fuck this job.com

I've been reading blogs on this site for some time now without submitting one for myself, mainly because my employment status has been temporarily suspended for school. Now I'm back for the summer, but this time, for the first time, having to deal with new customers rather than that of my old position, which was old customers.

With this new position (filling in for someone having surgery), I will have manned every position available within the automobile finance company I work for. This summer, it's sales contracts.

I'm not here to rail on someone in particular, although I do have a shortlist of deserving people. I want to share with you my personal discovery on the realitivity of the customer's annoyingness, their own class status, and the value of the goods sold.

It's no secret that there are a lot of people that blog on here about how much they hate their customers. From that, it's not hard to extract the implication that there's a class difference between the writer and the customers he write about. We're all adults here (I presume) so let's not beat around the bush-- white people tend to hammer on black people, but especially when there's a financial gap there. Full disclosure: I'm a white guy, and I'm definitely not hurting for cash. And in all honesty, in all the blogs I've read and in my own thoughts as I go shopping, I never really questioned my fellow whiteys' complaints on the annoyingness of the poor blacks. It's just something you're used to, and anyone who can't admit that it's present in our society is either stupid or lying.

Before you start hammering me with your angry replies, let me finish. What I'm saying is, my eyes have been opened to something. It seems to me that most of the racism in commerce doesn't revolve around race, but really around the value of the items sold. First, we must distingush between two types of money: pocket money, and credit. (I know there are more than that, but this discussion centers around these two.)

Groceries, for example, or anything that can be purchased with pocket money, tend to be more of a casual purchase for affluent people because pocket money is nothing to come by. Contrarily, poor people have a more limited supply of pocket money and subconsiously don't want to let it go, therefore, are way more picky about groceries and small purchases. That is what translates into bitch-fits at stores about prices and shoddy goods. An affluent person like myself couldn't understand the fuss, because so what if I got jipped seventy-five cents? I didn't care.

Then you have credit, which is the kind of money I deal with now at work. We give credit to a wide variety of people, from the bottom of the social ladder to the top, and after only a few days, there is no question in my mind that I'd much rather see a family of dirt-poor deadbeats come inside than a rich white guy with his casual polo shirt tucked into his khaki shorts and his sunglasses with a strap.

Credit is the total reciprocal of pocket money. Affluent people, while not totally averse about going into debt, will hound, pick, quibble, fuss, and bitch incessantly about the item they're financing, while a poor person will take any old thing and sign whatever you put in front of his face. This old white man, the kind that trades for a new pickup every year, bothered me all morning Saturday about financing his next truck.

First he finally found one he liked, but didn't want the running boards. He wanted them off.

Second he kept telling me how another dealer had one just like it but it was cheaper. (Unlikely, becasue the price tags are from the factory.)

Third, he kept claiming the other dealer offered him more on his trade.

Fourth, he swore up and down that GMAC Finance offered him a lower rate that our information shows. (Again, very unlikely.)

Fifth, as the salesman tried to plese him with his desired monthly payment, they began to argue about-- I swear to Christ-- TWO dollars a month.

Eventually, we make the man happy, although the salesman bent so much we would practially be taking a loss on the deal. Then the customer asks me in private, "Hey, you know, I really like that truck except for the color. Can we get one in charcoal?"

That was the bulk of my morning. Later that day, I had three other deals, in which their total combined time from start to finish was about six minutes more than the time I spent with just that one prick from earlier. The other customers were low-income black people-- the same ones I used to see giving so much trouble to cashiers in grocery stores and restaurants. On each one, I thought, "Oh, man, what did I do to deserve this job?" But I was surpised, because each one of them went smoothly without a hitch. They test drove one, maybe two cars each, and came inside. I said, "You like that one?"

"Yeah."

"You'll pay $300 per month?"

"Sure."

I wrote out some quick figures, explained them, they agreed immediately, I drew up the contracts, they signed without protest, we shook hands, and that was it. In 'n out. Without question, I prefer dealing with poor people IN THIS kind of business.

That all being said, that doesn't disqualify the assertions made by those in the pocket-money sales world, becasue all the same truths hold there too. I don't know what the overall point I'm trying to make is, other than share my assertions. I just know that working where I am, I've come to despise people like myself. Color and race have nothing to do with it, because white people and black people have played both roles in this scenario I've laid out.

Theorize all you want to on why poor people don't care about spending credited money and affluent people blow pocket money. I know there are better sociologists out there than I that can make something out of it.