One job he called about was as a manager at a Burger King. If someone offered me more money I might go. This sort of calculating job-hopping philosophy has business owners throwing their hands up in despair. More Americans are employed since the 1960s, and the days of hanging onto that low-wage paycheck through thick and thin are over. The economy is in the longest peacetime expansion ever, having created two million jobs in 1998.
Employers are desperate to fill slots for cashiers, waitstaff, store managers, security guards.
The low-wage workers have been doing significantly better over the past three years. There are so many jobs that you'll hire someone, and they won't even show up. Lichtenstein recalls how one young man she hired recently was lured down the street by another business owner who was so brazen that he came into her store to ask the clerk for his phone number. Rebecca Blank, a member of the White House Council of Economic Advisers, says it's about time that low-wage workers are compensated. If you run a strong economy long enough, it boils down to the low-wage worker.