'It just sucks': Service workers in Quebec say they aren't paid enough for all the stress, abuse
CBC
Chloe Peel was walking to work last fall when she felt the panic building in her.
Her breathing got heavy. As she got closer to the café where she worked, she felt herself starting to hyperventilate, tears streaming down her face.
"My mind is going through: 'I can't do this. I can't do this anymore.' But I don't have a choice. I have to go into work," she said.
After two years of working as a barista during the pandemic, Peel said that last November, she reached a breaking point.
She's not alone. Businesses across Montreal say they're struggling to hire staff, as more people shun minimum wage service jobs. In retail, that wage is $13.50 an hour. For employees who earn tips, the minimum hourly wage is $10.80.
Peel understands the frustration.
After that day, she wound up in the Douglas Psychiatric Hospital's emergency room in Montreal. Her psychiatrist has since placed her on leave from work and school.
"[People] are leaving because they're suffering. They're not leaving because they don't want to work. They want to work," Peel said. "They just can't handle it anymore."
Peel said that before she burned out, she watched as many of her coworkers chose to quit rather than keep working during the pandemic.
She said constantly being on the receiving end of people's frustrations, plus being tasked with enforcing public health measures, like the vaccine passport, wasn't worth the minimum wage pay.
When she apologized to customers because they were understaffed, she said many scoffed at the idea that people weren't working.
"And that whole discourse of 'people don't want to work, young people are lazy,' it hugely contributed to my lack of desire to go in and keep trying," she said.
Lorenzo Laurieri, a grocery bagger at a family-run grocery store in the city, said it's something he's heard at work too.
"[Customers are] like: 'There's no service here anymore. I guess nobody wants to work anymore.' And it's kind of frustrating because we are working. It's just not enough."
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