Make me coffee bitch!
I think one of the most graphic things that has hit me since moving to the middle east is the wage division.
I expect to get paid well for being over here, because I’m a capitalist wanker, but the stark realities of the wage situation just shocks me. The salary for the bloke who brings me coffee every morning (his title on the employee sheet is Coffee Boy) is fuck all. In fact I earn more than 20 times what he does.
Let’s put that in Aussie terms. Say I’m a lawyer or something and I earn $100,000 a year. That means the guy who brings me coffee earns $5000 a year. That’s $96 a week. And this guy is employed in a nice safe job. He told me that the poor buggers working the construction sites get about 1000 Dirhams a month. That’s $72 a week for working 12 hour days, 6 days a week in conditions that would make a nineteenth century coal miner think twice.
The worst part for these fuckers is that they are not earning $72 a week in Bangladesh, they are earning that in Abu Dhabi or Dubai, which are fast becoming the most expensive cities in the world.
I’m not sure what I’m trying to say here, other than it’s shit that these bastards are getting screwed over in a country where the average personal wealth of an Emirati is $17 million. (It’s worth mentioning that the Emiratis make up about 20% of the population here).
I guess it just hits home a lot more than when I have bought a pair of $2 thongs. You know in your heart that for you to buy that pair of thongs for $2 there is someone in China working for fuck all a day, but there are a few degrees of separation to make you not think too hard about it.
But when it’s right in your face you kind of have no choice. When your coffee boy says that he can’t afford to eat three meals a day because it’s eating into his savings (for his four kids and wife back in the Philippines) you just can’t push it out of your mind.
If it’s any consolation, he makes a shit coffee.
I expect to get paid well for being over here, because I’m a capitalist wanker, but the stark realities of the wage situation just shocks me. The salary for the bloke who brings me coffee every morning (his title on the employee sheet is Coffee Boy) is fuck all. In fact I earn more than 20 times what he does.
Let’s put that in Aussie terms. Say I’m a lawyer or something and I earn $100,000 a year. That means the guy who brings me coffee earns $5000 a year. That’s $96 a week. And this guy is employed in a nice safe job. He told me that the poor buggers working the construction sites get about 1000 Dirhams a month. That’s $72 a week for working 12 hour days, 6 days a week in conditions that would make a nineteenth century coal miner think twice.
The worst part for these fuckers is that they are not earning $72 a week in Bangladesh, they are earning that in Abu Dhabi or Dubai, which are fast becoming the most expensive cities in the world.
I’m not sure what I’m trying to say here, other than it’s shit that these bastards are getting screwed over in a country where the average personal wealth of an Emirati is $17 million. (It’s worth mentioning that the Emiratis make up about 20% of the population here).
I guess it just hits home a lot more than when I have bought a pair of $2 thongs. You know in your heart that for you to buy that pair of thongs for $2 there is someone in China working for fuck all a day, but there are a few degrees of separation to make you not think too hard about it.
But when it’s right in your face you kind of have no choice. When your coffee boy says that he can’t afford to eat three meals a day because it’s eating into his savings (for his four kids and wife back in the Philippines) you just can’t push it out of your mind.
If it’s any consolation, he makes a shit coffee.
posted by Sam Cox at
05:32
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12 Comments
