I think you should know that if you gave every WDW a raise of $1.50 an hour, if the average emplyee worked 25 hours a week, the cost would be $109,200,000.00 not including payroll taxes. I do believe the cast members should get the raise but also realize it can't come from cutting the salaries of top management, it has to come from us, the consumers. BTW, payroll taxes can add over 20% in many states.
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LA TIMES: Walt Disney World plans to deploy driverless shuttles
- Thread starter kpilcher
- Start date
Kamikaze
Well-Known Member
In theory, yes. In reality, thats not how it works, and you know it.
They are linked because you have to pay your employees from somewhere. Your source of revenue at WDW is the guests, so thats where you have to get the extra money to pay them comes from. That extra 15% would have to be made up for, and even if you cut the execs pay by some number (or just didn't pay them an increase), you'd still have to make up a large chunk of it from guests.
Otterhead
Well-Known Member
My assumption is that this will just supplement piloted buses in places where it makes sense -- for example, there's buses dedicated to just driving the loops around several of the largest resorts, such as Saratoga Springs, for intra-resort transport. That's a natural spot to have two or three driverless shuttles. I can only imagine the insane tedium of driving a resort loop constantly all day.
xdan0920
Think for yourselfer
I know. My inner socialist was showing there. Just drives me a little nuts the way capitalism has evolved in the US of A.
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
At one time WDW jobs were among the best paying in Central FL a smaller but more MOTIVATED workforce would in all likelihood be more productive as well...
A while back someone here had the Sentinel ad for EPCOT's opening staffing they were FULL time jobs STARTING at 10.50/Hour in 1982!!!!
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
No its Crapitalism in the US of A aka Crony Capitalism Whats going on now has little to do with Adam Smith
Kamikaze
Well-Known Member
But they can't have a (substantially) 'smaller' workforce. Do you really think they employ tons more people than they need?
While I agree that better paid employees are by-and-large better employees (see: Costco), that pay has to come from somewhere.
The thing to look at for that $10.50 an hour number is the number of employees in Epcot in 1982 vs now. The park, in terms of total attractions, is relatively the same. So you'd have a fair-ish comparison of wages. If they could run the park with say 5,000 employees in 82 but now need 7,500 to run the park, then the per-hour wage has to be proportional to that for them to be putting the same amount into labor costs.
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
All true but WDW relies these days on a HUGE contingent workforce which has its own compliance and administrative costs. It costs MORE to have 4 people who are scheduled for 2 hours day than it does to have one person scheduled for 8.
Much of this is built around Obamacare benefit avoidance of course.
But the reality is that each park requires a minimum number of FTE's to operate and fractional FTE's do not equal a single FTE on a 1:1 basis. Probably the part timers have a 30-40% efficiency loss in a role compared to having that role filled by a single FT FTE
That said a theme park will always require a large part time work force and thats been true since day 1 of DL
The problem now is WDW is out of balance on the PT workforce.
That expanded monorail system price tag back in the 70's and 80's seems pretty cheap compared with what you have today....
GoofGoof
Premium Member
Benefits are a major component to labor costs and they are the piece that is going up at a much faster pace than the actual wages. It's not surprising that they would try to mitigate that expense with more part time workers. If you have a good pool of part time workers who are happy to work part time it might be a win/win for both sides, but the problem is that a lot of the part time workers may really want full time work but take what they can get. It leads to lower morale and poor productivity in general. It's not just a Disney problem, but since they are so large it does stand out more than some places.
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
By no means are the cost of benefits a uniquely Disney problem. But is it a Disney problem when the workforce is generally disengaged and unhappy and it shows
But a poorly trained workforce also creates unnecessary costs and more 'guest recovery' than would be needed under a better trained workforce. A key example is Disney needing to bring in consulting companies to fix the issues in Mousekeeping
Uncle Lupe
Well-Known Member
I would think Tesla Motors would want a hand in these projects or does that conflict with the Chevy sponsorship? Talk about a great opportunity for some old schoool partnership property wide, not just a single pavilion.
And now they need to bring in someone new to help with transportation. Not saying it is a bad thing since they are making an effort to fix the issues, but wasnt Disney Imagineering once known for its problem solving abilities?
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
It WAS but remember Iger led the purge of the real creatives and engineers from WDI and then dumped WDI's industrial capabilities (fabrication etc), Pretty much all that's left from what I understand is Joe Rohde some political hacks who call themselves 'Imagineers', illustrators and a bunch of project managers and the suits that run the joint.
Remember the definition of an Imagineer was a either a trained artist with an engineering bent or an trained engineer with an artistic bent both of whom could take a concept and bring it to physicality.
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
Part of the high wages was of course the iron law of economics, You get what you pay for with Disney paying 3x minimum wage they could be very selective about who they hired AND the employees would value the job as well.
One complaint you heard a lot of in the late 90s and early noughts was 'Eisner keeps cutting our pay'
If WDW doubled their wages and went back to a reasonable mix of FT/PT staff I suspect a lot of the issues they have today would go away. Of course this IS the company which dumped it's entire IT staff so they could 'save' money on IT and send it to the lowest bid body shop (and the current end product reflects that).
Recall Henry Ford doubled the wages of his employees so they would have enough money to buy the cars they were producing, Which was very good business.
The last vestige of the OLD Disney is the maingate passes for ordinary CM's which I imagine will be going away soon as those dilute the all holy METRICS, But the reason for the passes was at the time a good business decision if my well paid employees visit the park outside of work hours it's FREE TRAINING on attractions and services and simply navigating the park.
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
Because in this Disney sees the dancing dollar signs of eliminating bus drivers and using automated buses, whereas with the monorail automation does not yield future personnel cost reductions. With an automated bus they can have a minimum wage 'conductor' load ECV's instead of paying a CDL licensed bus driver with wages 2-3x that of a CP'er and said conductor would stay with the station rather than the bus
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
From a Resort that throws off Billions in after tax profit that amount is a rounding error.
But it $2.00 a day per person
and that is using conservatives figures. It most likely is $3.00 a day per person including payroll taxes. I have an annual pass and go about 24 days a year and I would not mind paying more than my pass currently cocts but you are talking somewhere from $48.00 and $72.00 more per pasd. For my wife and I, its $96.00 to $144.00 a year and that is quite a bit. I can afforf it but think it would hurt attendance.
But what would Iger retire on?
ford91exploder
Resident Curmudgeon
Or you restructure P&R's wildly inefficient bloated and top heavy manangement structure. Becsuse nearly all of WDW's problems are caused by 'too many Chiefs too Few Indians'
Back when the place was run as a whole it both paid workers better and made more money as a percentage of revenue than it does today.
Now its a bunch of competing b/u's all occupying the same space all with independent management structures etc all trying screw over the other B/U's
The loser in this game is of course the guest