I graduated high school on June 16, 2000. I wanted to get a job. I didn’t need one—my expenses were covered for university. But I wanted one. Also I wanted to get out of the house and away from my parents, well, my mom, for part of the day. (I’ll stop here and note that I love my mommy, very, very much and we chat quite often. But 18yo me could think of almost nothing but getting away from home. Nothing.)
I didn’t want any job at the mall --the Springfield Mall in Delaware Co., PA, if you’re curious. The Republicans were coming that summer and I wanted to be part of something—not that, despite the entreaties of my long-time best friend at the time (in case you’re curious about that---he’s a member of a very rare breed in the city of Philadelphia—a Republican who actually is registered as such, and runs for office as such. )
Anyway I’m getting off track. I opened a newspaper---yes, a paper newspaper—to the want ads—yes, 90s-era Millennials, there were (and are) things called the want ads (can I make myself feel any older?!) and saw an ad. It looked something like this, and it’s been 16 years so my memory may be not entirely accurate.
WORK ON A CAMPAIGN FOR CLEAN WATER!
MAKE $300 A WEEK EASY
APPLY TODAY!
FUN PEOPLE SAVING THE WORLD!
PENN PIRG
[an address in Center City, Philadelphia and a phone number with a Center City prefix]
I did the math. It was mid June. I wouldn’t get to college until the very end of August. Even after tax it’d still be some nice play money for the first semester. I was all about the environment then, and clean water and air and whales and shit. And it was in an office building in Center City and that sounded kinda glamourous. And—this is key---I didn’t really bother to research them---after all how could I? It was the year 2000. The internet wasn’t that great then, and I didn’t have the research skills then that I do now. So, I applied and was hired on the spot (the phone.)
This turned out to be the worst two weeks of, up to that point, my life. What they do is this:
- work their managers for up to 16-18 hours a day
- pay them barely at minimum wage (and remember, this was the year 2000. What was minimum wage then?)
- collect tons of young, idealistic students as foot soldiers
- Tell those young people they’re going to make $300/week
- And then tell those young people that the catch is they must raise a certain amount every day knocking on peoples’ doors, usually at a time where they are not home at all, to get $300 a week.
- Then hurl those kids, spouting a pre-determined sales pitch (I learned recently they made it an entertaining rap), out into the nether regions of the suburbs. They’re given suburban residential streets to work, places they may be unfamiliar with---alone. Remember at this time, cellphones were uncommon. At least they paid for or provided transportation.
The most money I raised in a day was $125, and that was because I was being trained by someone who knew what she was doing. When alone (which was the rest of the time), I barely raised anything. I could remember the spiel but I would get easily flustered (especially when people answered the door topless---at least that guy I got a donation out of!) Also I thought it was a bit impersonal and I liked to make the spiel a bit more interesting. Also it was summer and it was hot. Also this is Pennsylvania. The suburbs I was sent to were mostly wealthy and white, and I am not white. There, I said it. I can see this now approaching 35---18 year old, raised by bougie Huxtable-clones in the suburbs me would not have seen this at all.
The managers didn’t like that I didn’t bring in any money, and they didn’t like that I didn’t stick to the script. I was told one evening that I had a week to up the game because the other kids were bringing in lots of money. My thoughts were “how is it my fault no one will give me their money?” Remember that the economy slowed significantly in 2000, especially that summer. People didn’t have it.
I quit the next day. Didn’t find a job at the mall either. Irritated my mother for the rest of the summer (I did odd jobs for my grandmother instead, just to get out of the house and make some money).
Why the long personal and negative story about a progressive group? This.
A network of left-leaning public-interest groups has come out in opposition to the Obama administration’s new overtime rule, prompting charges of hypocrisy from progressives who back the rule.
U.S. PIRG, a coalition of state nonprofits around the U.S., issued a statement last week saying the new overtime regulations would hamstring its efforts to hold corporations accountable. The new overtime rule will expand overtime eligibility to millions of workers who currently don’t qualify.
“Organizations like ours rely on small donations from individuals to pay the bills. We can’t expect those individuals to double the amount they donate,” the group said in its statement. “Rather, to cover higher staffing costs forced upon us under the rule, we will be forced to hire fewer staff and limit the hours those staff can work – all while the well-funded special interests that we’re up against will simply spend more” (emphasis theirs).
When I posted on Twitter, “wow, I’m not shocked. This was my first job! And I was treated badly!” I got quite a few responses back from people I don’t follow, who don’t know me, who said the same thing.
This is unacceptable for a Progressive organization to treat its workers this way. And people who are calling them hypocrites are right. The PIRGs are bloody hypocrites. And sadly, many other progressive non-profits are the same.
Or what Alan Pyke said:
My sentiments exactly (if you click through, there’s a whole thread there worth reading about his experience.)
Erik Loomis writes:
PIRG is an utter disaster of an organization. It identifies an always available source of labor–young people, usually college or immediate post-college students, who don’t have a good job lined up and want to do some good. That’s actually a good thing–I wish other left-leaning organizations could find a way to take idealistic people and put them to work doing some good. But all PIRG uses them for is door-to-door fundraising. PIRG has no interest in building organizing skills in these people, no interest in long-term movement building, no interest in helping these people advance to long-term investment in either the organization or larger progressive causes. You can work there for years and advance no further than supervising other fundraisers. All it does it burn out those idealistic people.
Emphasis mine. It sure as fuck does. There’s a reason beyond the Hatch Act that I now , as an adult, would never canvass, and it was my 2 soul-crushing weeks at PIRG. I’d leave home at 8 am and sit through some rah-rah mess at the office from 9:30 to 12 (where they quizzed us on the spiel), and then we’d be sent out into the suburbs to get money until about 9pm that night. I wouldn’t get home most evenings until well after 11pm, just to do it all over again the next day. Fuck that. It’s also why when they show up on my doorstep I give them money and water and food and whatever they might need. I have the utmost respect for the DNC’s phone fundraisers. But I bet they, working for the “Establishment” (whatever that means, I use it as a catchall for all things negative now, like the gloomy weather I had for most of May), are paid way better than the progressive kids just wanting to do good that are the PIRG’s footsoldier staff.
I wish this site existed in 2000---or that I’d found it if it did. I never would have applied. I’d have sucked it up and gone to work at the grocery store instead and I would have made more money and probably had more fun. My local grocery store at the time had hunky guys my age working at it. Shit.
Oh, by the way? My paycheck for the 2 weeks I worked there was $52 after tax. I know this because they reported it to Social Security (hey, at least they did something right!) and I see it every year when Social Security sends me a statement for that year. it’s the only $52 I actually made in that particular tax year.
If this diary seems a bit acerbic, it’s because the news about this finally let me know that it was okay to feel what I felt quite a bit back then. None of what happened was okay, not a single bit and it’s nice to have validation. I was mad for a long time—another reason I got on my mother’s nerves that summer. Now, I know that was okay to be mad.
I’m glad the President made those overtime rules. Pay people what they’re worth. It’s that simple.