay open during their holidays than?
Unnecessarily hostile response dude. I even gave an exception already, this is all lighthearted.
Legit question, no? You are suggesting places should be closed because it’s a national holiday, so when it’s their cultural holiday they have to be open so you can go shop since it’s not a national holiday?
It’s hypocritical. Thats a hostile reponse.
They should be allowed to choose to be open because it’s a free market.
Your exceptions are strange, they should be allowed to be closed too, if that’s truly how you feel that it should be. It’s a national holiday after all.
Nope, obviously I do not have a binary yes/no opinion, there is obviously nuance, but you’re being very hostile in your responses and I’m not interested in having an all-out argument here.
No, but it’s more subtle than ‘free market.’ There should be some mandatory national holidays.
This gives employees the opportunity to exchange shifts and have time off during their non-Christmas cultural holidays.
For me it’s like any other day. I wouldn’t mind working for the double holiday pay.