McDonald's, BMW, Texas, North Dakota, Minnesota -- Definitely Not a Bakken Story

There were two stories that appeared in the Los Angeles Times over the July 2-3, 2011, weekend.

One was an op-ed piece in the business section lamenting the fact that a BMW automobile parts distribution center in California is going to close down and the "mission" outsourced to an "unidentified third party."

Here's the story: link here.

I think the average McDonald's worker gets minimum wage or thereabouts, probably about $8.00/hour and health benefits significantly less than what union workers earning $25/hour would get.

What do you think is the more difficult job: working in a warehouse locating parts and shipping them to dealers, or working the front lines of a McDonald's fast food restaurant? In the former, you don't work with the public; you don't have to multi-task, you don't have to know a second language or deal in multiple languages. At McDonald's, dealing with some of the crazy customers (read the book by Dave Thomas) and trying to understand any number of non-English-speaking customers is a recurring experience. Multi-tasking is the name of the game, and smiling all day long is a given.

With regard to an automobile parts distribution center, my understanding is that most orders arrive by computer overnight; and by noon, most of the parts for the day are identified, picked and sent out. Most of the rest of the day is, well, whatever ... and since the distribution center is the "gem" of the industry, much of it is automated.

There is no question McDonald's is the tougher job. It looks like BMW is doing something about that.

The second story is another op-ed piece; this time about about the growth of jobs in Texas: link here.

For the last few weeks, I've been unable to get a startling statistic out of my head: Since the recession officially ended, Texas has created more than 4 of every 10 new jobs in America.

That's right, Texas: the reddest of red states, home to gun lovers and school textbooks that openly question whether the Founding Fathers intended for the separation of church and state. I am no ideologue. Still, whenever I get political, I tend to tilt reflexively to the left, making the jobs figure a bit disconcerting at first.

But there's no escaping it. The number is real. Which means that if you care about putting people back to work at a time when nearly 14 million in this country are unemployed, maybe Texas has something to teach us.

If the writer has trouble understanding what Texas is doing, he/she can take a look at the North Dakota - Minnesota experience along with the Texas experience: link here.

Maybe more later.