Pop Buzz UK

Not Bad For A McJob by Cloudy

Coined in the 80s but made popular in the 90s by Coupland’s Generation X, the word “McJob” is ruffling a few feathers with the employees at McDonalds and other service sector employers. The term “McJob“, which has imposed itself upon todays popular culture and is offically defined in The Oxford English Dictionary as “an unstimulating, low-paid job with few prospects, especially one created by the expansion of the service sector” had been the focus of the past few years of McDonalds staff recruitment drives. After the addition of McJob to the dictionary, McDonalds hit back with the advertising campaign slogan “Not bad for a McJob“, which was shown on posters depicting highly flexible working hours, competitive pay, share options, health plans and promotion opportunities.

In March this year, the BBC reported that McDonalds was now campaigning against the McJob definition. Obviously growing bored with the attention they’ve been receiving, McDonalds is
petitioning the UK’s dictionary houses in order to have the definition of McJob removed or redefined. They’ve published an online petition at changethedefinition.com where members of the public can sign their petition against the derogatory definition of McJob. On the site, McDonalds say “This definition is out of date, out of touch with reality and most importantly is insulting to those hard-working, talented and committed people who serve the public every day in the UK. As the namesake for this derogatory term, this prejudice is felt most sharply by the 67,000 people who pursue careers and jobs at McDonald’s in the UK. It’s time the dictionary definition of McJob changed to reflect a job that is stimulating, rewarding and offers genuine opportunities for career progression and skills that last a lifetime.”

Having seen a petition actually inside a McDonalds restaurant being signed by people, it seems that it’s not so much of a joke as some may think. Employees of McDonalds seem to have mixed feelings about their employer, where some will say that they only work for McDonalds because it’s an easy job to get, there are many who make a career out of McDonalds and are incensed by the way people look down on the job that they are passionate about. Surely then, it’s not the occupation that makes a job a McJob, but the attitudes of the driveless employees who make a McJob what it is.

Someone I know who works for a McDonalds restaurant spoke to me about this recently and said “God only knows how much money McDonalds have ploughed into this cause in order to lift the morale of the staff and shun the public opinion of them but it’s safe to say that if they put all that cash into staff incentives and days out they’d have a hell of a lot of happy employees.” And I’m inclined to agree.

The UK isn’t that much different to the rest of the world when it comes to hating McDonalds. We eat there because it’s cheap, we use the toilets there when we’re in a bit of a tight spot because they’re pretty clean, but work there?! Are you having a laugh? We pretty much frown upon everything that McDonalds is, it makes us fat, damages the environment with all it’s waste (99.9% of rubbish on the streets is dropped by us, the customer by the way) and is the personification of corporate capitalism. Would you say being a teacher is a good job? What would you say if I told you that you can get paid as much if not more working for McDonalds than teaching at high school level? Basic salaried managers at McDonalds get paid a minimun of £18,500 to do what people deem a McJob, and a maximum of £97,000 if your McProspects are good enough to take you to the top of the ladder. Not bad for a McJob, eh?

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