As I never tire of telling people here (and other places), Marxism is one of those strange belief systems that holds that as long as the intentions are praiseworthy, the consequences are irrelevant. Take this latest episode in the People’s Soviet of Kaliforniaaahhh:
In their seemingly never-ending quest to make lives for Californians miserable, the state legislature passed a bill that Governor Newsom signed into law mandating a $20 minimum wage for fast food workers by April of 2024.
…and why not? Don’t we want people to be able to earn a “living” wage in California? (Okay, Califuckingfornia is expensive to live in because of their insane one-party government and its onerous laws, rules and regulations, but we can discuss all that some other time.)
Well, sure. Except that business owners, already driven up against the wall by said laws and regulations, have decided that enough is enough, and they need to rein in costs — in this case, salary costs.
So:
PacPizza LLC, operating as Pizza Hut, said in a federal WARN (Worker Adjustment and Retraining Notification) Act notice filed with California’s Employment Development Department that the company has made a business decision to eliminate first-party delivery services and, as a result, the elimination of all delivery driver positions. Similarly, Southern California Pizza Co. has also announced layoffs, impacting about 841 drivers across the state.
Thus, Californians too lazy to fetch their own pizzas will now have to rely on expensive “third-party” delivery services (e.g. UberEats etc.) to deliver their deep-dish delicacies.
Oh, wait; didn’t California recently pass legislation that made Uber service essentially too costly for people not on a corporate expense account? Why yes, yes they did:
The California Legislature passed a law in 2019 that changed the rules of who is an employee and who is an independent contractor. It’s an important distinction for companies because employees are covered by a broad range of labor laws that guarantee them certain benefits while independent contractors are not.
While the law applied to lots of industries, it had the biggest impact on app-based ride hailing and delivery companies. Their business relies on contracting with people to use their own cars to give people rides and make deliveries. Under the 2019 law, companies would have to treat those drivers as employees and provide certain benefits that would greatly increase the businesses’ expenses.
But hey, that was too much even for the serfs and helots a.k.a. ordinary Californians, who later passed Proposition 22 in a ballot measure, in essence telling the legislature to fuck off and leave Uber and their drivers alone. Of course, that was no good, so the CalGov tried to get the Prop 22 overturned in the courts (standard Commie reaction when the peasants revolt, if they can’t be stuffed into gulags or shot in killing pits).
App-based ride hailing and delivery companies like Uber and Lyft can continue to treat their California drivers as independent contractors, a state appeals court ruled Monday, allowing the tech giants to bypass other state laws requiring worker protections and benefits.
The ruling mostly upholds a voter-approved law, called Proposition 22, that said drivers for companies like Uber and Lyft are independent contractors and are not entitled to benefits like paid sick leave and unemployment insurance. A lower court ruling in 2021 had said Proposition 22 was illegal, but Monday’s ruling reversed that decision.
Everyone following the story of the film so far? (There may be a test.)
Anyway, now that the Cali Politburo has decreed that workers have to be paid a lot more than their services are worth, and employers have responded by applying one of the basic capitalist principles (when wages get too high, reduce the workforce), expect the Politburo to pass some equally-stupid new law, say that companies which sell fast food have to employ drivers.
You heard it here first.
Frankly, I look forward to the day when Californians have to fetch their own fucking pizzas, driving cars at $7/gallon fuel costs or EVs which catch fire and turn them and their pizzas into extra-crispy meals for buzzards.
Me, I say: Let California sink.
