#game: fast food

[randomestfandoms-ocs]

🍟 Ace, Queenie and Helena?

Pizza Hut (+ Maria)

they would share an extra large pepperoni lovers pizza with breadsticks & fries

[reasonsforhope]

Federal regulators on Tuesday [April 23, 2024] enacted a nationwide ban on new noncompete agreements, which keep millions of Americans — from minimum-wage earners to CEOs — from switching jobs within their industries.

The Federal Trade Commission on Tuesday afternoon voted 3-to-2 to approve the new rule, which will ban noncompetes for all workers when the regulations take effect in 120 days [So, the ban starts in early September, 2024!]. For senior executives, existing noncompetes can remain in force. For all other employees, existing noncompetes are not enforceable.

[That's right: if you're currently under a noncompete agreement, it's completely invalid as of September 2024! You're free!!]

The antitrust and consumer protection agency heard from thousands of people who said they had been harmed by noncompetes, illustrating how the agreements are "robbing people of their economic liberty," FTC Chair Lina Khan said. 

The FTC commissioners voted along party lines, with its two Republicans arguing the agency lacked the jurisdiction to enact the rule and that such moves should be made in Congress...

Why it matters

The new rule could impact tens of millions of workers, said Heidi Shierholz, a labor economist and president of the Economic Policy Institute, a left-leaning think tank. 

"For nonunion workers, the only leverage they have is their ability to quit their job," Shierholz told CBS MoneyWatch. "Noncompetes don't just stop you from taking a job — they stop you from starting your own business."

Since proposing the new rule, the FTC has received more than 26,000 public comments on the regulations. The final rule adopted "would generally prevent most employers from using noncompete clauses," the FTC said in a statement.

The agency's action comes more than two years after President Biden directed the agency to "curtail the unfair use" of noncompetes, under which employees effectively sign away future work opportunities in their industry as a condition of keeping their current job. The president's executive order urged the FTC to target such labor restrictions and others that improperly constrain employees from seeking work.

"The freedom to change jobs is core to economic liberty and to a competitive, thriving economy," Khan said in a statement making the case for axing noncompetes. "Noncompetes block workers from freely switching jobs, depriving them of higher wages and better working conditions, and depriving businesses of a talent pool that they need to build and expand."

Real-life consequences

In laying out its rationale for banishing noncompetes from the labor landscape, the FTC offered real-life examples of how the agreements can hurt workers.

In one case, a single father earned about $11 an hour as a security guard for a Florida firm, but resigned a few weeks after taking the job when his child care fell through. Months later, he took a job as a security guard at a bank, making nearly $15 an hour. But the bank terminated his employment after receiving a letter from the man's prior employer stating he had signed a two-year noncompete.

In another example, a factory manager at a textile company saw his paycheck dry up after the 2008 financial crisis. A rival textile company offered him a better job and a big raise, but his noncompete blocked him from taking it, according to the FTC. A subsequent legal battle took three years, wiping out his savings. 

-via CBS Moneywatch, April 24, 2024

--

Note:

A lot of people think that noncompete agreements are only a white-collar issue, but they absolutely affect blue-collar workers too, as you can see from the security guard anecdote.

In fact, one in six food and service workers are bound by noncompete agreements. That's right - one in six food workers can't leave Burger King to work for Wendy's [hypothetical example], in the name of "trade secrets." (x, x, x)

Noncompete agreements also restrict workers in industries from tech and video games to neighborhood yoga studios. "The White House estimates that tens of millions of workers are subject to noncompete agreements, even in states like California where they're banned." (x, x, x)

The FTC estimates that the ban will lead to "the creation of 8,500 new businesses annually, an average annual pay increase of $524 for workers, lower health care costs, and as many as 29,000 more patents each year for the next decade." (x)

Clearer explanation of noncompete agreements below the cut.

Noncompete agreements can restrict workers from leaving for a better job or starting their own business.

Noncompetes often effectively coerce workers into staying in jobs they want to leave, and even force them to leave a profession or relocate.

Noncompetes can prevent workers from accepting higher-paying jobs, and even curtail the pay of workers not subject to them directly.

Of the more than 26,000 comments received by the FTC, more than 25,000 supported banning noncompetes. 

[toyastales]

Chicken wings

[retrogamingblog2]

[thesolarangel]

[shirecorn]

Tumblr keeps popping up to sell me ad free dashboard. But what it doesn't understand is that me and the ads have a sort of symbiosis at this point.

The guys from the fake gameplay trailers for a predatory mobile app are my blorbos

[shihoerusu]

Family time at the manor

[400facts]

Parappa The Sriracha

[housecow]

i’m soooo close to being able to get a 30 count nugget entree from chick fil a purely bc of points. god bless

[asimpletable]

Based on the the dev's post stating that Kuras 'doesn't need to eat and pretends to eat food' in the Touchstarved Fan Discord we started questioning if Kuras can even eat food or if he doesn't like eating and then it escalated into this and I thought it would be a good idea to draw it for Kuras's birthday:

Then we ended up theorizing how Kuras's physiology worked cause he's not human. And we debated if he even has a skeleton and as you can see below:

Was racing the clock to get this posted, but I made it!

Happy Birthday Kuras!

These chaotic scenarios are brought to you by the Touchstarved Fan Discord: https://discord.gg/9hZ4rjjvGQ

Feel free to join in on the fun! :)

[stealingyourbones]

Bones. Bones.

How have you NEVER HEARD of The X-Files before? Very popular 90s TV show. Very. Very. Very Popular. Next you'll tell me you haven't heard of Xena: Warrior Princess.

Yes Mulder/Sculley was a ship. it was Such a huge ship that the ship *coined the phrase shipping*.

that is all thank you for coming to my mini-talk, this has been a brief foray into Fandom History. o7

Simply said, I was born in the 2000s, I don’t think I’ve ever heard X files ever mentioned besides in passing.

When I replied saying I was offline as a kiddo I truly meant it, ya girl only had books, the outdoors, and art as things to do. I think X Files is some supernatural/alien type thing right? That’s why it’s “X Files” because it’s what would be in conspiracy theory type censored government documents???

With the “check back for bites” thing, like are the aliens like zombies?

And what it COINED THE PHRASE SHIPPING? That’s so rad I absolutely have to read the history of that, that’s so incredibly neat my dude holy hell

[randomestfandoms-ocs]

🍟 Mer?

Wheel said Panda Express and honestly I can't imagine Mer ever getting fast food but

Honey walnut shrimp & chow mein, water to drink

[chimerafeathers]

there's an essay jumbled up in my brain about dunmeshi's beginning and how clever and deceptive it is as a sleight-of-hand trick that distracts the audience from the depth and scope of the worldbuilding and foreshadowing that's being set up the entire time by dangling zany characters and wacky dishes and biology fun facts in front of us, and how that serves to catch invested viewers off guard when those elements come to the forefront, but also how it works against it with other viewers wanting "more" and not seeing it because the plot bait isn't laid out up front

how people getting frustrated with the characters "not taking things seriously" is mirrored and refuted in the confrontation between Laios and Shuro. how the characters' attitudes aren't just a result of shallow low-stakes "comedy rules" where nothing matters, but are an extension of their personalities (Laios's nonstandard expression of emotions being offputting even to people he knows) and the world and social environment (adventurers being desensitized to death and injury because resurrection magic is commonplace). the way the party refers to "saving Falin" instead of "retrieving Falin's corpse," indicating that they still see her with full personhood, and how that phrasing leads to some readers/viewers believing that Falin is alive in the dragon's stomach, conscious of being slowly digested while the party carelessly fucks around "wasting time." how the weird tonal dissonance makes sense in-universe and yet is deliberately challenged more and more the deeper the party goes

all the character building and pieces of lore slowly weaving together the shape of the larger world, laying the groundwork for the major themes that will surface later. so much is right there in the "low-stakes" early episodes if you know what you're looking for (or pass the perception checks).

it can be so satisfying to see new viewers/readers pick up on the clues even in the earliest "simple" episodes, or notice new things and make connections yourself....and it can also be frustrating to see people dismiss oddities and dissonance as shallow or bad writing because they don't expect a "cooking anime" to have depth like that. why try to question and understand and peel back the layers when you don't expect there to be any layers?

why can't laios take things seriously for once?

[toyastales]

Philly Cheesesteak Egg Rolls

[buried-in-autumn-leaves]

Our Life/Xoxo Droplets Characters as things that have happened in my hell that I call work <3

Cove: Group crying session in the dish room after every single Friday during lent.

Derek: Dropping an entire bag of custard mix in the walk-in only to immediately walk out of the building and not be seen for 10 minutes.

Baxter: My one coworker that wears a chefs jacket in the stores colours even though he is not a manager and I have never seen anyone else wear that shirt.

Tamarack: That one kid that gave me a flower they made out of the bag their kids meal came in.

Qiu: Veggie Burger Pickle Bowl

Jeremy: The time I was cleaning the soda tabs and accidentally set off the machine, got covered in coke zero, and cried for 20 minutes.

Pran: The time I got yelled at by 4 different customers because they had a question and my manager wouldn't answer the headset.

Everett: The one coworker who comments on what I order every single time I go on break (I'm going to lose my shit).

Nate: The manager that sides with the customers after they verbally abused the 14 year old cashier for something the kitchen did.

Shiloh: Singing along to Carl Wheezer covers at 12:30am because dishes are still not done.

Bae: The girl that got mad we get our fish frozen (it's an ocean fish) (we are in the midwest).

[solradguy]

There are a lot of things about Granblue than I don't like and am pretending don't exist (Draph sexual dimorphism), but one I keep getting caught up on is that this is supposed to be a 32 year old man:

Dragon blood, I know, whatever. But this is eyebags erasure. His joints snap, crackle, and pop when he squats down. To me. Siegfried's gen y ass craves 1990s Burger King chicken nugget recipe