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Speaker 1: Hey, this is Annie, and you're listening to stuff Mom

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Speaker 1: never told you. So. Is after Thanksgiving here in the

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Speaker 1: United States, which means naturally shopping, right. What better time

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Speaker 1: to shop than when you're stuffed to the brim with food.

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Speaker 1: When I was in high school, I used to work

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Speaker 1: on Black Friday, which if you don't know, is I'm

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Speaker 1: sure you probably do, but if you don't, it's this

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Speaker 1: big shopping day after Thanksgiving in the United States. Um.

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Speaker 1: And I worked at Osh Gosh Bagosh sells baby clothes,

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Speaker 1: and I would get there around eleven PM the day

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Speaker 1: of Thanksgiving and I would work until probably eight am,

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Speaker 1: I think. And I got to see a lot of

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Speaker 1: very frustrated shoppers not believing me when I said, no,

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Speaker 1: we do not have any more of whatever size that

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Speaker 1: you want in the back. People refuse to believe that. Um.

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Speaker 1: If they insisted, I would go to the back, which

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Speaker 1: literally had nothing nothing, and I would sit for a minute,

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Speaker 1: drink some coffee, check my phone, and I would go

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Speaker 1: back out and tell them, yes, I checked, but there's

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Speaker 1: no more in that size. And then my friend who

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Speaker 1: she she worked with me, we would go to iye Hoop.

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Speaker 1: We lived in a small town so our options are remanded.

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Speaker 1: And she would deliriously tell me her sister was going

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Speaker 1: to steal her hashgrowns. That seriously happened more than once.

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Speaker 1: She did not handle lack of sleep well. Um. And

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Speaker 1: Black Friday is something that my mom and I enjoyed

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Speaker 1: when I was young, um in a very low key

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Speaker 1: type of way. But the situation for retail workers in

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Speaker 1: the United States is not great, and it's a conversation

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Speaker 1: we wanted to revive and revisit in this classic episode.

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Speaker 1: I hope you enjoy. Welcome to Stuff Mom Never told

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Speaker 1: you from how stupp works dot Com. Hello, and welcome

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Speaker 1: to the podcast. I'm Kristen and I'm Caroline, and we're

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Speaker 1: talking about women in retail today because as we're recording

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Speaker 1: this podcast, the holiday season is upon us, which means

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Speaker 1: 'tis the season for shop until you drop in? Yeah?

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Speaker 1: I can't. I'm terrified, Kristen. I can't go into stores

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Speaker 1: normally because it stresses me out so much. Um. And

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Speaker 1: by that, I just mean, like, you know, the peak

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Speaker 1: time of day when there's a million people at the mall,

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Speaker 1: I just can't do it. I can go early in

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Speaker 1: the morning, I can go right before close, but if

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Speaker 1: there's a million people, I can't do it. Um. And

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Speaker 1: Christmas season, holiday season, gift giving season, and by that

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Speaker 1: I mean obsessive shopping season. It's all too much. People

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Speaker 1: are all over the place, they are congregating in the stores,

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Speaker 1: They're not walking fast enough, they're picking up the merchandise

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Speaker 1: and just like throwing it or something. I don't know

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Speaker 1: what happens, but basically what I'm saying is, uh, we

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Speaker 1: don't pay our retail workers enough for them to deal

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Speaker 1: with the horror that is us as consumers during the

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Speaker 1: holiday season. Right, everybody's shopping for those bargains. You've got

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Speaker 1: Black Friday deals. But imagine, Caroline, all of the things

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Speaker 1: that annoy both of us about holiday shopping, the traffic,

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Speaker 1: the people, the mess, the stress that beatles, Christmas song

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Speaker 1: playing over and over again, simply having a wonderful Christmas time.

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Speaker 1: It doesn't stop from Thanksgiving to Christmas Eve. Uh. It's

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Speaker 1: okay one time, um, but imagine having to do that

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Speaker 1: avery day. Um. And if you are a part time

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Speaker 1: retail worker, full time retail already things are stressful, and

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Speaker 1: then the holidays just ramp it up. And of course

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Speaker 1: every year seasonal retail workers are hired on this year.

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Speaker 1: In the US alone, there are seven hundred thousand projected

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Speaker 1: seasonal workers who will be hired um, although some of

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Speaker 1: that is transitioning from traditional storefront to warehouse work because

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Speaker 1: of people like me who prefer Amazon Prime to the mall.

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Speaker 1: Also supporting local independent artisans and makers whenever I can,

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Speaker 1: of course, but all of this just exacerbates these year

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Speaker 1: round issues. Rude customers who were yelling at you as

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Speaker 1: if things are your fault when you are the floor walker. UM,

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Speaker 1: Messy customers, people again, throwing merchandise. It seems like I

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Speaker 1: mean you and I. Chris and I've talked about the

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Speaker 1: horror that is H and M on like a Saturday.

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Speaker 1: It gets even worse around the holidays. UM. And the

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Speaker 1: awkwardness of having to push a stores credit card on customers.

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Speaker 1: You don't like it customers neither does the person behind

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Speaker 1: the register, And that was something I hadn't thought about

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Speaker 1: until we ended up on a Reddit thread asking retail

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Speaker 1: workers like, what don't we know what's happening behind the scenes?

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Speaker 1: And the pushing the store credit card was something that

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Speaker 1: came up a lot because some stores allah the whole

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Speaker 1: Wells Fargo fiasco of people really pushing those credit cards,

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Speaker 1: managers setting quotas that they have to hit and really

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Speaker 1: making them as uncomfortable as we are. And and the

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Speaker 1: twisted thing about that is too A lot of times

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Speaker 1: the employees who are being pressed to push these credit

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Speaker 1: cards on us are not making very much money to

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Speaker 1: begin with, you know. Um, and retail represents such a

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Speaker 1: massive sector of jobs. Oh yeah, fifteen million people work

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Speaker 1: retail jobs in the United States alone, and more than half,

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Speaker 1: about fifty of them are women. And I didn't realize this,

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Speaker 1: but cashiers and retail salespeople. Uh, those are the two

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Speaker 1: largest occupations in this country according to the Bureau of

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Speaker 1: Labor Statistics. Uh, and that equates to about seven point

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Speaker 1: eight million people. And those seven point eight million people

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Speaker 1: are making around twenty two thousand a year median and

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Speaker 1: one in three or part time, and a lot of

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Speaker 1: those are also working nights and weekends. Um. And you

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Speaker 1: see a lot of disparities that we're going to get

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Speaker 1: into deeper into the podcast. But in terms of transitioning

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Speaker 1: from part time to full time and then in management,

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Speaker 1: it's really really tough, especially if you are a woman,

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Speaker 1: and even more, especially if you are a woman of color.

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Speaker 1: So if you look at Walmart alone, women make up

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Speaker 1: about fifty of their workforce, but a study from the

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Speaker 1: think tank Demos found that only twenty nine percent were

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Speaker 1: promoted to store manager over a ten year period. So

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Speaker 1: tailors all this time, you definitely see a disproportionate number

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Speaker 1: of fellas and management, supervisory and ownership roles, and more

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Speaker 1: of that of women in the workforce who are in

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Speaker 1: the lower paying cashier jobs and even just the salesperson jobs. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and this kind of reminds me of the episode we

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Speaker 1: did on waitresses women working in restaurant server positions. But

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Speaker 1: by that I mean the situation is not great in

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Speaker 1: terms of working conditions and also compensation. About one point

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Speaker 1: three million women in retail live at or near the

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Speaker 1: poverty line, and one in five are the soul breadwinners

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Speaker 1: for their family. Also, one in five women who work

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Speaker 1: retail want more hours. They want to be able to

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Speaker 1: work more make more money, but they can't get them um.

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Speaker 1: For a variety of reasons, employers might want to maintain

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Speaker 1: just a part time workforce. They don't want to pay

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Speaker 1: you full time UM. But also there's the issue that

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Speaker 1: of retail workers receive their schedules a week or less

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Speaker 1: in advance, which that's great for the employer they can

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Speaker 1: maintain like a flexible schedule and fit people in where

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Speaker 1: they need to. Horrifying though for the workers who are

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Speaker 1: actually trying to have a life and plan things like childcare,

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Speaker 1: elder care, doctor's appointments, their own holiday shopping, just so

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Speaker 1: many other things that can really put your life into

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Speaker 1: a tailspin if you can't even plan like a couple

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Speaker 1: of days in advance. And I would are you that

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Speaker 1: in terms of not giving people more hours, not having

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Speaker 1: more full time employees is maybe to do with not

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Speaker 1: wanting to pay benefits, you know, because once you get

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Speaker 1: to uh, the full time status, then it costs employers more.

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Speaker 1: And there's a whole other conversation that we could have

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Speaker 1: that we don't have time to have in this podcast

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Speaker 1: about changes the Obama administration made lowering the threshold for

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Speaker 1: employees to have to be paid over time, for employees

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Speaker 1: to have to start giving paid sick leave and vacation,

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Speaker 1: things that really, UM, I believe that all workers should

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Speaker 1: be afforded, but when you look too at a lot

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Speaker 1: of these one in five women who are part time

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Speaker 1: and want more hours they're working like thirty one hours.

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Speaker 1: So because when you might hear part time and think, oh,

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Speaker 1: it's what like fifteen hours a week, twenty hours a week, No,

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Speaker 1: it's almost full time, but not quite, just to keep

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Speaker 1: that overhead low. And of course, not surprisingly, there is

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Speaker 1: a wage gap issue as well. Uh, full time retail

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Speaker 1: sales women earn about sixty eight cents to every dollar

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Speaker 1: a man in the same position earns, and to put

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Speaker 1: that in perspective, that woman would need to work in

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Speaker 1: extra six months to match that man's annual income. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and these are apples to apples jobs. People were not

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Speaker 1: talking about a cashier making sixties eight cents to a

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Speaker 1: mail manager's dollar. This is the same across the board.

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Speaker 1: And this reminds me of our conversation about the gender

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Speaker 1: wage gap in custodial work, where in these lower paying

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Speaker 1: jobs we often see that the wage gap widens um,

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Speaker 1: which seems counterintuity, but this is another example of that

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Speaker 1: absolutely being the case. And surprise, no surprise, retail has

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Speaker 1: never been particularly kind to women, even though we think

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Speaker 1: of it as a very feminized and woman friendly type

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Speaker 1: of job. Well, now it's very feminized. But again to

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Speaker 1: harken back to Kristen, would you say most of our episodes, uh,

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Speaker 1: so many of them? Uh teaching? Uh what else? Librarianship?

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Speaker 1: These things all started out employing men folk, uh, and

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Speaker 1: then started employing women because they were cheaper secretarial work. Yes,

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Speaker 1: So a little tidbit that I I didn't know. Um shocking.

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Speaker 1: I'm not fully aware of the entire history of retail establishments,

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Speaker 1: but I am now. Um, but we're gonna be so

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Speaker 1: fun at holiday parties. But I can't wait till Yeah,

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Speaker 1: I'm just and a guilt everybody at Thanksgiving. The world's

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Speaker 1: first department store opened in seventeen nineties six. It was

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Speaker 1: called Harding Howl and Companies, Grand Fashionable Magazine. Uh. And

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Speaker 1: that was in London, and it had four departments. Uh,

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Speaker 1: furs and fans really all the important food groups, right,

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Speaker 1: furs and fans. Haberdashery. I'm sorry, I literally don't know

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Speaker 1: how to say that word without saying it like that

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Speaker 1: jewelry and clocks and millinery. Yeah. I like that they

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Speaker 1: have millinery and haberdashery separate because I guess you know,

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Speaker 1: folks were wearing so many hats, even you wouldn't want

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Speaker 1: men and women in the same space. You cannot have

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Speaker 1: the mixing of hats up promiscuous group of hats. So millinery,

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Speaker 1: I would imagine, would be safe for the ladies to

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Speaker 1: go in and look at all their their BIMs and

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Speaker 1: bobs and ribbons and what what's not and things with

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Speaker 1: the feathers. Yes, and for the men folk to be

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Speaker 1: able to safely go over and smoke their cigars and

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Speaker 1: look at the their fedoras. Um. And like you said,

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Speaker 1: the first retail clerks, we're guys, uh. And these were

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Speaker 1: men who operated and often slept in their stores. These

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Speaker 1: were small stores, and really there was no major need

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Speaker 1: to hire women because fathers would essentially apprentice their sons.

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Speaker 1: It was the family business. Yeah. It kind of reminded

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Speaker 1: me if anyone out there has watched Deadwood of the

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Speaker 1: hardware store, that the two main guys open in Deadwood

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Speaker 1: because they they basically sleep there. They run this hardware

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Speaker 1: store and they live there. It's their whole life. Their

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Speaker 1: whole existence is around this hardware store, minus some drama

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Speaker 1: with some prostitutes. Now, Caroline, this reminds me also of

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Speaker 1: the Wild West, the Frontier. No prostitutes though, This makes

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Speaker 1: me think of Nelly Olsen in Little House in the

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Speaker 1: Prairie because her family, if y'all remember, they owned Olsen's Mercantile,

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Speaker 1: which was the general store, and she was such a

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Speaker 1: snob and so mean because she had access to all

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Speaker 1: the penny candies and the ribbons. And I want to

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Speaker 1: say that they also slept above the general store, which

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Speaker 1: I just thought was really cool. But this was also

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Speaker 1: in the phase where my dream car was a camper,

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Speaker 1: so go figure um. But Nellie would not have been

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Speaker 1: the person to have run the store. Her dad would

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Speaker 1: have passed it down to her brother. And you want

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Speaker 1: to know what changed everything, the same thing that changed

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Speaker 1: everything for white women in employment outside the home and

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Speaker 1: outside the domestic service in the United States, the Civil War. Really,

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Speaker 1: wars always get women out of the house and into

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Speaker 1: new jobs, and retail is one of those. Yeah, there

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Speaker 1: was a man drain, and I just picture men getting

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Speaker 1: stuck in a drain, the old man drain. It happens.

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Speaker 1: There's the World War one man drain, the World War

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Speaker 1: two man drain. But really without man drains, would we

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Speaker 1: have women's gains? As a rhyme, Oh, put that on

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Speaker 1: a poster and was it not, though considered sort of

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Speaker 1: dirty and scandalous for women to be behind the counter

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Speaker 1: working with money and making these transactions. Yeah, I mean

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Speaker 1: this was this was one of the first times that

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Speaker 1: female labor was really put on public display. So she

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Speaker 1: would have been coming into contact with not only other women,

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Speaker 1: but also with other men. And so if we hop

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Speaker 1: back to London, where a lot of stuff is going on. Initially,

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Speaker 1: you have this rising middle class in the Victorian era

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Speaker 1: and apartment stores are popping up, and it's deemed inappropriate

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Speaker 1: for for women to be clerks. Snobs called them counterhoppers,

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Speaker 1: but there were some more progressive women who were like, uh,

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Speaker 1: ladies need employment. Working class women need to be able

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Speaker 1: to make a wage. And in eighteen fifty nine there

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Speaker 1: was this group of women in London's West Side called

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Speaker 1: the Ladies of Langham Place who got together at a

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Speaker 1: coffee house, which, first of all, if y'all have listened

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Speaker 1: to our episode on gender Coffee and Barisa's, you know

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Speaker 1: that that's a daring move to begin with, because coffee

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Speaker 1: houses were for fellas. But these ladies were like, now y'all,

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Speaker 1: we're going to meet here too, and they got together

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Speaker 1: to figure out how to improve employment options for women,

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Speaker 1: and they really inspired what's considered the shopgirl revolution. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: and you have one of these ladies of Langham Place,

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Speaker 1: Jesse Boucherette, who called for schools to be founded to

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Speaker 1: train girls to be come shop assistant. She said, why

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Speaker 1: should bearded men be employed to sell ribbon lace and handkerchiefs,

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Speaker 1: which to me just echoes our advertising Women in Advertising

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Speaker 1: episode where women are arguing we need more women in

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Speaker 1: advertising because women can speak to other women, they know

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Speaker 1: what women want, so therefore we need to get women

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Speaker 1: in here, and then there ended up being this like

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Speaker 1: pink ghettoization of the products that women were hawking. And

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Speaker 1: to me this kind of reads like this as well,

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Speaker 1: because it's sort of a preview of actually getting more

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Speaker 1: women into these sales lady or shop girl roles. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: And we learned a lot of this info about the

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Speaker 1: shop girl revolution in London from this fantastic multipart BBC

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Speaker 1: series that's also starts out recounting diary entries from well

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Speaker 1: healed women who could afford to go to stores and

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Speaker 1: go to buy their ribbon lace and handkerchiefs from the

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Speaker 1: bearded men and how dismissed they often were by the

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Speaker 1: mail clerks, and what a drag it often was, and

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Speaker 1: shopping was really not an enjoyable process. All these somber

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Speaker 1: men working as clerks, right, And that was another argument

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Speaker 1: to get women working as clerks, because you know, ladies

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Speaker 1: like ladies, right, Ladies can probably sell better too. Ladies.

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Speaker 1: Are we not kind of touching on emotional labor here? Sure?

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Speaker 1: Codling being kind when you don't care. There is so

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Speaker 1: much emotional labor that goes into retail work, and it's expected.

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Speaker 1: If you aren't putting forth the emotional labor effort, you're

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Speaker 1: considered rude or a bad employee. Well, because well before

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Speaker 1: the ladies of lang in Place got together at ye

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Speaker 1: oldie Starbucks, the guy that the department store magnate and

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Speaker 1: his name is escaping me right now, um had already

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Speaker 1: come up with the philosophy of the customer always being right.

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Speaker 1: So that was already ingrained. And that also establishes this

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Speaker 1: class system that you have behind the counter and in

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Speaker 1: front of it. And because of that class and the

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Speaker 1: fact that these women needed those jobs, Yes, from eighteen

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Speaker 1: fifty we do see women making the first inroads into

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Speaker 1: retail although some stores hired more than others. But what

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Speaker 1: was driving a lot of that for the male shop

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Speaker 1: owners who were hiring them was that there was a

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Speaker 1: large supply of them, and they came cheap, like those

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Speaker 1: penny candies. They came as cheap as a penny candy.

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Speaker 1: But it's the same kind of thing that we do

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Speaker 1: see with the shift to secretarial work, where it's like, well,

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Speaker 1: you know, the women are cheaper, same thing with librarianship, Well,

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Speaker 1: the women are cheaper. And here we're still talking about

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Speaker 1: white women though, true, true, true, And so if you

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Speaker 1: look at eighteen ninety, about one in fifty sales people

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Speaker 1: were women. By ninety though that was one in sixteen. Um.

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Speaker 1: But things were not rosy. It wasn't like there was

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Speaker 1: some like lady utopia behind the counter in these in

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Speaker 1: these shops. I know, if only it were all just

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Speaker 1: fun makeover montages. Everybody dabbing each other's faces with this huge,

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Speaker 1: comically large like powder poop, you know, trying on different

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Speaker 1: coursets and fainting into each other's arms. Um. And for

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Speaker 1: listeners who have have or are are right now working

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Speaker 1: in retail, hell, can you imagine not only having that

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Speaker 1: job but also having that job responsible for your housing.

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Speaker 1: So and this makes me think of one of my

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Speaker 1: best friends who for a very long time worked at

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Speaker 1: American Apparel and who all, she's got some stories to

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Speaker 1: tell um And if if she also had to work

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Speaker 1: at American Apparel and then turn around and go home

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Speaker 1: to the American Apparel dormitories where I mean do Jerry

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Speaker 1: would probably be laying in wait up. But that's kind

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Speaker 1: of the situation. So especially for a lot of these

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Speaker 1: stores um in Britain that we're popping up at the time,

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Speaker 1: and these shop girls who were moving into the big city,

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Speaker 1: they required women to quote unquote live in or live

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Speaker 1: in accommodations designated by the employer, which is exactly what

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Speaker 1: we were talking about a little while ago on our

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Speaker 1: episode about women flight attendants. The first female flight attendants

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Speaker 1: had to live in stewardess dormitories. And that major league

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Speaker 1: paternalistic move was also really money grubbing on the part

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Speaker 1: of these shop owners because while they did require the

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Speaker 1: women to live in these dorms, they also required them

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Speaker 1: to pay rent, but the rent was just taken out

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Speaker 1: of their paycheck, which is that is a dirty move. Yeah,

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Speaker 1: So you're already hiring cheaper labor than men. And we

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Speaker 1: should also mention that another motivation for keeping these women

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Speaker 1: sequestered in these highly regulated dorms was to manage morality. Yeah.

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Speaker 1: But the thing is, when you have these workers who

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Speaker 1: are making such paltry sums of money, it drove many

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Speaker 1: of them too in order to survive into sex work,

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Speaker 1: and so you start to see this association. It was

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Speaker 1: already such a scandalous thing to have women needing to

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Speaker 1: work work outside the home, and no less in a

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Speaker 1: job that required them to interact with all sorts of people. Um,

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Speaker 1: but that's when you really see the strong association between

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Speaker 1: the scandal of having women work as uh, shop ladies

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Speaker 1: or shop girls and assuming that they're all sex workers

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Speaker 1: or prostitutes. Well, because a lot of them had to

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Speaker 1: turn to sex work to actually make ends meet, they

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Speaker 1: didn't make enough money. I mean, this was a very

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Speaker 1: real fact of shop work at this time. And Uh.

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Speaker 1: In that BBC series which will link to in the

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Speaker 1: source post for this episode on stuff Mom Never Told

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Speaker 1: You dot Com because it's on YouTube and you should

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Speaker 1: check it out. It's fascinating, the host goes into one

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Speaker 1: of these very old shops and goes upstairs where the

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Speaker 1: shop girls would possibly meet customers to make some extra

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Speaker 1: cash selling their bodies. Um, And if we hop back

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Speaker 1: to the US, the thing is as deplorable as these

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Speaker 1: situations kind of were. And I'm not sure how often

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Speaker 1: uh women in retail at this time in the US,

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Speaker 1: we're also turning to sex work. I can't imagine that

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Speaker 1: that none of them we're doing it, but it's still

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Speaker 1: these jobs still tended to pay more than domestic labor

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Speaker 1: and manufacturing work, which if you are a working class woman,

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Speaker 1: those are really the only options employment options that you've got.

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Speaker 1: So kind of like secretarial work, while they were being

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Speaker 1: undervalued and underpaid and in some case outright abuse. It's like, well,

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Speaker 1: but at least it's not at least we're not in

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Speaker 1: a factory. At least we're not in a factory. But

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Speaker 1: that doesn't mean the work was not punishing. You worked

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Speaker 1: incredibly long hours, think six am to nine pm. You'd

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Speaker 1: be stocking things, tidying up and cleaning, having to deal

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Speaker 1: with the emotional labor aspect of customer service. And you

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Speaker 1: better not sit down. Oh yeah, no sitting allowed. I mean,

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Speaker 1: the conditions were so physically punishing that they prompted Nellie

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Speaker 1: Bli style exposes on the harsh working conditions. For instance,

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Speaker 1: there was one published called Death and Disease Behind the counter.

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Speaker 1: The physical ailments that women in retail often developed became

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Speaker 1: nicknamed the standing evil because they tended to develop anemia

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Speaker 1: and consumption. There was even this thing called the bustle stick,

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Speaker 1: which was invented at one point that would allow women

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Speaker 1: to just sort of lean back and and perch on it,

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Speaker 1: so they're not sitting necessarily, but they're not quite standing.

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Speaker 1: They can take a break for a second. But unfortunately

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Speaker 1: the bustle stick never caught on. Yeah, I think you

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Speaker 1: can get something like that now for camping. So when

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Speaker 1: you're on the trail hiking up a mountain, you know,

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Speaker 1: you don't have to necessarily lie down or sit down.

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Speaker 1: You can sort of a lean and perch. I I

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Speaker 1: am heading straight to Ori e I and asking do

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Speaker 1: you have a bustle where the bustle sticks women, Um, well, yeah,

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00:26:10,440 --> 00:26:13,560
Speaker 1: I mean it was considered in poor taste to be

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Speaker 1: sitting down and that wasn't just a directive coming from

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Speaker 1: the higher ups in the department store. Customers would complain, Uh,

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Speaker 1: They thought it was like a sign of laziness and

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Speaker 1: disrespect if they saw any of these shop girls sitting down.

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Speaker 1: Oh yeah, I mean it's heaped in, steeped in classism. Uh.

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Speaker 1: And Macy's probably a familiar name to a lot of listeners.

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Speaker 1: Nineteenth century Macy's was real intense. Although on the one

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Speaker 1: hand they did promote a lot of the first female

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Speaker 1: supervisors Lady Go Macy's. But Macy's also did not allow

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Speaker 1: sitting and considered what they called unnecessary conversations grounds for firing. Yeah.

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00:26:57,520 --> 00:26:59,520
Speaker 1: I mean, like they adim on a short leash. Don't

397
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Speaker 1: be too chick addie, as one boss told me when

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Speaker 1: I was right out of college. Um. And it is funny,

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00:27:06,800 --> 00:27:10,199
Speaker 1: you know. We in our waitressing episode, we kicked it

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Speaker 1: off by asking women who are in the service industry,

401
00:27:13,800 --> 00:27:17,680
Speaker 1: do you prefer to be called waiters, waitresses, servers? What?

402
00:27:18,280 --> 00:27:20,720
Speaker 1: Because what you call yourself and what other people call

403
00:27:20,800 --> 00:27:25,520
Speaker 1: you it does matter. Um And American stores did originally

404
00:27:25,560 --> 00:27:29,800
Speaker 1: adopt the British term shop girls, but the serious employees

405
00:27:29,920 --> 00:27:33,760
Speaker 1: preferred sales ladies. Right. They didn't even want to be

406
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Speaker 1: called saleswomen. They want to be called sales ladies because again,

407
00:27:37,640 --> 00:27:41,440
Speaker 1: class a lady is someone who I mean that denotes

408
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Speaker 1: a higher class. Yeah, but reading this, I was like, oh,

409
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Speaker 1: I call them sales ladies, not ironically or or anything.

410
00:27:49,560 --> 00:27:52,320
Speaker 1: I just called I refer to them as sales ladies. Well,

411
00:27:53,080 --> 00:27:55,920
Speaker 1: ye oldies. Sales ladies would be happy to hear them.

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Speaker 1: But you know, I don't call like, if I see

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Speaker 1: a woman who's about my age working at Best buy

414
00:28:01,600 --> 00:28:04,320
Speaker 1: or or or a jay Crew or something, I don't

415
00:28:04,320 --> 00:28:05,879
Speaker 1: think of her as a sales lady. I tend to

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00:28:05,880 --> 00:28:07,879
Speaker 1: think of sales ladies as as the women who were

417
00:28:07,880 --> 00:28:11,080
Speaker 1: in their fifties, sixties, seventies, maybe they're at Talbot, the

418
00:28:11,080 --> 00:28:16,280
Speaker 1: ones who do Bram measurements. Sales ladies. Yeah, exactly. My

419
00:28:16,320 --> 00:28:20,199
Speaker 1: mother was a sales lady. She worked at Coldwater Creek

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00:28:20,320 --> 00:28:24,439
Speaker 1: part time to supplement her flight attendant income slash have

421
00:28:24,600 --> 00:28:27,639
Speaker 1: something to do on her off time, and uh, I

422
00:28:27,680 --> 00:28:30,560
Speaker 1: think she would qualify as a sales lady. She's also

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Speaker 1: the reason that I make sure to always remove my

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Speaker 1: clothes from the dressing room when I am done trying

425
00:28:37,560 --> 00:28:41,200
Speaker 1: them on, because if you want to hear a bunch

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Speaker 1: of women complain about you, be the person who leaves

427
00:28:44,840 --> 00:28:49,440
Speaker 1: your clothes in the dressing room, you will be disliked intensely. Well.

428
00:28:49,480 --> 00:28:54,960
Speaker 1: And speaking of what retail sales people prefer to be called,

429
00:28:55,280 --> 00:28:59,200
Speaker 1: let's not forget that they also have names, as we

430
00:28:59,280 --> 00:29:03,440
Speaker 1: all do. That was something on the Reddit thread where

431
00:29:03,520 --> 00:29:07,200
Speaker 1: especially if someone is wearing a name tag, uh, they're like,

432
00:29:07,440 --> 00:29:09,400
Speaker 1: I'm wearing a name tag for a reason. You can

433
00:29:09,520 --> 00:29:11,480
Speaker 1: you can call me by my name, and we really

434
00:29:11,520 --> 00:29:15,080
Speaker 1: appreciate it if you. Yeah, if you remember our names.

435
00:29:15,200 --> 00:29:20,280
Speaker 1: And I have a horrible short term memory. And often

436
00:29:20,560 --> 00:29:24,040
Speaker 1: in stores like a maid Well where I go too

437
00:29:24,040 --> 00:29:26,720
Speaker 1: often only when the sale is on sale, but still

438
00:29:26,760 --> 00:29:29,360
Speaker 1: it's too often. Um, And you know, whenever you go

439
00:29:29,400 --> 00:29:34,760
Speaker 1: to try something on, the person says, oh, okay, I'm Belinda,

440
00:29:34,920 --> 00:29:38,160
Speaker 1: I immediately forget Belenda's name. I know, and immediately, but

441
00:29:38,400 --> 00:29:42,680
Speaker 1: after this episode, I'm going to remember Belenda. You're just

442
00:29:43,360 --> 00:29:46,840
Speaker 1: everyone's gonna become Blenda now. But in retail workers listening,

443
00:29:46,920 --> 00:29:49,040
Speaker 1: let me know, am I just like overblowing this because

444
00:29:50,400 --> 00:29:53,400
Speaker 1: it's got to feel nice and humanizing for people to

445
00:29:53,480 --> 00:29:56,560
Speaker 1: remember your name when you tell it to them. So

446
00:29:56,680 --> 00:29:58,920
Speaker 1: just another thing that we can do in addition to

447
00:29:59,160 --> 00:30:04,600
Speaker 1: keeping our dressing rooms tidy when we're leaving. But back

448
00:30:04,640 --> 00:30:12,760
Speaker 1: to our history. Women at this time, even though they

449
00:30:12,880 --> 00:30:15,160
Speaker 1: might have been sales ladies, they might have been a

450
00:30:15,160 --> 00:30:19,680
Speaker 1: bit more ambitious and cared about their job and had

451
00:30:19,720 --> 00:30:22,840
Speaker 1: every intention of working in it for as long as

452
00:30:22,880 --> 00:30:28,200
Speaker 1: they could. They were often considered by employers and kind

453
00:30:28,200 --> 00:30:32,440
Speaker 1: of just across the industry to be dead end workers

454
00:30:32,680 --> 00:30:35,760
Speaker 1: because men were always hired as clerks with the implicit

455
00:30:36,200 --> 00:30:39,440
Speaker 1: understanding that they were working their way up a ladder

456
00:30:39,760 --> 00:30:43,200
Speaker 1: and sort of an unofficial apprenticeship. But women were just

457
00:30:43,280 --> 00:30:46,920
Speaker 1: seen as almost like seasonal workers today, the way that

458
00:30:46,920 --> 00:30:49,040
Speaker 1: we use them during the holidays, like well, we're just

459
00:30:49,120 --> 00:30:54,160
Speaker 1: kinda churned through them. Um, No One, No one considered

460
00:30:54,320 --> 00:30:56,840
Speaker 1: an employment ladder for women at the time. I think

461
00:30:56,880 --> 00:30:58,960
Speaker 1: the one exception that we could cite, or one of

462
00:30:59,000 --> 00:31:01,280
Speaker 1: the exceptions that we could say it would be buyers.

463
00:31:01,920 --> 00:31:06,640
Speaker 1: A lot of women did start out as shop girls,

464
00:31:07,320 --> 00:31:09,520
Speaker 1: and we're able to work. When I say a lot,

465
00:31:09,560 --> 00:31:11,800
Speaker 1: I don't actually literally mean a lot. I mean some

466
00:31:12,760 --> 00:31:15,360
Speaker 1: worked their way up to being buyers, where they would

467
00:31:15,400 --> 00:31:18,040
Speaker 1: deal with the manufacturers and the designers to get new

468
00:31:18,120 --> 00:31:20,640
Speaker 1: styles in. And a lot of that goes back to

469
00:31:20,640 --> 00:31:23,040
Speaker 1: to the attitude that we sited earlier of like don't

470
00:31:23,080 --> 00:31:28,200
Speaker 1: women know women better? Um? And so rather than having uh,

471
00:31:28,240 --> 00:31:32,080
Speaker 1: these fuddy duddy men who just take what the manufacturers make,

472
00:31:32,440 --> 00:31:34,720
Speaker 1: why don't we get women in here who know how

473
00:31:34,760 --> 00:31:38,680
Speaker 1: women want to dress themselves and have them uh set

474
00:31:38,720 --> 00:31:41,760
Speaker 1: the tone for what the fashions will be in the stores.

475
00:31:41,920 --> 00:31:46,280
Speaker 1: And so uh you started to see schools actually having

476
00:31:46,360 --> 00:31:50,960
Speaker 1: programs for fashion buying. And of course that was that

477
00:31:51,040 --> 00:31:53,000
Speaker 1: was an arc that wasn't all at once. It's not

478
00:31:53,080 --> 00:31:55,320
Speaker 1: like they hired a bunch of women and were like,

479
00:31:55,400 --> 00:31:58,320
Speaker 1: and now we're going to educate you at college for

480
00:31:58,400 --> 00:32:03,240
Speaker 1: this exact thing, right, because more often than not, even

481
00:32:03,480 --> 00:32:08,040
Speaker 1: if a gal worked to swell sixteen hour day, she

482
00:32:08,080 --> 00:32:11,120
Speaker 1: would likelier be fired than rewarded for fear of her

483
00:32:11,120 --> 00:32:14,640
Speaker 1: eventually demanding a higher salary. Women were expendable. There are

484
00:32:14,640 --> 00:32:17,960
Speaker 1: plenty of them. They're cheap. Just bring them in and

485
00:32:18,000 --> 00:32:23,440
Speaker 1: toss them out. So we should remake the expendables, uh

486
00:32:23,640 --> 00:32:26,600
Speaker 1: and have it just be shop girl nine century British

487
00:32:26,600 --> 00:32:30,240
Speaker 1: shop Girls. Yeah, I'd watch it as long as Sylvester

488
00:32:30,360 --> 00:32:34,560
Speaker 1: Stallone is not in it. Um. But here here's a

489
00:32:34,600 --> 00:32:38,160
Speaker 1: thing that is absent one from our conversation so far

490
00:32:39,160 --> 00:32:43,880
Speaker 1: women of color. That's because the history of black sales

491
00:32:44,000 --> 00:32:49,880
Speaker 1: ladies was largely non existent pre civil rights and we're

492
00:32:49,880 --> 00:32:51,800
Speaker 1: going to talk about that when we come right back

493
00:32:52,000 --> 00:33:08,640
Speaker 1: from a quick break. So we mentioned these Civil War

494
00:33:09,040 --> 00:33:12,680
Speaker 1: man drain earlier. You know, men getting caught in the drain,

495
00:33:12,960 --> 00:33:15,840
Speaker 1: like so much hair that you've got to remove. Oh no, wait, sorry,

496
00:33:15,880 --> 00:33:18,480
Speaker 1: they're going off to war and women are filling their places.

497
00:33:18,560 --> 00:33:21,800
Speaker 1: Same thing happened with World War One. So women are

498
00:33:21,800 --> 00:33:26,840
Speaker 1: becoming more visible as shop girls, as retail workers around

499
00:33:26,840 --> 00:33:32,360
Speaker 1: this time, but that's still mainly applied to white women.

500
00:33:32,440 --> 00:33:36,560
Speaker 1: Black women who were hired by these retails stores still

501
00:33:36,640 --> 00:33:40,640
Speaker 1: were relegated to jobs that revolved around the kitchen, the bathroom,

502
00:33:41,000 --> 00:33:45,480
Speaker 1: service areas until about the nineteen sixties. Yeah, I mean,

503
00:33:46,240 --> 00:33:50,719
Speaker 1: it wasn't mainly white women. It was exclusively white women.

504
00:33:51,040 --> 00:33:52,840
Speaker 1: And we learned about this in a book by jan

505
00:33:52,920 --> 00:33:56,520
Speaker 1: Whittaker called Service and Style, How the American Department Store

506
00:33:56,520 --> 00:34:02,360
Speaker 1: Fashioned the Middle Class, And she wrote about how before

507
00:34:02,480 --> 00:34:07,200
Speaker 1: the nineteen sixties, the most visible job for an African

508
00:34:07,200 --> 00:34:11,640
Speaker 1: American woman would have been as an elevator operator. Until

509
00:34:11,719 --> 00:34:15,680
Speaker 1: you have department store. Some department stores swapping them out

510
00:34:16,160 --> 00:34:22,120
Speaker 1: for sexier white women. So even elevator operator is too visible.

511
00:34:22,520 --> 00:34:26,880
Speaker 1: And you do see organizing and protesting around this time,

512
00:34:27,040 --> 00:34:32,960
Speaker 1: especially in the nineteen thirties in black neighborhoods. The a

513
00:34:33,040 --> 00:34:37,920
Speaker 1: c P, for instance, initiated a don't buy where you

514
00:34:38,000 --> 00:34:44,080
Speaker 1: can't work protest that we're focused on black neighborhoods where

515
00:34:44,080 --> 00:34:46,799
Speaker 1: you have stores owned by white people that wouldn't hire

516
00:34:46,800 --> 00:34:51,279
Speaker 1: black people. And so you know, these customers were saying, no,

517
00:34:51,520 --> 00:34:54,360
Speaker 1: this is not right. You're you're going to take our money,

518
00:34:54,960 --> 00:34:58,759
Speaker 1: but you won't hire us. No. And women were very

519
00:34:58,800 --> 00:35:03,360
Speaker 1: instrumental in or organizing these protests. Now, unfortunately, partly because

520
00:35:03,400 --> 00:35:08,120
Speaker 1: they were so concentrated in predominantly black areas of town,

521
00:35:09,080 --> 00:35:15,960
Speaker 1: they were largely ineffective in initially instigating industry wide change.

522
00:35:16,800 --> 00:35:22,000
Speaker 1: World War two, however, did afford some black people more

523
00:35:22,320 --> 00:35:27,080
Speaker 1: sales floor jobs, but as long as their skin was

524
00:35:27,239 --> 00:35:31,319
Speaker 1: light enough. This goes back to the paper bag test. Yeah,

525
00:35:31,360 --> 00:35:33,600
Speaker 1: you had to pass the paper bag test and have

526
00:35:33,920 --> 00:35:41,120
Speaker 1: light enough skin that it wouldn't potentially make white customers uncomfortable. Um.

527
00:35:41,280 --> 00:35:44,759
Speaker 1: And there were arguments though around and after World War

528
00:35:44,800 --> 00:35:48,440
Speaker 1: Two that well, why would white people be uncomfortable with

529
00:35:48,440 --> 00:35:53,760
Speaker 1: black people in retail jobs. White people are already accustomed

530
00:35:53,800 --> 00:35:55,839
Speaker 1: to black people serving them and cleaning up after them

531
00:35:55,840 --> 00:35:58,600
Speaker 1: in their homes, so we why wouldn't we hire them

532
00:35:58,640 --> 00:36:01,600
Speaker 1: as as retail workers. But to put some numbers around

533
00:36:01,640 --> 00:36:07,000
Speaker 1: that benevolent racism, shall we call it? A nine New

534
00:36:07,080 --> 00:36:11,839
Speaker 1: York retail customer survey found that most white people were

535
00:36:12,160 --> 00:36:17,160
Speaker 1: fine with black sales people if they had light enough skin,

536
00:36:18,239 --> 00:36:24,040
Speaker 1: but of them did not want them touching clothing, lingerie,

537
00:36:24,280 --> 00:36:28,920
Speaker 1: or food. So no, we're actually not We're not fine

538
00:36:29,200 --> 00:36:33,000
Speaker 1: with that. UM. And the year before New York City

539
00:36:33,040 --> 00:36:39,600
Speaker 1: report identified one black saleswoman among all the stores on

540
00:36:39,760 --> 00:36:43,600
Speaker 1: Fifth Avenue. Yeah, and during this time in the forties,

541
00:36:43,760 --> 00:36:47,680
Speaker 1: most of those retail job gains for black people were

542
00:36:47,760 --> 00:36:50,560
Speaker 1: again in stock rooms. As long as they weren't visible,

543
00:36:51,360 --> 00:36:56,000
Speaker 1: then okay, maybe we will hire you. UM. Store owners

544
00:36:56,040 --> 00:37:01,600
Speaker 1: were genuinely worried that having black employees be visible would

545
00:37:01,600 --> 00:37:06,040
Speaker 1: mean it would scare off white customers. Right, because more

546
00:37:06,080 --> 00:37:10,280
Speaker 1: black employees meant that it would be a safer space

547
00:37:10,560 --> 00:37:14,879
Speaker 1: for black customers to come in, UM, and that would

548
00:37:14,920 --> 00:37:18,839
Speaker 1: trigger all of white customers racism, so they would go

549
00:37:19,480 --> 00:37:25,600
Speaker 1: to Gimbals instead of Macy's. UM. And this also brings

550
00:37:25,680 --> 00:37:29,960
Speaker 1: up another conversation that we could have about the horrendous

551
00:37:30,000 --> 00:37:34,839
Speaker 1: mistreatment of black customers and retail um who would go

552
00:37:34,880 --> 00:37:40,680
Speaker 1: into wide establishments and be treated like second class citizens.

553
00:37:40,920 --> 00:37:43,160
Speaker 1: But well, I mean that's how is that different from

554
00:37:43,200 --> 00:37:47,120
Speaker 1: now with black customers being followed around stores? Very true?

555
00:37:47,520 --> 00:37:52,520
Speaker 1: So you you know, you have black customers going to

556
00:37:52,960 --> 00:37:58,520
Speaker 1: patronizing uh, black owned businesses because literally those were the

557
00:37:58,520 --> 00:38:02,600
Speaker 1: only safe spaces wore them to shop. Now, once we

558
00:38:02,640 --> 00:38:06,040
Speaker 1: get to the late nineteen fifties and early sixties with

559
00:38:06,080 --> 00:38:09,920
Speaker 1: a civil rights movement, we do see protests ramping up

560
00:38:09,960 --> 00:38:16,239
Speaker 1: against racist hiring practices, targeting the largest department stores. Um.

561
00:38:16,280 --> 00:38:18,560
Speaker 1: And you do start to see the dial moving a

562
00:38:18,600 --> 00:38:22,200
Speaker 1: little bit. In ninety eight, the New York State Commission

563
00:38:22,280 --> 00:38:25,560
Speaker 1: against Discrimination kind of padded itself on the back because

564
00:38:25,560 --> 00:38:29,120
Speaker 1: it tallied up a grand total of one hundred black

565
00:38:29,200 --> 00:38:35,759
Speaker 1: retail sales people and two in retail management in the city. Um. Now,

566
00:38:36,200 --> 00:38:39,319
Speaker 1: I don't have the number of one hundred and two

567
00:38:39,440 --> 00:38:42,319
Speaker 1: out of how many, I mean, it still has to

568
00:38:42,360 --> 00:38:45,640
Speaker 1: be a tiny, tiny, tiny percentage. And so you know

569
00:38:45,680 --> 00:38:48,800
Speaker 1: a lot of these protests and boycotts that are happening.

570
00:38:49,120 --> 00:38:53,000
Speaker 1: UM did open up some jobs, they did have an effect,

571
00:38:53,560 --> 00:38:57,640
Speaker 1: but a a lot of the jobs that were opened up,

572
00:38:58,120 --> 00:39:02,480
Speaker 1: we're in more failings wars. Stores that weren't seeing as

573
00:39:02,560 --> 00:39:07,480
Speaker 1: much customer traffic anyway, UM, or they were not getting

574
00:39:07,560 --> 00:39:12,400
Speaker 1: hired uh to work with high priced home furnishings and fashion,

575
00:39:13,040 --> 00:39:16,760
Speaker 1: which also was a struggle for women in general earlier

576
00:39:16,800 --> 00:39:20,800
Speaker 1: in our history when women struggled to get jobs with furniture,

577
00:39:20,840 --> 00:39:24,200
Speaker 1: it was it was considered so dirty and inappropriate for

578
00:39:24,280 --> 00:39:27,120
Speaker 1: women to work with furniture. Oh, it's big and heavy

579
00:39:27,120 --> 00:39:30,920
Speaker 1: and dusty, and the same ended up applying to black

580
00:39:30,960 --> 00:39:34,880
Speaker 1: people in general. But certainly not for paternalistic reason. No,

581
00:39:35,400 --> 00:39:38,319
Speaker 1: because these are high ticket items that we want to

582
00:39:38,480 --> 00:39:42,959
Speaker 1: move to our wealthier customers, and wealthier customers certainly can't

583
00:39:42,960 --> 00:39:47,000
Speaker 1: be waited on by our black salespeople. UM. But in

584
00:39:47,040 --> 00:39:51,360
Speaker 1: the background, too, we have to acknowledge the crucial importance

585
00:39:51,480 --> 00:39:55,040
Speaker 1: of lunch counter desegregation that was going on because a

586
00:39:55,080 --> 00:39:57,680
Speaker 1: lot of these were in department stores. So you have

587
00:39:57,760 --> 00:40:02,839
Speaker 1: this combination of civil rights prot tests and pocketbook boycott's

588
00:40:03,320 --> 00:40:09,360
Speaker 1: and lunch counter desegregation. UM. That is opening the space

589
00:40:09,480 --> 00:40:13,560
Speaker 1: up slowly but surely, and no surprise, White owned stores

590
00:40:13,600 --> 00:40:19,440
Speaker 1: in the South were the most resistant because desegregation. So

591
00:40:19,520 --> 00:40:22,520
Speaker 1: for instance, I don't have the exact year, but it

592
00:40:22,560 --> 00:40:26,240
Speaker 1: wasn't until well into the nineteen sixties that a woman

593
00:40:26,320 --> 00:40:32,320
Speaker 1: named Dorothea Davis became Charlotte, North Carolina, a relatively large city,

594
00:40:32,640 --> 00:40:41,040
Speaker 1: Charlotte's first first black saleswoman in a not black owned store. Yeah,

595
00:40:41,080 --> 00:40:44,560
Speaker 1: and I mean, the retail industry still has not done

596
00:40:44,680 --> 00:40:47,880
Speaker 1: right by most of its black and Latina and Latino

597
00:40:47,960 --> 00:40:51,319
Speaker 1: workers in particular, and we're going to talk about that

598
00:40:51,360 --> 00:41:05,960
Speaker 1: when we come right back from a quick break. So

599
00:41:06,040 --> 00:41:07,839
Speaker 1: with everything we've talked about at this point in terms

600
00:41:07,920 --> 00:41:12,120
Speaker 1: of the racism that's been deeply embedded in retail from

601
00:41:12,440 --> 00:41:15,960
Speaker 1: the get go, it's shouldn't be much of a surprise

602
00:41:16,040 --> 00:41:19,239
Speaker 1: that it isn't really an equitable haven for people of

603
00:41:19,320 --> 00:41:25,520
Speaker 1: color today, because, like you mentioned, if you're simply a customer,

604
00:41:26,239 --> 00:41:29,399
Speaker 1: you have to deal with racism so often in the

605
00:41:29,440 --> 00:41:32,520
Speaker 1: form of racial profiling that we have, we can we

606
00:41:32,560 --> 00:41:36,400
Speaker 1: can't not have a conversation on race and retail without

607
00:41:36,440 --> 00:41:40,359
Speaker 1: talking about customer profiling. Oh yeah, and some of our

608
00:41:40,400 --> 00:41:49,879
Speaker 1: biggest stores have been implicated in cases of racial profiling. Macy's, Sephora, Zara, Barney's, CVS,

609
00:41:50,040 --> 00:41:54,560
Speaker 1: Best Buy, Ross, Walgreen's, Hollister, Um. All of these stores

610
00:41:54,600 --> 00:41:58,480
Speaker 1: have gotten in trouble for issues of racial profiling and

611
00:41:59,120 --> 00:42:06,200
Speaker 1: not to mention to issues of black people being killed outright. Um.

612
00:42:06,560 --> 00:42:09,360
Speaker 1: A lot of this was highlighted in a piece in

613
00:42:09,480 --> 00:42:14,040
Speaker 1: The International Business Times by Catherine Dunn, who reported that

614
00:42:14,120 --> 00:42:20,320
Speaker 1: between and two thousand two, at least six shoppers died,

615
00:42:20,719 --> 00:42:23,680
Speaker 1: five of them people of color, and confrontations with off

616
00:42:23,760 --> 00:42:29,560
Speaker 1: duty police officers employed as security guards at Dillard's department

617
00:42:29,640 --> 00:42:33,719
Speaker 1: stores in three states. At Dillard's alone, just at Dillard's. Well,

618
00:42:33,760 --> 00:42:37,320
Speaker 1: things aren't great at Walmart either. In ten John Crawford,

619
00:42:37,360 --> 00:42:41,480
Speaker 1: the third was shot at in Ohio Walmart by security

620
00:42:41,520 --> 00:42:45,319
Speaker 1: guards just because he picked up a baby gun. Yeah,

621
00:42:45,320 --> 00:42:47,279
Speaker 1: I mean, well he was killed. He was shot and

622
00:42:47,400 --> 00:42:50,680
Speaker 1: killed because he just, yeah, he just picked up a

623
00:42:50,680 --> 00:42:54,440
Speaker 1: gun and the security guard assumed that he was armed

624
00:42:54,520 --> 00:42:57,440
Speaker 1: and dangerous. Meanwhile, we had those stories a couple of

625
00:42:57,480 --> 00:43:00,279
Speaker 1: years ago of all of those white militants walking into

626
00:43:00,360 --> 00:43:04,839
Speaker 1: Walmart's wearing guns and and they weren't killed. Well, it's

627
00:43:04,840 --> 00:43:08,600
Speaker 1: because America doesn't hate white people. And these are just

628
00:43:08,640 --> 00:43:13,000
Speaker 1: a handful of the instances of not just discrimination but

629
00:43:13,080 --> 00:43:17,680
Speaker 1: outright violence that people of color, Black people in particular

630
00:43:18,200 --> 00:43:24,439
Speaker 1: often face as customers in retail stores. And Gallop Pole

631
00:43:24,719 --> 00:43:28,680
Speaker 1: found that cent of black respondents felt they'd been treated

632
00:43:28,760 --> 00:43:31,680
Speaker 1: unfairly in stores because of their skin color. And honestly,

633
00:43:31,719 --> 00:43:36,919
Speaker 1: that sounds low to me. And it doesn't get much

634
00:43:37,160 --> 00:43:42,240
Speaker 1: better in terms of discrimination when we hop behind the counter.

635
00:43:42,680 --> 00:43:47,439
Speaker 1: Because we've already talked about the gendered siloing of low

636
00:43:47,520 --> 00:43:52,160
Speaker 1: income jobs in retail. Well, once you toss race and

637
00:43:52,239 --> 00:43:56,680
Speaker 1: ethnicity into the mix, it gets even worse, as it

638
00:43:56,719 --> 00:44:01,840
Speaker 1: often does hashtag intersectionality. Yeah, retail is the second largest

639
00:44:01,880 --> 00:44:04,279
Speaker 1: source of jobs for Black Americans, and it's one of

640
00:44:04,280 --> 00:44:08,320
Speaker 1: the largest sources of new employment across the United States.

641
00:44:08,360 --> 00:44:11,560
Speaker 1: But not all retail jobs are created equally, as should

642
00:44:11,560 --> 00:44:14,439
Speaker 1: be no surprise. Um, I mean, you've got a ton

643
00:44:14,600 --> 00:44:20,880
Speaker 1: of mainstream major stores who faced lawsuits for discriminatory hiring practices. Um,

644
00:44:20,960 --> 00:44:22,879
Speaker 1: what was the story a couple of years ago about

645
00:44:22,880 --> 00:44:26,920
Speaker 1: Abercrombie and Fitch being sued over a woman wearing a

646
00:44:26,960 --> 00:44:31,360
Speaker 1: hidge job? Right, So it ended up going to the

647
00:44:31,400 --> 00:44:35,200
Speaker 1: Supreme Court, and they ruled in favor of the former

648
00:44:35,760 --> 00:44:42,400
Speaker 1: Abercrombie employee UM, who was fired because they refused to

649
00:44:42,440 --> 00:44:47,640
Speaker 1: allow her to wear her he job on the store floor. UM.

650
00:44:47,719 --> 00:44:50,920
Speaker 1: And like I said, the Supreme Court ruled in her favor.

651
00:44:50,960 --> 00:44:56,920
Speaker 1: Abercrombie has long had a reputation though for UH presenting

652
00:44:57,160 --> 00:45:04,600
Speaker 1: a very white, very lusionary image UM, with its advertising,

653
00:45:04,719 --> 00:45:07,560
Speaker 1: with its hiring. UM. There was one time in New

654
00:45:07,600 --> 00:45:09,320
Speaker 1: York and I'm sure a lot of New Yorker is listening.

655
00:45:09,719 --> 00:45:13,480
Speaker 1: I've also seen this where they've got the sales gimmicks

656
00:45:13,520 --> 00:45:17,560
Speaker 1: with the white chiseled guys in and next to nothing

657
00:45:17,680 --> 00:45:21,520
Speaker 1: standing outside and just all of that just body spray

658
00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:25,040
Speaker 1: just coming at you so much, so much. Body spread

659
00:45:24,960 --> 00:45:27,839
Speaker 1: a headache just walking past from Abercrombie. But I'm even

660
00:45:27,880 --> 00:45:30,520
Speaker 1: surprised at aberca ominous Honestly, side that, I'm surprised at

661
00:45:30,520 --> 00:45:33,840
Speaker 1: Abercrombie even still exists. But in same with wet Seal,

662
00:45:33,880 --> 00:45:37,640
Speaker 1: they've also been nailed for discriminatory hiring practices. I can't

663
00:45:37,680 --> 00:45:41,759
Speaker 1: believe that store still exists and target place where a

664
00:45:41,800 --> 00:45:45,279
Speaker 1: lot of us love to shop in the name of

665
00:45:45,280 --> 00:45:50,000
Speaker 1: self care. UM and Okay, so if we talk again,

666
00:45:50,040 --> 00:45:53,880
Speaker 1: if we zero in on these Black Americans working in retail,

667
00:45:54,880 --> 00:45:59,640
Speaker 1: they are likelier to be among the working poor. Uh So,

668
00:46:00,200 --> 00:46:03,040
Speaker 1: like the overall retail workforce, a majority of black and

669
00:46:03,120 --> 00:46:07,000
Speaker 1: Latino retail workers do have some education post high school

670
00:46:07,040 --> 00:46:11,920
Speaker 1: and about a third or parents. But seventeen percent of

671
00:46:11,920 --> 00:46:16,600
Speaker 1: black retail workers and of Latino or Latina retail workers

672
00:46:16,719 --> 00:46:20,960
Speaker 1: live below the poverty line, compared to just nine percent

673
00:46:21,520 --> 00:46:25,799
Speaker 1: of the overall workforce, and they have fewer opportunities for advancement.

674
00:46:25,800 --> 00:46:29,520
Speaker 1: They're overrepresented as cashiers, which tends to be the lowest

675
00:46:29,520 --> 00:46:35,239
Speaker 1: paid retail work, and underrepresented in managerial positions. And we

676
00:46:35,320 --> 00:46:40,520
Speaker 1: talked about a gender wage gap, there's also a racial

677
00:46:40,560 --> 00:46:44,879
Speaker 1: wage gap. And again this is coming from research conducted

678
00:46:45,080 --> 00:46:49,480
Speaker 1: jointly by Demos and the Double a CP finding that

679
00:46:49,800 --> 00:46:54,800
Speaker 1: black and Latin X full time cashiers are nine pcent

680
00:46:55,320 --> 00:47:00,360
Speaker 1: of what white cashiers do, which translates to about loss

681
00:47:00,400 --> 00:47:05,120
Speaker 1: of eight dollars now full time sales people. Though it

682
00:47:05,200 --> 00:47:10,400
Speaker 1: gets even worse. That gap is twenty White people make

683
00:47:11,880 --> 00:47:16,200
Speaker 1: more than sales people of color, which translates to an

684
00:47:16,200 --> 00:47:20,359
Speaker 1: income difference of seventy five hundred dollars a year, And

685
00:47:20,440 --> 00:47:25,080
Speaker 1: consider this, the retail salesperson is the industry occupation with

686
00:47:25,160 --> 00:47:31,520
Speaker 1: the highest share of workers but the widest wage divide,

687
00:47:31,719 --> 00:47:35,239
Speaker 1: and the cashier wage gap, meanwhile, is narrower because the

688
00:47:35,320 --> 00:47:39,000
Speaker 1: income is just so low to begin with. And so

689
00:47:39,160 --> 00:47:41,600
Speaker 1: I think all I could keep thinking when I was

690
00:47:41,640 --> 00:47:46,320
Speaker 1: reading these statistics and how massive and sprawling the retail

691
00:47:46,360 --> 00:47:51,120
Speaker 1: workforce is, all I could think was, huh, our politicians

692
00:47:51,719 --> 00:47:56,320
Speaker 1: on the left of the right, whoever talk about protecting Americans,

693
00:47:56,360 --> 00:48:01,840
Speaker 1: working for Americans, wanting to uh help families, and oh,

694
00:48:01,880 --> 00:48:06,640
Speaker 1: you know, this country just steps on the working poor. Well,

695
00:48:07,200 --> 00:48:10,440
Speaker 1: a lot of those people are in retail in some

696
00:48:10,800 --> 00:48:14,560
Speaker 1: way or another. And if we aren't doing more to

697
00:48:15,320 --> 00:48:19,680
Speaker 1: protect these people, bolster these people, um make sure that

698
00:48:19,719 --> 00:48:23,880
Speaker 1: they are making a living wage. That's a good percentage

699
00:48:23,880 --> 00:48:27,680
Speaker 1: of Americans that are being stepped on. Oh. Absolutely. And

700
00:48:27,800 --> 00:48:32,319
Speaker 1: it's not just the low wage issue. It's also the

701
00:48:32,400 --> 00:48:36,400
Speaker 1: instability of that part time work that we talked about,

702
00:48:36,440 --> 00:48:39,880
Speaker 1: and also this thing called just in time scheduling. So

703
00:48:39,920 --> 00:48:43,920
Speaker 1: in terms of the part time work, again, black and

704
00:48:44,040 --> 00:48:48,120
Speaker 1: Latino X retail employees are likelier than white people to

705
00:48:48,680 --> 00:48:52,439
Speaker 1: be part time workers working thirty one hours a week

706
00:48:52,480 --> 00:48:55,920
Speaker 1: on average, even when they would rather be full time.

707
00:48:56,560 --> 00:48:59,680
Speaker 1: And then heap on top of that you know that

708
00:49:00,160 --> 00:49:02,080
Speaker 1: lack of benefits that you would get as a full

709
00:49:02,080 --> 00:49:06,160
Speaker 1: time worker. Then you have to deal with the rampant

710
00:49:06,360 --> 00:49:10,200
Speaker 1: use slash abuse of justin time scheduling, which is the

711
00:49:10,280 --> 00:49:15,160
Speaker 1: worst and happens most often again to black and Latin

712
00:49:15,360 --> 00:49:19,440
Speaker 1: X workers. So just in time scheduling UH is basically

713
00:49:19,880 --> 00:49:24,440
Speaker 1: the nickname for employers giving very little advanced notice of

714
00:49:24,640 --> 00:49:29,160
Speaker 1: your schedule, um as little as a week in advance.

715
00:49:29,600 --> 00:49:33,880
Speaker 1: And on top of that, you're also subject to shifts

716
00:49:33,920 --> 00:49:37,560
Speaker 1: being canceled or getting sent home if it's a slow day.

717
00:49:37,600 --> 00:49:43,960
Speaker 1: So if you're managing things like transportation cost, being the breadwinner,

718
00:49:44,000 --> 00:49:47,000
Speaker 1: the soul earner in your household, as a lot of

719
00:49:47,040 --> 00:49:51,239
Speaker 1: these people are childcare elder care, all of this is

720
00:49:51,280 --> 00:49:56,960
Speaker 1: thrown into complete chaos because there is nothing stable about

721
00:49:57,040 --> 00:50:01,319
Speaker 1: these jobs. And it also prevents you from probably being

722
00:50:01,360 --> 00:50:05,720
Speaker 1: able to go out and reliably searched for better work

723
00:50:06,280 --> 00:50:09,719
Speaker 1: because you don't know when you're gonna be working at

724
00:50:09,760 --> 00:50:14,680
Speaker 1: the job you have right now. So what do we do? Well,

725
00:50:14,840 --> 00:50:17,399
Speaker 1: For one, we could raise the federal minimum wage. Right

726
00:50:18,000 --> 00:50:23,880
Speaker 1: people are on board for that probably not President elect Trump. Actually,

727
00:50:24,280 --> 00:50:27,720
Speaker 1: by probably, I mean he's talked openly about how he

728
00:50:28,080 --> 00:50:31,880
Speaker 1: thinks the minimum wage, which is seven dollars and twenty

729
00:50:31,880 --> 00:50:35,120
Speaker 1: five cents an hour, folks, that is not a living wage,

730
00:50:36,480 --> 00:50:41,120
Speaker 1: especially if you live anywhere close to a metropolitan area. Uh.

731
00:50:41,160 --> 00:50:46,319
Speaker 1: He thinks that that is too high already. So with

732
00:50:46,480 --> 00:50:50,799
Speaker 1: the Republicans now in control of the House and Senate, Uh,

733
00:50:50,920 --> 00:50:54,120
Speaker 1: that's not likely to happen in the next four years.

734
00:50:55,239 --> 00:51:00,120
Speaker 1: Oh okay, well, um, maybe big retailers can hop on

735
00:51:00,280 --> 00:51:03,200
Speaker 1: paying their workers the living wage. Yes, they could do that.

736
00:51:03,320 --> 00:51:05,960
Speaker 1: They absolutely could do that. You know, if you are

737
00:51:06,960 --> 00:51:10,520
Speaker 1: a CEO of Target making bazillion million dollars a year,

738
00:51:10,920 --> 00:51:13,960
Speaker 1: you could reallocate some of that money to pay your

739
00:51:14,000 --> 00:51:17,240
Speaker 1: workers a living wage. And listeners, if you are curious

740
00:51:17,280 --> 00:51:21,600
Speaker 1: about what exactly is the living wage for you where

741
00:51:21,680 --> 00:51:24,520
Speaker 1: you live in work h M I T has a

742
00:51:24,600 --> 00:51:28,520
Speaker 1: hand calculator that we will link to in this source post.

743
00:51:28,880 --> 00:51:33,320
Speaker 1: And for us Caroline, it's eleven dollars and thirty six cents,

744
00:51:33,960 --> 00:51:38,000
Speaker 1: far cry from seven dollars and cents. Yeah, and of

745
00:51:38,040 --> 00:51:43,359
Speaker 1: course what you often hear from people, Um, this has

746
00:51:43,400 --> 00:51:46,200
Speaker 1: happened to me on Twitter. It's happened to me, uh,

747
00:51:46,440 --> 00:51:49,000
Speaker 1: from people in my own family. When you discuss things

748
00:51:49,000 --> 00:51:50,600
Speaker 1: like the minimum wages, well, how are we going to

749
00:51:50,680 --> 00:51:53,160
Speaker 1: pay for it? Are you going to pay for it? Right?

750
00:51:53,440 --> 00:51:56,720
Speaker 1: Prices will go up, right, so we'll we will actually

751
00:51:56,800 --> 00:51:59,799
Speaker 1: be the ones paying for these you know, these ex

752
00:52:00,080 --> 00:52:04,799
Speaker 1: urban in salaries that are essentially subsistence, which, again I

753
00:52:04,840 --> 00:52:07,480
Speaker 1: would say, ties back into an earlier episode we did

754
00:52:07,600 --> 00:52:12,400
Speaker 1: on the welfare queen stereotype. People are so scared about

755
00:52:12,560 --> 00:52:16,080
Speaker 1: what the working poor are going to do with more money, Well,

756
00:52:16,160 --> 00:52:20,520
Speaker 1: they presume that they are lazy and undeserving. You know,

757
00:52:20,560 --> 00:52:23,600
Speaker 1: we worked hard for our money. Yeah. Well, uh, This

758
00:52:23,719 --> 00:52:27,040
Speaker 1: Berkeley study crunched the numbers and found that if Walmart,

759
00:52:27,160 --> 00:52:29,920
Speaker 1: for instance, which again has a massive workforce all on

760
00:52:29,960 --> 00:52:33,560
Speaker 1: its own, paid twelve dollars an hour as a starting wage,

761
00:52:33,719 --> 00:52:38,440
Speaker 1: shoppers would see a price increase of one point one percent,

762
00:52:38,760 --> 00:52:42,160
Speaker 1: or forty six cents per shopping trip. Oh wow, So

763
00:52:42,800 --> 00:52:48,120
Speaker 1: I mean, I don't know, caroline cents that could buy you,

764
00:52:48,400 --> 00:52:53,200
Speaker 1: uh like two and a half chicken nuggets McDonald's. Um,

765
00:52:53,360 --> 00:52:56,359
Speaker 1: I don't know if we can be that generous. Another thing, though,

766
00:52:56,400 --> 00:53:04,000
Speaker 1: that demos and the c p recommend, especially for uh ending,

767
00:53:04,120 --> 00:53:10,160
Speaker 1: that siloing of people of color and also women in

768
00:53:10,239 --> 00:53:14,720
Speaker 1: general in those lower paying jobs is ending employment credit checks,

769
00:53:14,760 --> 00:53:20,799
Speaker 1: because credit checks are mostly used for things like loans

770
00:53:20,960 --> 00:53:25,160
Speaker 1: and housing. Uh And when you start enforcing employment credit

771
00:53:25,239 --> 00:53:29,840
Speaker 1: checks on a lot of your employees who are already

772
00:53:29,880 --> 00:53:37,240
Speaker 1: the working poor, it is just automatically disqualifying so many

773
00:53:37,320 --> 00:53:43,600
Speaker 1: of them for circumstances that they themselves cannot help. And

774
00:53:43,680 --> 00:53:47,879
Speaker 1: another thing that employers could and come on should do

775
00:53:48,920 --> 00:53:52,960
Speaker 1: is to ensure more stable hours and predictable schedules. I mean,

776
00:53:54,760 --> 00:53:57,560
Speaker 1: letting people know what they're going to be working two

777
00:53:57,640 --> 00:54:00,880
Speaker 1: weeks out at least. Is that much of a hardship?

778
00:54:00,880 --> 00:54:04,640
Speaker 1: I mean, especially for part time workers, uh ending, that

779
00:54:04,680 --> 00:54:08,759
Speaker 1: whole just in time scheduling process or system could go

780
00:54:08,920 --> 00:54:12,479
Speaker 1: a long way to enabling people to not only take

781
00:54:12,520 --> 00:54:15,279
Speaker 1: care of their personal life stuff, but enable them to

782
00:54:15,920 --> 00:54:21,160
Speaker 1: miss less work. Right, it seems that way, absolutely, And

783
00:54:21,320 --> 00:54:26,040
Speaker 1: I do want to hear from retail managers listening who

784
00:54:26,239 --> 00:54:30,520
Speaker 1: are in charge of scheduling, because I'm sure that where

785
00:54:30,560 --> 00:54:33,880
Speaker 1: we're sitting this, the ending just in time scheduling seems

786
00:54:33,960 --> 00:54:38,440
Speaker 1: like a simple fix, But I'm curious to know in

787
00:54:38,560 --> 00:54:42,880
Speaker 1: reality why it is such a juggling act? What kind

788
00:54:43,160 --> 00:54:49,840
Speaker 1: of factors perhaps force your hand at being so late

789
00:54:49,880 --> 00:54:52,759
Speaker 1: to give your employees notice? Because I mean, I know

790
00:54:52,840 --> 00:54:55,080
Speaker 1: from friends who've worked in retail, like they dealt with

791
00:54:55,120 --> 00:54:58,839
Speaker 1: a similar kind of thing, And UM, I wonder if

792
00:54:58,840 --> 00:55:03,320
Speaker 1: it has to do with target sales being reached or

793
00:55:03,360 --> 00:55:08,360
Speaker 1: not being reached, um, mandates from the powers that be

794
00:55:08,920 --> 00:55:12,319
Speaker 1: in your retail brand. Um. So if folks can't help

795
00:55:12,360 --> 00:55:15,560
Speaker 1: Phillison on that, that would be super helpful, because yeah,

796
00:55:15,560 --> 00:55:18,759
Speaker 1: I mean, it just it does seem unnecessarily cruel, and

797
00:55:18,840 --> 00:55:25,680
Speaker 1: yet it's so common. Um. And while the federal initiatives

798
00:55:26,480 --> 00:55:30,600
Speaker 1: that could potentially happen uh seem really sad to think

799
00:55:30,600 --> 00:55:36,080
Speaker 1: about at the moment because of the recent election and

800
00:55:36,200 --> 00:55:41,760
Speaker 1: how sort of anti working poor. UM, I would argue

801
00:55:42,920 --> 00:55:47,400
Speaker 1: a lot of the politicians now in power seemed to

802
00:55:47,480 --> 00:55:53,920
Speaker 1: be we do have bright spots, wonderful champions like Senator

803
00:55:53,960 --> 00:55:59,040
Speaker 1: Elizabeth Warren who has sponsored the Schedules that Work Act.

804
00:55:59,480 --> 00:56:01,239
Speaker 1: She has in reduced it. There are a number of

805
00:56:01,320 --> 00:56:04,640
Speaker 1: co sponsors on it as well. UM, but it has

806
00:56:04,719 --> 00:56:08,399
Speaker 1: yet to be passed. And I have a feeling that

807
00:56:08,800 --> 00:56:14,359
Speaker 1: in a quote unquote pro business, pro jobs, Republican administration. Um,

808
00:56:14,400 --> 00:56:19,279
Speaker 1: it's unlikely to get signed, but we have to remember

809
00:56:19,360 --> 00:56:22,839
Speaker 1: that our state legislatures can make a difference as well.

810
00:56:23,440 --> 00:56:27,760
Speaker 1: Dial up your local reps, dial up your congressional representatives,

811
00:56:27,880 --> 00:56:31,880
Speaker 1: tell them that you want to see the schedules that

812
00:56:31,960 --> 00:56:36,480
Speaker 1: Work Act get past. If not in the US Congress,

813
00:56:36,480 --> 00:56:40,879
Speaker 1: then in the state congress. UM. The the other part

814
00:56:40,960 --> 00:56:43,840
Speaker 1: of this and the reason why it is, I believe,

815
00:56:44,320 --> 00:56:47,920
Speaker 1: especially now in these times, part of our civic obligation

816
00:56:48,160 --> 00:56:52,080
Speaker 1: to do as much as we can to reach out

817
00:56:52,160 --> 00:56:56,640
Speaker 1: and advocate on behalf of disenfranchised groups is that for

818
00:56:57,280 --> 00:57:00,960
Speaker 1: retail workers in particular, they are often so powerless because

819
00:57:01,040 --> 00:57:06,239
Speaker 1: they're they're not unionized. And when I mean, I know

820
00:57:06,280 --> 00:57:09,640
Speaker 1: that unions are. There's a lot of politics that goes

821
00:57:09,640 --> 00:57:13,360
Speaker 1: on in that a lot of it's a very polarized thing.

822
00:57:14,040 --> 00:57:19,000
Speaker 1: But when workers aren't organized and they're already marginalized, it

823
00:57:19,160 --> 00:57:22,880
Speaker 1: is hard for them to collectively advocate for themselves. Well sure,

824
00:57:22,880 --> 00:57:25,800
Speaker 1: and I mean, um, you know, maybe some folks want

825
00:57:25,880 --> 00:57:29,560
Speaker 1: to march to their state capital or something like that.

826
00:57:29,640 --> 00:57:32,200
Speaker 1: But again it goes back to the scheduling issue, like

827
00:57:32,200 --> 00:57:33,919
Speaker 1: how much free time do you have? If you're also

828
00:57:34,040 --> 00:57:37,800
Speaker 1: your main breadwinner and your main source of childcare, and

829
00:57:38,000 --> 00:57:40,160
Speaker 1: you know you're working crazy hours that you're not sure

830
00:57:40,200 --> 00:57:42,439
Speaker 1: when you're going to be scheduled, it kind of makes

831
00:57:42,440 --> 00:57:46,160
Speaker 1: it hard to even get together with like minded individuals,

832
00:57:46,200 --> 00:57:50,000
Speaker 1: not even I mean like unions aside, or or activism aside.

833
00:57:50,000 --> 00:57:52,320
Speaker 1: It makes it hard to even have time to talk

834
00:57:52,360 --> 00:57:56,200
Speaker 1: to other people about this well, and especially this episode

835
00:57:56,240 --> 00:58:00,160
Speaker 1: coming out during the holiday shopping season. We can not

836
00:58:00,280 --> 00:58:05,880
Speaker 1: underestimate the power of our pocketbooks, even if we don't

837
00:58:05,880 --> 00:58:10,160
Speaker 1: have a ton of money to spend. If you make

838
00:58:10,200 --> 00:58:14,960
Speaker 1: a decision to not support a particular store or brand

839
00:58:15,080 --> 00:58:19,000
Speaker 1: because of how they treat their employees, be loud about it.

840
00:58:19,120 --> 00:58:24,200
Speaker 1: Make it known, you know, organize a boycott. UH companies

841
00:58:24,280 --> 00:58:27,200
Speaker 1: listen to where the money goes, and if the money

842
00:58:27,200 --> 00:58:32,720
Speaker 1: stops coming in, they'll probably maybe start paying attention. UM.

843
00:58:32,840 --> 00:58:36,600
Speaker 1: So this is this is an issue that is hugely

844
00:58:36,680 --> 00:58:39,760
Speaker 1: important year round because again, I mean, this is the

845
00:58:39,920 --> 00:58:45,400
Speaker 1: largest industry sector in the United States, millions and millions

846
00:58:45,440 --> 00:58:49,920
Speaker 1: and millions of people who are stuck in what seems

847
00:58:50,000 --> 00:58:54,640
Speaker 1: like a real economic trap. Um. And if this is

848
00:58:54,680 --> 00:58:58,240
Speaker 1: not if this is not a reason to treat retail

849
00:58:58,280 --> 00:59:03,000
Speaker 1: workers like humans and to just simply clean up after

850
00:59:03,080 --> 00:59:07,120
Speaker 1: yourself in your dressing rooms, even if you are in

851
00:59:07,120 --> 00:59:11,240
Speaker 1: a bustling h and m uh, then I don't know

852
00:59:11,320 --> 00:59:17,120
Speaker 1: what is so retail workers, let us know what's happening. Um,

853
00:59:17,240 --> 00:59:20,520
Speaker 1: I personally have never worked retail. I've worked fast food,

854
00:59:20,640 --> 00:59:26,200
Speaker 1: I've worked I've done domestic work, childcare, etcetera. But um,

855
00:59:26,360 --> 00:59:29,320
Speaker 1: retail has not been one of them. Caroline, have you

856
00:59:29,360 --> 00:59:32,280
Speaker 1: worked a retail job? I have not. Okay, So, folks,

857
00:59:32,360 --> 00:59:37,360
Speaker 1: we are speaking from inexperienced firsthand. So please Phillison let

858
00:59:37,440 --> 00:59:39,960
Speaker 1: us know all of your thoughts. And for anyone who

859
00:59:40,040 --> 00:59:44,560
Speaker 1: has suggestions on political organizing, sent them our way. Mom

860
00:59:44,640 --> 00:59:47,400
Speaker 1: Stuff at how stuff works dot com is our email address.

861
00:59:47,680 --> 00:59:50,400
Speaker 1: You can also tweet us at mom Stuff Podcast. You

862
00:59:50,440 --> 00:59:53,280
Speaker 1: can also directly reach out to Caroline and me. I'm

863
00:59:53,320 --> 00:59:56,800
Speaker 1: at Kristen Conger and I am at the Caroline herv

864
00:59:57,080 --> 01:00:00,360
Speaker 1: and we've got a couple of messages to share with you. Now.

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01:00:05,560 --> 01:00:08,400
Speaker 1: I have a letter here from Sam. She says, I

866
01:00:08,440 --> 01:00:11,480
Speaker 1: was writing in about your recent Genius episode and it

867
01:00:11,600 --> 01:00:13,760
Speaker 1: you talked a bit about how women who do pursue

868
01:00:13,800 --> 01:00:17,280
Speaker 1: science tend to gravitate towards the biological sciences, which is

869
01:00:17,320 --> 01:00:20,800
Speaker 1: something I noticed in college myself. I went to Rinselaer

870
01:00:20,920 --> 01:00:25,360
Speaker 1: Polytechnic Institute and major to mechanical engineering. As you can guess,

871
01:00:25,360 --> 01:00:28,760
Speaker 1: it's primarily a technical engineering school, but I noticed a

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01:00:28,840 --> 01:00:31,800
Speaker 1: strong divide among the women in choice of major. The

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01:00:31,880 --> 01:00:35,640
Speaker 1: only biomedical engineering majors I knew were women or gay men,

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01:00:35,960 --> 01:00:38,240
Speaker 1: while on the other hand, I could count the number

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01:00:38,240 --> 01:00:40,800
Speaker 1: of women in my classes on one hand out of

876
01:00:40,840 --> 01:00:43,560
Speaker 1: say fifty or so people. I always thought it was

877
01:00:43,640 --> 01:00:46,919
Speaker 1: strange how women even today still tend to gravitate toward

878
01:00:47,000 --> 01:00:51,120
Speaker 1: the organic sciences and not physics or computer science. Also

879
01:00:51,160 --> 01:00:52,720
Speaker 1: would like to give a shout out to all the

880
01:00:52,760 --> 01:00:56,600
Speaker 1: women like myself not conforming to stereotypical gender roles. Not

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01:00:56,720 --> 01:00:59,320
Speaker 1: only did I get my BS and mechanical engineering, I

882
01:00:59,360 --> 01:01:02,000
Speaker 1: went into the Navy as a submarine officer and was

883
01:01:02,080 --> 01:01:04,520
Speaker 1: part of the second or so group of women stationed

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01:01:04,520 --> 01:01:07,640
Speaker 1: aboard U S submarines. I now work in the commercial

885
01:01:07,680 --> 01:01:11,240
Speaker 1: sector as a design engineer for building automation, but just

886
01:01:11,520 --> 01:01:14,320
Speaker 1: wanted any women out there thinking about pursuing the science

887
01:01:14,400 --> 01:01:16,960
Speaker 1: is to know it is possible with some hard work

888
01:01:17,520 --> 01:01:22,040
Speaker 1: and a little bit of genius. So thanks Sam. I've

889
01:01:22,080 --> 01:01:25,520
Speaker 1: got a letter here from Hannah, also about our episode

890
01:01:25,520 --> 01:01:28,840
Speaker 1: on gender and genius, and she writes, as a cancer

891
01:01:28,880 --> 01:01:32,600
Speaker 1: biology PhD candidate, I love listening to you too every

892
01:01:32,680 --> 01:01:35,880
Speaker 1: day as I do science. The Boy Geniuses episode struck

893
01:01:35,920 --> 01:01:38,400
Speaker 1: a chord for me, as I just had a conversation

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01:01:38,440 --> 01:01:41,480
Speaker 1: with a brilliant professor the other day about females and

895
01:01:41,560 --> 01:01:45,840
Speaker 1: leadership positions in STEM. We've both observed that women tend

896
01:01:45,880 --> 01:01:49,600
Speaker 1: to hold positions of authority and have a ton of responsibility,

897
01:01:49,640 --> 01:01:52,520
Speaker 1: but not actually a lot of power. I think this

898
01:01:52,840 --> 01:01:57,640
Speaker 1: stems fun intended from the perception of women as responsible

899
01:01:57,720 --> 01:02:01,640
Speaker 1: multitaskers as compared to men who hold qualities like leadership

900
01:02:01,720 --> 01:02:05,880
Speaker 1: and vision. Justin anecdotal observation from a newly devoted listener,

901
01:02:06,240 --> 01:02:09,360
Speaker 1: I'm hoping that a new generation of informed and introspective

902
01:02:09,400 --> 01:02:13,040
Speaker 1: scientists can lead the way in changing our perception of

903
01:02:13,160 --> 01:02:16,640
Speaker 1: who makes a great leader. Well, thank you so much

904
01:02:16,760 --> 01:02:20,400
Speaker 1: for that insight, Hannah, and thanks to everybody who's written

905
01:02:20,400 --> 01:02:23,400
Speaker 1: into us. Mom Stuff at how stuff works dot com

906
01:02:23,560 --> 01:02:27,720
Speaker 1: is our email address, And speaking of email, friends, I

907
01:02:28,320 --> 01:02:32,160
Speaker 1: Kristen have started a tiny letter in response to a

908
01:02:32,160 --> 01:02:37,840
Speaker 1: lot of this stuff going on in our post election society.

909
01:02:37,960 --> 01:02:41,400
Speaker 1: It's called the Do Better digest Um, So if you

910
01:02:41,400 --> 01:02:44,000
Speaker 1: want to check that out, you can subscribe at tiny

911
01:02:44,120 --> 01:02:49,880
Speaker 1: letter dot com slash Kristen and it's Kristen c R

912
01:02:49,920 --> 01:02:54,400
Speaker 1: I S T e N. Should be a good one

913
01:02:54,600 --> 01:02:56,360
Speaker 1: and I hope to see there. And for links to

914
01:02:56,360 --> 01:02:58,000
Speaker 1: all of our social media as well as all of

915
01:02:58,000 --> 01:03:01,400
Speaker 1: our blogs, videos and pod has with our sources so

916
01:03:01,480 --> 01:03:05,120
Speaker 1: you can learn more about women and retail, head on

917
01:03:05,160 --> 01:03:12,640
Speaker 1: over to stuff Mom Never Told You dot com for

918
01:03:12,800 --> 01:03:15,120
Speaker 1: more on this and thousands of other topics. Is it

919
01:03:15,200 --> 01:03:24,040
Speaker 1: how stuff Works dot com