'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters

Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by jandrewrogers on Friday September 06, 2019 @07:45PM (#20900847)

That is an exceedingly cynical way of looking at it. People usually volunteer to do this kind of thing and have no small amount of personal pride that they are able to help their neighbors in a disaster. It is a very positive experience for the people that do it, and they are often some of the first people on the ground. This is a manifestation of the self-reliance bias of American culture, they want to fix things themselves when disasters happen.

Disaster response in the US is completely driven by these kinds of community-oriented actions by private individuals and companies, and it has a long history of being highly effective.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by ethbro on Friday September 06, 2019 @08:53PM (#20901101)

I've been in the hurricane center at a large retailer (last week, in fact). Aside from freezing prices at before-storm levels, no one who volunteers for the 24/7 emergency staffing is thinking about the dollars. Sales take care of themselves.

They're doing it because it feels good to help people.

And because rerouting truckloads of supplies effectively at 2 AM means someone in the affected area will be able get to their nearest store and get the things they need.

I'm not sure why the comments here are so !%^&ing jaded, but sometimes you do the right thing... simply because it's right.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by zigzaggy on Friday September 06, 2019 @09:50PM (#20901299)

I totally agree. I think a lot of people think this way and just don’t express their opinions because they have nothing to prove. But there are also lots of selfish people that don’t and they’ll probably never get this.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by Angostura on Saturday September 07, 2019 @05:15AM (#20902704)

I don’t think it’s extremely cynical. Depending on the culture of the company it would be quite possibly that there was pressure - subtle, or less so - put on employees.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by AmericanChopper on Saturday September 07, 2019 @02:33AM (#20902157)

For every good thing a company does, there’ll always be a HN commenter ready to explain why it’s exploitation.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by CoolGuySteve on Friday September 06, 2019 @10:16PM (#20901370)

How many volunteers are doing it because they need the hours?

Does WH pay employees who can't show so they can still cover their bills?

Is it ethical to pay someone $7/hour (the average wage of a WH employee) and then ask them if they would volunteer to travel to work in a hurricane?

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by wcunning on Friday September 06, 2019 @10:28PM (#20901405)

Citation on the average wage? Federal minimum is $7.25/hr, and at least in my midwestern town, McDonald's is paying $11.25/hr, starting, so that seems shockingly low as an average. Or is that the average of the tipped staff, before tips?

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by CoolGuySteve on Friday September 06, 2019 @10:35PM (#20901436)

https://www.payscale.com/research/US/Employer=Waffle_House%2...

https://www.indeed.com/cmp/Waffle-House/salaries

But really, if the employee was making $11.25/hour, would that somehow make it more ethical? $22k/year is still borderline impoverished for a 3 person household: https://www.thebalance.com/federal-poverty-level-definition-...

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by Scoundreller on Saturday September 07, 2019 @09:28AM (#20903633)

Does it?

Here’s the kind of house that $35k BUYS you in Cleveland:

https://www.zillow.com/homedetails/2840-E-122nd-St-Cleveland...

I can only assume the neighbourhood and/or it’s schools are atrocious, but damn.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by diminoten on Saturday September 07, 2019 @12:31AM (#20901790)

Wouldn't it be $44k/year?

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by pessimizer on Saturday September 07, 2019 @12:43AM (#20901826)

The usual estimate is 2000 hours/year.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by diminoten on Saturday September 07, 2019 @01:30AM (#20901985)

Yes, per person, and two people who can work in the household.

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Re:'Waffle House Index' is a real thing during disasters by falcongod082 on Friday September 06, 2019 @11:38PM (#20901648)

I don't think it's ethical to pay that little period, but I don't see Waffle House commercials talking about this either, so if the company isn't trying to profit off of it and the employees want to do it I'm all for it.

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