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Comment by braingenious | Hacker News Reader

How many people got a job and quit after a few days as you described?

Did this have any impact on recidivism?

Is it possible that these employees found better jobs? If so, could it have theoretically been possible to retain them had you offered better wages, benefits or assignments?

I just don’t fundamentally understand the position of “I had a group of people that truly needed my business, but a phenomenon called The Great Resignation changed the world in such a way that they… didn’t need it anymore (?)”

Is it possible that your business model of (in your parlance) leasing out convicts maybe had some sort of innate flaw unrelated to covid?

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Staffing agencies, from a super cynical point of view, take a slice of money that would otherwise go to the people actually working.

I think in the more nuanced view staffing agencies allow people with irregular rhythms to still have a job. And of course helping people actually get a foot in the door! But if you're going to work full time anyways, and there's more open-ness to you being hired, why go through a staffing agency? I think the reasons end up being limited to "could not get hired yourself".

At least, the staffing agency can negotiate a better deal than you could find and secure for yourself.

Maybe, but maybe not - and maybe that negotiated difference leads to the profit slice or a higher profit slice.

Why would a person make $14.50/hour when they could make $15/hour applying directly to places?

The issue may be that so few people are looking for work right now that it's easier for convicted felons to be hired, perhaps not worrying about or taking on whatever vetting process that may or may not happen through an agency for people with a criminal record.

>Why would a person make $14.50/hour when they could make $15/hour applying directly to places?

Yeah, the generally wouldn't, which is why you have to conclude that they don't have the option.

> maybe that negotiated difference leads to the profit slice

Of course.

It’s kinda odd. I’d expect people to be happy to have a new job, but if they (regularly) quit after only a few days, then it sounds like being jobless is more comfortable for them (they can’t all find a different position after just a few days).

Either they like being jobless (which isn’t really a typical type of person in my experience), or the job itself was terrible due to pay, commute, working conditions, company culture, etc. or they were able to find more favorable employment outside of 70M.

I would love to know what jobs were difficult to fill and how much they paid because “The Great Resignation” narrative (kind of conveniently) squarely puts the blame for the failure of this business on a caricature of lazy poors and the government. This narrative also absolutely vindicates the founder and management because the demise is because of an uncontrollable external force.

Those are all possible explanations, but it seems unlikely that previously acceptable jobs suddenly turned unacceptable at the same time COVID started?

Kind of hard to think something suddenly changed about the operation of the company that had been running well for the past few years.

To quote the original post:

> Now our workers were reticent to come back to work. And if they did accept a job, they’d often leave after only a few days.

Businesses fail for myriad reasons every day, even ones that functioned perfectly for years. Not every business, however, lays blame on a big and uncontrollable phenomenon to explain why it folded.

The author did not mince words — people no longer wanted to use his service. He has decided that that’s because people didn’t want to work due to a sociopolitical phenomenon that’s entirely decoupled from basics like “How good were the jobs?”, “How much did they pay?”, “How were the working conditions at these workplaces?”

This narrative completely avoids any possibility of his business making poor decisions or simply not offering a service that people want.

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