Everything is a skill

 Musing I had while satisfying a late-night fast food craving...

Despite being held up as every anti-living-wage advocate's example of "unskilled labor," working in fast food service requires a LOT of skills. Cashiers take two or three orders at once, keep up with the contents and price of each, and handle food, all while remaining on their feet and dealing with often rude customers. It's exceptionally hard work. I couldn't do it. Lots of people couldn't do it. Many people who disparage it as "unskilled labor" couldn't do it. And many disabled people couldn't do it.

Because what people mean when they say "unskilled labor" is that the skills the labor requires are so taken for granted that they aren't considered "skills," just default human abilities. But there are no default human abilities. Each human has a unique set of abilities and learned skills -- all are valuable, but not all are valued. Being able to mentally and physically juggle multiple sets of corresponding customers, orders, and prices requires a complex set of mental and physical abilities and learned skills, but the people who do it are considered too "unskilled" to deserve a living wage. And the many disabled people who can't do it are considered too "unskilled" to deserve a wage at all.

Living wages for all work is a disability justice issue, and so is reexamining what we call "skilled" and "unskilled."