If the business never opens, then the jobs are never even created. Jobs are being lost because of this policy and I think that is a serious loss.

I think you are a bit optimistic about the economics of small hotels and restaurants. The margin on cooked food is lower than on sambos and a lot lower than on coffee. It’s tough to run a restaurant without 4 or 5 staff, and at 19 euros an hour or whatever, you need to do a lot of covers to get it to make sense.

We have to think about flexibility in the economy overall to maximise the use of resources. Inflexible rules = a vulnerable economy.

Here’s an interesting example of something similar in an unrelated sector.

“It’s making it impossible. You should be able to set up a radio station for €150,000, except that new entrants to the market can’t do that because of the regulations. So if you’re spending €2m on a studio, you’re then paying lease payments or equity against that – or you’re borrowing as much money as you can.” (DO’B on regulation – http://firsttuesday.ie/node/118)

It’s interesting who is saying this – a person whom you would think has more to lose than anyone else from new entrants in the radio business.

Dole payment when taken on its own is probably too high but when taken in the context of society its too easy for the socialists to argue otherwise. The real problem is that folk aren’t given community jobs to do in return for payment and as such the net worth to society is actually a drain on the economy.

I can see how what I said may have come across as build export jobs and down with cafés, etc but perhaps I need to fine tune my phrasing a little. Really what I was thinking is that the balance of cafés to sustaining local economies is probably a little upset these days. They are incredibly plentiful without even adding the sandwich franchises to the equation whom are now doubt taking from the traditional café’s customers. A good selection of cafés is essential to keep a buzz to an area and entice people inwards to the centre (other). However, they cannot survive in areas where the disposable income creating workforce aren’t that gainfully employed nor can they operate when the number of cafés in existence divides the market share beyond breakeven point.

I think we are largely on the same hymn sheet in terms of our background thinking. However, my argument in this post was that the existing business rules should not be costing jobs nor closing business to close down (especially the business type that prompted this post by Damien). Any business starting out, knowing the rules (as unfair as they may be) should be able to run a 1, 3 and 5 year prediction of business. If the figures aren’t adding up at prediction stage allowing for 7-day opening and double time Sundays then there’s no point in opening the business and therefore no jobs lost. The issue at hand is to then decide if 6-day opening is viable or if a different type of business can turn a profit for the investor to create other jobs and a life for themselves. Just for the record, I do agree with your points about the min wage, etc I just think there’s a different argument here to be teased out as to why relatively new businesses with prior knowledge are effectively blaming their ignorance for their problems but expecting the government to make up for it.

If what you say about some Irish workers is true (and I agree, it could well be), then the problem is that the dole payment is too high.

I think what you are getting at is that services like cafes don’t add value in the way that export-oriented jobs do, and that we should concentrate on developing export-oriented jobs. (I may be paraphrasing you wrongly here, in which case I apologize.) At first face, that’s true, but it’s not that simple. Cafes do (sometimes) add to quality of life by making the place vibrant and interesting to live in, something which will attract and hold skilled workers. Other services which may appear ‘low end’ are similarly important. Another important role of these jobs is to spread money around in the economy. That’s why vibrant local service economies are part of all modern developed markets.

I don’t want an argument with you but I think the problem here is that there are actually two issues being correlated and debated as one. The issue of minimum wage/double time law being respected and that of how businesses survive in this economic climate. It’s not that the two are mutually exclusive but Sunday hours aren’t as simple as you are making out in the context of supporting XYZ.

Every economy operates on balance: For the last 15 years in Ireland we experienced a construction boom. The construction workforce and supporting industries thrived and bloated beyond sustainability. 20 years ago in Ireland, in rural areas that you refer to, we had the village café if you were lucky and perhaps a sandwich shop in the centre of bigger cities to support the tea/coffee rooms of hotels and the occasional café. All back in a time when tourism was one of the biggest earners in the country and Sunday trading was a distant prospect. Today all big cities are flooded with these sandwich shops to the extent that people question will I go for a B or will I go for a C for lunch today. Now choice is good but from a business perspective there is only so much custom and too much choice in the market means that somebody (or everybody) isn’t making money by simple breakeven analysis.

The problem with understanding the equation of the business plan is that while more hours might equal more jobs for workers it doesn’t necessarily mean profitable or sustainable business. I could setup 20 coffee shops in the morning all competing against each other, within the one area, and be out of business this time next week. I have to operate within the parameters of profitability and just because a well-known franchise or already done business looks like a good way to earn a living, it doesn’t make it feasible to enter the market if the staff necessary to run the business cost too much to gain the edge on competitors without long-term recouping of initial outlay and neither does it make sense to oversupply a flooded marketplace with choice that might be good for the consumer but which doesn’t equal profit for the business owner. We’re into soup kitchen territory then.

I fully appreciate how hard it is for rural towns to make money and attract custom to enrich their local economy. However, we seem to be missing the point that these rural towns (not sure how rural you actually mean but rural in my mind is certainly a lot smaller than let’s say Waterford City) don’t have the demand for Sunday trading hours; any café operating in such a town is normally owner run and doesn’t incur the double time issue. However, let’s take my home city of Waterford as an example. In terms of inhabitants, supporting those 5 mins walk across the river in co Kilkenny also, the city centre supports (excluding tourists) approximately 55-60 thousand people on any given day and that’s only those living within the city boundary or within 5 mins of the city centre. Sunday trading is still not a fact of life in Waterford and yet it has always historically been a huge tourism zone off the back of the crystal factory and other medieval attractions. Sunday opening is constrained to large dept stores and to seasonally adjusted needs such as Christmas shopping weeks when consumerism is rampant and there’s money to be made by the increased activity. Only one or two café type shops open on a Sunday, usually only after lunch and the remainder of the need is served by hotels and their dining facilities. Now if a small city supporting 60,000 occupants doesn’t see the demand for Sunday hours then I fail to see how anything more rural does?

I’ve already agreed with you that the minimum wage is already too high and I do appreciate how this portrays us in global terms as per my previous comment. The other issue here that seems to be ignored continually is that perhaps, just maybe, there is too much supply in the market for this type of business in certain areas? Now creating jobs is great and all that but creating unsustainable jobs according to the figures in this thread, doesn’t make any sense – it turns business into charity and simply puts huge pressure on an economy that is already suffering from the lack of stable investment and primary employment sectors that support the tertiary services of catering by injecting cash into the economy. I fear even making the next comment but it’s a fact and as such will hopefully be treated that way: In recent times there has been huge growth in the café/sandwich shop arena and for whatever reason (Irish greed or otherwise) the staffing situation seems to provide for a great deal of migrant workers. This presents the question of what the equivalent national worker is doing if the population has increased by one for every migrant worker job? Sadly in an increasing number of cases the national worker is opting to hop on the dole queue because it’s less hassle and greater benefit to them to do so. This means that we have less people with a tie to the country creating and bolstering future employment positions and a greater draw on our social welfare system as a result.

The economy will only support so many jobs, no matter how good our intentions are. We have to realise that supply and demand must be observed. Franchise parents get their money no matter what happens on the street. There is no easy way to make money or do business, it’s always hard work. Not doing the math and identifying these problems before trading commences is a serious fundamental flaw in business planning, irrespective of the counter argument that minimum wage is too high or we need to create more jobs – we can only support what is profitable, anything beyond is not a genuine need.

Who said that? Or is it going to remain as “some people”?

>>>Nobody said it! As I said above the comments are suggestive of this attitude<<>None of us can have all our rights – In a limited world with limited resources it is simply not possible – compromise (on both sides) is essential and inevitable and any legislation which removes local bargaining power is ultimately destructive IMHO <<

The problem is that workers are going to be forbidden from doing the latter.

I don’t see the difficulty understanding the equation – shorter weekly opening hours translate directly and necessarily into fewer jobs.

The purpose of a minimum wage is to stop exploitation. It is not there to stop people from getting jobs.

I don’t think you are realistic about how hard it is to make money in a service business outside the main centres. I don’t think you understand how dependent smaller communities are on one or two businesses to bring in money and how vulnerable they are if they lose them.

I don’t think you appreciate what’s happening in our tourism industry as one example. The prices we are charging for food and refreshments are just not sustainable on the world stage. In the past the prices might have been driven by greed for sure, but now, the prices are driven by high labour costs, particularly outside the centres. If you are going to shut down all the small and medium sized cafes and restaurants on a Sunday (including pubs that serve food), that is going to have an impact on tourism.

Here is the SI by the way.

http://www.attorneygeneral.ie/esi/2008/B26108.pdf

And as I say, the fact that it’s a crappy law isn’t a reason not to obey it.

exploitative scumbags that some of the comments on this posting would suggest.

Who said that? Or is it going to remain as “some people”?

If my rights as an employee when fully exercised cause my employment to fail then does not responsibility kick in whereby I take responsibility for the future of my employment by being prepared to compromise.

Giving up some things in order for a bit of peace or money have been catastrophic in the past have they not? If you compromise integrity and morals or turn a blind eye to bad or illegal practices what happens then?

There are bad employers who exploit and abuse workers just as there are bad employees who abuse the state protections for workers and manipulate the welfare system. Sadly we now have a very adversarial working environment where rights are enforced but responsibilities are ignored. Both employers and employees have both rights and responsibilities. Neither of these are absolutes. Any individual’s rights are circumscribed by their impact on their neighbour – If everyone got what was due to them they might not be so passionate about rights and might start to consider responsibility.

This applies to both employers and employees alike. If my rights as an employee when fully exercised cause my employment to fail then does not responsibility kick in whereby I take responsibility for the future of my employment by being prepared to compromise. The same applies to employers who may apply discretionary leniency to an employee who is having personal difficulties and who through same is perhaps failing to do their work properly – The employer may be entitled to sack the said person but one would hope that they would take a more sympathetic view and do their best to help their employee get back on their feet – In my wife’s business this has been the case on more than one occasion.

The situation we find ourselves in is perhaps symptomatic of society as a whole where trust has broken down and has been replaced by legalism which of its nature destroys working relationships.

I’m not suggesting a return to the ‘Good old days’ which were perhaps even worse in other ways but I do think that a system focussed solely on rights will never create a happy working environment. This must be a priority no matter how much we earn we should have some sense of fulfillment in our work which takes up a large proportion of our short lives. All this is an attempt to move the discussion beyond the impasse of Them and Us – We are all in this together.