TODAY: Trader Joe’s widens its attack on organizing workers to include the NLRB itself, arguing in tandem with Amazon and SpaceX that the employee-protection agency is unconstitutional. We discuss how this anti-worker move flies in the face of their ostensibly liberal brand and grapple with some of the most unhinged anti-union ideas we’ve ever seen in the Fox Business comment section. ALSO: Meet the world’s youngest landlord, an 8 year old girl who says positively-geared rental properties are the bee’s knees! Shirts and stickers: http://thatawfulsound.com/miniondeathcult Sign up at http://patreon.com/miniondeathcult for $5/month and get 2 bonus episodes a week Subscribe to our youtube channel at http://youtube.com/miniondeathcult
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And we are Minion Death Cult.
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The National Labor Relations Board telling Trader Joe's that they can't discriminate against their organizing workers is responsible and unconstitutional, they argue.
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Yeah, so I don't think people know about Trader Joe's recently arguing that the National Labor Relations Board, like, Pretty much the only institutional protection that workers have against, you know, their bosses.
He's trying to argue that it's constitutional because it's Trader Joe's workers took them to court over numerous violations or took them to that court over numerous violations.
And Trader Joe's response was like, actually, I think you guys don't exist.
You say that you say that we're not supposed to do this.
I think you're not supposed to do this.
Yeah, they will actually, real hard.
No, people don't know about it, because I've tried to bring it up to people, and you tell them, like, hey, you know about Trader Joe's teaming up with SpaceX, right?
And then they get really excited because they think we're going to get some sort of new Gyoza or something.
But actually, no, no, it's to restrict labor rights.
Like, they're suing the labor board.
And when you say that, when you say Trader Joe's teamed up with SpaceX to sue the labor board, it sounds unreal.
It sounds like some sort of bullshit malarkey, but it's very real and it's very exactly what it sounds like.
Yeah, Amazon has also done this.
This is the tactic now.
If you're an asshole company, this is what you do.
I do like, like, why couldn't, man, Trader Joe's and SpaceX teaming up would be so epic.
Like, imagine two buck Chuck grown in zero-g gravity.
Oh my god.
I would pay four buck for that Chuck.
Easily.
You know?
Easily.
$4.50.
Fuck it.
Yeah, uh, just something to think, something to think about.
You know, I don't, I don't, I don't really like Trader Joe's.
It's, I don't know, I think this is like, maybe I'm like, Kind of on my high horse here because I never go to Trader Joe's anyway.
So I'm like, I'm like, you know, lording it over people, but like they've always been more expensive than just a regular grocery store.
Except when it comes to alcohol, which no, no shots.
That's great.
But, uh, and, and the portions all super small, you know, you pay like $8 for four small, you know, masala patties or whatever.
It's just like, nah, See, I gotta say, I do go to Trader Joe's fairly regularly because there's a lot of easy stuff there.
All the pre-made dinners I make come from there.
I'm getting the pre-made fried rice and the vegan bulgogi beef, and that's what I'm making.
Because it feels superior to just the signature brand Safeway pre-made fried rice, Well, it's just, it's a different, it's a different one.
It's a totally different thing.
And like most of those ones aren't vegan.
Most of the, most of the, the pre-made ones from like other stores are just not vegan as all.
But, but because of this, I have stopped going there.
Um, it's, I haven't gone there in about two months now.
And it is, it's like, it is a thing where it's like, Oh yeah, I was really just going there for convenience.
Cause like, it's just easier when you had a long day with the kid and you just want to do something easy, but it's, it's fine.
It's like, I don't really, I don't really uh it's not really a necessity it's it's like I don't know it's a bummer it's just a bummer because like it's such an easy thing and now it's like well how easy is it at what cost brother at what cost Yeah, it's funny.
Trader Joe's is, I guess, kind of like Costco, in my mind at least, where I always kind of heard good things about working there.
But they're not unionized, and they're both apparently fairly anti-union.
Like, I know Costco has been trying to ward off the Teamsters for years, especially with regards to their delivery drivers and stuff.
And, you know, that's easier to do if you're Employees are making a living wage and they're treated fairly or treated better at least and that is that is kind of what I heard about Trader Which is insane because they all have to wear those Hawaiian shirts, and I'm like you guys can't be happy What is happening?
What other what what other levels of abuse am I not seeing?
If I'm saying only man only managers get to get to wear Hawaiian shirts, you know So it is actually a good thing.
They are suddenly getting the managers to embarrass me.
So it's actually a good thing.
But I have some friends that work for Trader Joe's and I was talking to them about it and they were like, get out of my face with that union stuff, man.
And then I was talking, I was like, no, don't you understand?
If they're fighting so hard to stop this, that means as good as it is for you, it could be so much better.
Yeah, they're spending how much to prevent you from organizing?
Like, how much money are you losing every day to them?
Yeah, there's a couple local Stater Brothers in Seattle that specifically were fighting their workers.
Trader Joe's.
Local Trader Joe's.
What did I say?
Stater Brothers.
Oh, no.
Sorry.
Can't take the I.E.
out the man.
Wishful thinking.
Oh man, I wish there were Stater Brothers.
The Stater Brothers are a union.
Right.
State of Brothers Union, I think QFC's union too.
I think some of Safeway's union.
But anyway, they like, they like fought hard against their employees organizing it at local Trader Joe's up here in Seattle.
So I've had a They've put a bad taste in my mouth since then.
And this is, you know, let me read here from the Huffington Post.
Trader Joe's attorney argues National Labor Relations Board is unconstitutional.
A lawyer for the union says the company is aligning itself with right-wing ideologues who want to destroy the regulatory state.
This is by Dave Jameson.
Trader Joe's is facing a litany of union busting charges before the National Labor Relations Board.
The agency's prosecutors have accused the company of illegally retaliating against workers firing a union supporter and spreading false information in an effort to chill an organizing campaign.
But in a hearing last Tuesday, the grocer's attorney briefly summarized a sweeping defense it intends to mount against the charges.
The labor board itself, which was created during the New Deal and has refereed private sector collective bargaining for nearly 90 years, is, quote, unconstitutional.
It's amazing.
And the way they did it, it just like, I'll read it here, but they just like tacked it on to their other argument.
It was like, it was like the last.
Oh, oh, oh.
And another thing, by the way, they like tried to matlock them.
You know, or no, that's not Matlock, who is that?
That's the other Colombo.
They try to Colombo him.
Oh, one more thing.
One more thing.
Aren't you guys unconstitutional?
And the Labor Relations Board was like, no!
And then they freeze.
Roll credits.
Owned.
The exchange, a transcript of which Huffington Post obtained through a public records request, came at the start of a trial to determine whether Trader Joe's violated workers' rights.
Trader Joe's attorney, Christopher Murphy of the law firm Morgan Lewis, informed the judge, Charles Muell, that there was, quote, one final thing the grocery chain wanted to add to its defense before proceedings began, quote, the National Labor Relations Act as interpreted and or applied in this matter, Including but not limited to the structure and organization of the National Labor Relations Board and the agency's administrative law judges is unconstitutional, Murphy said.
Murphy added that the company was making the quote affirmative defense now so that it could argue it in full later.
It's he's he's like licking the donut so he can eat it for lunch you know.
That's that's wild that's like I love that.
Like you said, leaving that to the end, we shouldn't even be here in the first place actually.
This should have never started.
This is a non-starter.
You guys are unconstitutional.
I just wanted to say, and another thing, the whole damn system's corrupt.
Thank you.
That's my time.
I'm sorry, did you post your argument from an iPhone?
Yeah, the company may be using an argument similar to one recently made in federal court by SpaceX, Elon Musk's rocket company, which NLRB prosecutors have also accused of labor law violations.
SpaceX claims that the NLRB violates the constitutional separation of powers as well as the right to due process, calling the board, quote, the very definition of tyranny.
Absolutely.
The working people need at least one avenue for tyranny.
You know what I mean?
Right?
Yeah.
Give us one option.
Because the thing is, most people don't even know it exists, so you don't even worry about it.
And you know, to be fair to SpaceX, I don't think the Labor Relations Board is considering the resale value of the patches they give the employees and the overall package.
Because some of those patches, you can get a good $250 for those patches on eBay.
I have no idea what you're talking about.
You're seeing SpaceX patches on eBay?
Yeah, they're on eBay, but they give all their employees little trinkets.
They give them memorabilia.
You don't need healthcare.
If you have a little paperweight shaped like a rocket, do you really need annual checkups?
Exactly.
Then my SpaceX friend that was like, listen, I've been in a union and they kept on giving people positions just because they've been there longer.
So like this is, so they're, you know, it's working, it's working for them.
And it's funny cause like they have kind of a, people who work there, a lot of them kind of are, are like satisfied even though they're busting their asses, but that's good.
There is enough pushback to where they are doing this.
They are like going this hard.
Or do you think they just see the general swell?
Trying to get ahead of it?
No, they've had specific... There's been Trader Joe's unionization efforts all over the country.
I thought so.
Yeah.
This is absolutely like a reaction to... Employees flexing.
Yeah, power.
This is what happens when working people try to flex power.
Private corporations go to the US government and say, actually, the USA doesn't exist.
Yeah.
Actually, we're going to eliminate the Bill of Rights.
Because my Trader Joe's checker wanted $21 an hour.
Insane.
None of this stuff is cheap.
None of this stuff is free.
You can't just push these cases for free.
It's making it very evident how worthy I am about this.
Responses to this, we're fantastic.
My God, some of the finest like anti-union derangement I've seen in our long time paying attention to this stuff.
These are all from the Fox Business comments section.
John 7755 says it's an employee's right to organize and seek union representation.
It's also a company's right to reorganize and relocate in order to stay competitive and be successful.
And I was thinking about this, I was like, what?
The Trader Joe's is going to relocate to avoid having union workers?
How is that going to work?
Yeah, they're going to drop ship instead of having an actual brick and mortar.
Like, physical locations, physical shops, Not just in what we're about to talk about but in like retail spaces and like service industry spaces do try to like shut down specific locations to avoid Unionization efforts or whatever.
I guess that could happen to a Trader Joe's under, you know, choosing to go that route or whatever.
But what they're actually referring to is auto manufacturing.
Because yeah, Jepps hits it on the head right here.
Due to the tactics during the latest contract negotiations, Ford has said they will be looking at other places for production.
And we know what that means.
More U.S.
manufacturing going overseas.
Good job, UAW.
You always want more and wind up with less.
And it just hit me, okay, because, yeah, in our years of covering this stuff, this is, like, one of the biggest arguments against unions is they forced the poor car companies and other manufacturing companies to go overseas and exploit people for, you know, pennies on the dollar, and that's all union workers' faults.
That's all workers' faults for daring to ask for a piece of the massive profits they helped generate.
But the way this was phrased, I, I don't, I don't know.
It brought up an interesting question in my mind because it's right here.
Good job, UAW.
Like, why are you, why are you mad?
Yeah.
You know what I mean?
Like, do you, like what, what intrinsically is valuable about these jobs for you, somebody who doesn't work these jobs, right?
Like if, Sorry, go ahead and say what you're going to say.
Well, it's flawed from the jump because, like you said, it's an employee's right to organize and seek union representation.
It's also a company's right to reorganize.
So they're equating these companies to people.
They're saying people have rights, human rights are a thing, and these companies have rights.
And the thing is, Do they?
Should they?
That's the whole thing.
They shouldn't.
If a company's rights are overriding someone's well-being, then they don't count.
They don't get the same rights as a person.
Sure, I agree with that.
But the thing is, these people might one day have a Ford.
They're like, listen, I have some ideas, and they're like fucking Ford big.
They're giant.
But I'm just saying, okay, but this other guy who's, when they cry about outsourcing jobs, right?
It's like, those jobs were outsourced.
That means a union person lost their job.
Isn't that good?
Don't you like that?
Aren't you happy about that?
Why are you pretending to be sad?
Is it because now you know that somebody else is going to be exploited even harder by this company and this company is going to make an even larger profit?
Does that, like, do you feel like I don't know like slighted or something by that because you should, you know, but it's but the answer isn't to take it out on the people who actually did lose the job.
They have more to be slighted by by this company moving production overseas.
Do you see what I'm saying, Tony?
Oh totally, but the thing is, I have to listen to these fucking UAW motherfuckers whine and bitch and moan and lose their jobs, but I don't speak Mandarin.
So it doesn't fucking matter.
It doesn't affect me because it's not people who are me or look like me.
Okay, well, this raises an interesting point.
I mean, I think maybe you inadvertently answered it because, yeah, it's, oh, the money is going to China or the money is going to Mexico or something when it could be reinvested here in the States or something.
And it's like, well, so then you do believe in the economic benefit of putting money in domestic workers' hands.
Right, like the whole conversation is gobbled.
It's like freezing me in my tracks.
I'm like trying to figure out how to grapple with these people's minds.
But lots of good stuff in here.
True One says, when government meddles, the people suffer.
The government never produces anything.
I mean, ours doesn't.
That's for goddamn sure.
The government never produces anything.
No government employee has ever created wealth.
They are all an expense, which is misspelled here.
As Ronald Reagan once made clear, the 10 most scary words ever heard were, quote... Is this a little kid?
This is a little kid, right?
The 10 scariest words ever spoken were, we are the government and we are here to help.
Mm-hmm.
The most, the most flip-tacularly frightening, frightening-making words of all.
It's, yeah, awesome, awesome.
Like, again, because they don't know, they don't know that the 40-hour work week came from that.
You know, I think that's the big, one of the biggest things that they don't understand that like what little comforts they do have now are a result of those struggles.
Yeah.
Well this, this one specifically is about the government.
So that's about the NLRB, which did not unfortunately create the 40 hour work week.
We don't like actually have a regulated 40 hour work week of course.
I was generalizing.
That is, that is my bad.
Yeah, but this is about the NLRB and it's, you know, it's trying to... and a lot of these people were like...
Saying, well good, just another letter, one of the ABC agencies from the bureaucratic state goes down.
I hope, and it's like, you don't, you really don't see some, like a distinguish, any distinguishment between the NLRB and like the CIA?
Yeah.
Or the, or the, or the ATF or something like the, you know, like the one agent, and it would be the one agency to get cut.
You know what I mean?
It would be the one actual piece of government that does successfully get butchered would be the NLRB and I mean it has been in the past what by having it under understaffed you know it's had vacant seats for for years that is one way they've tried to deal with it this is I guess the the unconstitutional argument is the next one but I just found it funny a lot of people were like
Like this sick and tired 820 says wholeheartedly agree with these companies and I like it when they admit that you know but it's funny because if like a private company puts a fucking rainbow flag in their window or something All of these guys are like, oh wow, you side with the elites.
Because Target sells merch with a rainbow on it or whatever.
Like, clearly you have all the power.
Well, they were selling flags that you can tuck your penis into.
When companies put like a ribbon on their product or on their cereal box or something, that's like the same to liberals as it is when a company fires all of its staff without warning to a conservative.
You know, that's when they're like, wow, finally companies are doing the right thing.
Yeah.
Speaking truth to power, you know?
Uh, the overreach of government has reached a point that we have to fight back.
The leftist desire to control everything and everyone has gotten out of control and must be stopped.
How dare these people try to control their bosses?
You know what I mean?
Like, it's in the fucking name.
You don't get to control them, alright?
They get to control you.
They're trying to rewi- tell us words don't mean what we know they mean.
Listen, if you want to be in control, then be a boss.
Yeah.
Okay?
It's not hard, alright?
Like, what do these people do for a living?
Why are they so satisfied?
Well, they're all on Fox Business' comment section.
I don't know, but Fox Business gets posted to Facebook and stuff, so they're probably like Facebook users come over.
I don't know, they could be businessmen, Tony.
That might be why they agree with the multinational conglomerates, I don't know.
They might be rising and grinding.
Jay Crinn replies to this about sick and tired of wholeheartedly agreeing with these companies.
The democratic socialist and communist types do not care!
They only want their power and to continue their agents, their agenda to destroy America.
At some point, the citizens of America will either stand up and say enough is enough.
Period.
Or they will become good little socialist peons and slaves to the state.
It's so funny because, I don't know, I never really hear a very loud rumble about anything more than a living wage and healthcare, right?
You don't hear much more than that in the grand scheme.
What are they hearing that they're like, they're trying to ruin everything?
These greedy fucking pigs, they're trying to ruin businesses in America.
They're not for the people.
They don't care about the people.
What are they hearing?
Well, I think one of the demand, one of like one list of demands got leaked from the Trader Joe's workers side.
I think it's Trader Joe's United.
And they were demanding that Beyonce win the best country song of the year.
So I think that might be an indication of what's happening.
Yeah, that makes sense.
The thing is, I want to get her signature guacamole when it comes out.
I want to get her like signature Her like signature guacamole when it comes out.
I want that She's but she's putting out guacamole no, I don't know.
Oh Oh, okay.
How is Trader Joe's going to get involved with Beyonce?
How are they going to work together?
Hmm, interesting.
Yeah, I don't know.
I do love, yeah, at one point, will citizens finally have to take up arms against the National Labor Relations Board?
I think so.
Right, everybody?
Right, friends?
I think so.
Someone has to stop them.
I guess, like, if you know who the National Labor Relations Board is, you either love them or you hate them.
You either begrudgingly appreciate them or you hate them.
Or you've paid them a fine.
You've been arrested for leaving a fake bomb in one of their mailboxes.
Yeah, exactly.
You're hyper aware of them and they're aware of you.
um okay we get real good here will not tell says when fabric mills subjugated women and children chained to looms and working 18-hour days dot dot dot that was the time unions parentheses guilds were necessary Do they just try to, like, white up unions more?
Is that what that was?
No, he's just using historical terms.
He's, like, trying to use fancy, archaic terms.
I mean, guilds aren't archaic everywhere.
Sometimes they're still used in modern language, but not, like, by a layperson.
I think he's just trying to sound fancy when he says that.
No, I love...
Hey, get back to me when children are chained to the loom, okay?
That's when we'll talk about unions again.
Have a thousand people died in a factory fire recently?
No, we don't need unions, folks.
I think that one guy got boiled in the tuna factory, but that's really all I've heard.
Yeah.
When it comes to, you know, I don't think anyone else has been hurt on the job.
Oh, sure.
I mean, yes, we should say plenty of people get hurt on the job every year.
That was gnarly, though.
That was tragic.
Brutal.
Brutal way to go.
You know it's time for unions to die when a factory worker with overtime will earn almost as much as the President of the United States for sweeping floors and taking out garbage.
Unions only help unions, not workers.
Well, okay, you can't say both of those.
You can't say that if somebody sweeping a fucking floor makes $500,000 a year and that unions don't help workers.
Both of those can't be true, okay?
Because if a union is getting a fucking porter paid $500,000, sounds like they're helping them.
Yeah, yeah.
Also, where's that job at?
Where is that happening?
Uh, Fantasyland.
Candyland.
Not Disneyland, I'll tell you that much.
It's definitely not happening at Disneyland.
Uh, it's like, it's like that fucking Simpsons joke.
It's like that Sideshow.
Everywhere I go, I see, no, it's a Krusty the Clown joke.
Everywhere I go, I see teachers in Ferraris.
It's like nobody in their right mind believes that somebody sweeping floors, unless they're like the CEO's nephew or something, is making $500,000.
Yeah.
Yeah, come on now.
Unions only help unions, not workers.
I love this.
And that's why I'm anti-union, because janitors make too much money.
Absolutely, yeah.
And honestly, they make too much money, and I'm not really seeing the results.
The world's just getting dirtier and dirtier.
I'm seeing dirty floors everywhere I go.
Uh, replying to this was Dash Hounds Rule, Dachshunds Rule 330, exactly why my dad many years ago retired early from Anheuser-Busch.
He complained that people coming and pushing brooms were making the same money and had the same benefits as he did after 40 years with the company.
I was pretty young, but I remember telling him, that's you union dad.
I think he or she might say, that's your union, dad.
But maybe they're quoting like their stupid young self who didn't really know possessive pronouns.
That's your union, dad.
That's your union, dad.
I love how even a child understood that unions were bad.
The simple mind of a child was able to comprehend this.
What is wrong with leftists?
My poor dad, my poor dad was able to retire early because the fucking janitor who's also been there for 40 years is making almost as much money as he's making.
So it's so funny, I love this phrase, like my dad was forced to retire early because he got too mad at how well everybody else was also doing.
Wow, he got to retire at all.
That's pretty cool.
Oh, he got to retire early.
That's great.
Wow, he got to retire early out of spite.
It sounds like he was really well off, actually.
I bet he started a company, too.
It sounds like he was pretty fucking well set if he could just choose to stop based on that bullshit.
Yeah, I didn't like it.
I did not like the Janet who's been there.
Like, that's the same argument that my silly friend was making where it's like, just because they've been there a long time, they were making almost as much?
That's not cool.
Well, okay, I need to correct you, Tony.
The comment is he's mad about somebody, a new hire, making as much money.
He complained that people coming and pushing brooms were making the same money and had the same benefits as he did after 40 years with the company.
That also didn't happen.
Yeah, I think he's just saying that people got like the wages increased with inflation.
Yeah, I think is what he's complaining about, which is sounds like an insane thing for a worker to be complaining about.
Unless you listen to any of our coverage of the UPS Teamsters contract negotiation, because plenty of people have their minds blown, have their like.
Whole, literally have their entire identities called into question because a new employee makes more than they did as a new employee.
Yeah, they're literally saying, like, what the fuck do you mean you're paying them $18.50 an hour?
When I started here in 1982, I was making $6.75.
Right.
And then it's like, bitch.
That's not fair.
Well, if that doesn't make sense to you, then why don't you quit your job and start over again if it's such a good wage to be working at?
Yeah, go for it.
No one's going to stop you.
You have experience.
It's going to look good on your resume.
That's you, union dad, always giving your co-workers raises.
That's what you signed up for.
Second to last response.
Republican Patriot 691 says unions today are communist parasites.
And Vicky Jax replies, even back in the day, unions were not only, quote, communist parasites, but they were violent as well.
My dad was a UAW member, and even though I was very young, I remember the all-too-familiar baseball bat in the trunk of his car whenever they were on strike.
And I think she's sharing this as like a negative, you know, that her dad was like violent and had weapons because he didn't use that violence or those weapons on his own children.
Like if he were, you know, I don't know, threatening his daughter with a bat because, you know, she was out past 8 p.m.
or something like that, or if he were whatever, doing something else related to raising your children right, I think they'd be singing a different tune here.
Because he had a bat to fight off scabs or whatever.
I don't know, that sounds like traditional masculinity to me, to be honest.
Also, your dad is so embarrassed right now.
Your dad is so bummed that this is how you're speaking.
It's pretty fucked up.
Both her and the previous person, Dash Doxon's Rule, had their fucking entire childhoods paid for by union membership and they're on the Fox Business comments section fucking crying about it.
So real, wow.
Yeah, that's very direct.
Pathetic.
Your ancestors are looking down on you in shame.
Yeah, shaking their heads.
Just letting you know.
Last one here.
BrokeDownEngineMama818 says, If I could take money my union charges and dues and use it to buy stock in my own and other companies, I would achieve a stronger bargaining position and profit from labor cost containment while assuring availability of insurance and pension funds.
But then I would be reaping the benefits of capitalism.
So there's that.
How much are your fees, bro?
Maybe your union is bad, if you think you can do all that with your fees.
I have a few questions about this, BrokeDownEngineMama.
If I could take the money my union charges and dues, okay, so she's a union member, and use it to buy stock in my own and other company, oh, maybe she means the company she works for, is when she says my own company?
I think that's what she's talking about, yeah.
Okay.
Well, maybe there's your first... You would understand if you took pride in your work, Alexander.
I was going to say, maybe that's something to interrogate why you think you own the company you work for.
You certainly don't.
They're also making it seem like they think they're going to be able to buy enough shares to actually have a say in the company.
Which is so silly.
You don't know how things work.
If you could afford to buy enough shares to have a say in your company, you wouldn't have to work for the company.
Yeah, you fucking idiot.
That's how it works.
You know what?
Good for you.
Also, it's not that easy.
People don't just wake up one day and be like, son of a bitch, someone bought 12,000 shares.
They own the company now.
That's not how that works.
Yeah, that's not how it works because you're a communist, Tony.
Well, I mean, you're okay, but so you so let hypothetically, you're a union member, you sweep floors, you make $500,000 a year, but that's only after the union has taken their $100,000 a year from you.
You could have used that extra $100,000 a year to invest in your yourself, you know, take a take.
Take a couple master class courses in stock trading.
Something like that.
Yeah, I was talking about exactly that.
I just want a job so that I can make it so I don't have to have a job.
I'm just going to buy shares from the company.
Just for anybody who doesn't know, yeah, I've been union for 18 years.
My union dues are about $20 a week and I make $45 an hour.
Why haven't you bought UPS yet though?
That's my question.
Why are you sitting there on the sidelines and not buying a voting share and making your co-workers lives and yourself better?
I just, I don't think I have that gumption bone.
You know, I don't have that You know how there's like creators in society and then there's takers?
I'm not a creator.
So I don't think I would flourish in that role.
Don't be so hard on yourself.
The answer was because of union dues.
That's why you haven't done that.
That's right.
That's the only reason.
Oh, if you didn't have to pay those dues, why yada yada?
Yeah.
Yeah, I should buy the company and then fire my boss.
Oh, that's the American dream.
Oh, I want to get a union so my boss doesn't harass me or whatever.
If you buy the company, you can just fucking fire him, dude.
How fun would it be to like tell your boss, Hey, the boss wants to speak to you.
And they're like, what the heck?
I'm the boss.
And you're like, nah, go in the office.
And as they're going to the office, you have already set up a series of trap doors and shoots.
It's going to let you get to the office there first.
You're going to be waiting behind what was his desk.
And you now have a name tag on it.
Yeah.
And he walks in and then you look him in the eyes and you say, hey pal, pack your stuff.
You're freaking fired.
This is a really good prank.
It's so good.
I think you should quit the union so you can do that.
on Anyway Niggas yelling from the sands watch what you saying blow a peanut butter cookie with my cup like jam Heart time to a word for the W.O.A.
You don't want to work with some drugs in his hand and a very put a top on it It's like a good daddy.
Well, how some money does much cheese and trust nobody my man fucked up came from nobody with heart brown love nobody Everyone make a rest come with mom doing a slip blue kid 150 up that bitch niggas turning a ring turn with bad news turning give turn right around I'm coming home with a man in I have the worst floors for smoking weed.
I have the worst floors for smoking weed.
They're like kind of this wood grain that's just like the right shade to where you can just lose a nug.
Okay, so a little bit of an annoying story about the National Labor Relations Board being attacked by Trader Joe's and SpaceX and Amazon.
So I thought maybe we'd talk about something heartwarming and, you know, a little more uplifting.
And that is Girl becomes one of world's youngest homeowners after buying her first property.
She says, quote, it's pretty cool being a landlord.
And I think she's 88 years old.
Because here's here's the headline of the story.
I'm eight years old and I already own a four bedroom home in Melbourne.
This is how I became Australia's youngest property owner and the secrets I learned from my savvy dad.
I'm going to send this to Penny and be like, Hey, maybe get your shit together.
Right?
I know that I'm very proud of you that you went from a 3.2 reading grade average reading level to a 5.3 reading level.
I'm really proud of you for that, but you don't own one bedroom.
You, you simply live in one of mine.
Uh, yeah.
I've told you how many times real estate is more valuable than, uh, public education.
Yeah, come on.
You don't have to go to school.
You can just manage your dropshipping company from home.
I have so many YouTube videos that would benefit.
So many YouTube videos about doing very creative things in restrictive zoned areas.
Yeah, come on.
Come on.
Insane.
This is from the Daily Mail.
This headline alone is a fucking crime.
I'm eight years old and already own a four bedroom home in Milburn.
This is how I became Australia's youngest property investor and the secrets I learned from my savvy dad.
This isn't written by the girl.
Like, I don't, it's, it's written by Karina Stathis for Daily Mail Australia, but it's, she's like, like, this is like insane level clickbait where, where the editors of Daily Mail pretended to be an eight year old girl for the headline of the article.
So I think the little girl was just like, and other things I learned from my savvy dad.
I don't think she said savvy dad.
I don't think she did that.
No.
Her name is Ruby McClellan.
Ruby McClellan is Australia's youngest property investor.
She and her two siblings saved $2,000 each for a deposit.
So that's how they did it.
I guess you just assumed she saved up the money.
You didn't have any questions about how.
No.
How she was able to be a property owner at eight.
They apparently saved up $2,000 each, her and her siblings.
Easy, easy.
Easy thing to do.
Since 2021, the four bedroom house has grown in value by $289,000.
Rupi McClellan isn't like most eight year olds.
Instead of spending her pocket money on toys and sweets, Her $2,000 in pocket money, she chose to enter the property market and earn the title of, quote, Australia's youngest homeowner.
Like, they know what they're doing, right?
Daily Mail knows what they're doing when they publish these articles, right?
Yeah, absolutely.
They know that they're going to get, hopefully, a massive number of hits from like 55 and older Facebook users.
Who just like say amen under this because it's got a picture of an eight-year-old white girl on it or whatever.
They're gonna get clicks that way.
And they're definitely gonna get clicks by a leftist podcast losing their minds about this fucking article.
This sucks so bad.
Like this, $2,000, how do you save $2,000 as like a working adult?
$2,000?
How is, not only that, how is $2,000 times three, $6,000 a down payment on a On a $671,000 home, Ruby and her siblings, Angus, 14, and Lucy, 13, purchased their first four-bedroom home in Clyde, Victoria, two years ago for $671,000.
Like, I don't know, maybe Australia's different.
In the U.S., I don't think you can put down like $6,000.
Like, you can't put down... No.
What percentage even is that?
It's a 0.1% down?
It's not enough, that's for sure.
Yeah, I think it's exactly what it is.
0.1% is super minuscule.
Yeah, that's not going to happen.
What they're doing too, they're kind of being like, look, the housing market isn't that bad.
This fucking kid bought a house.
Yeah, home ownership is attainable.
Even an eight-year-old can do it.
What's your excuse?
Yeah.
Get it together.
The siblings pulled together $6,000 of their hard-earned pocket money.
How did they earn it?
For a deposit by helping out their parents with chores and packing their father's how-to guide to investing.
Oh, so they were fucking... Oh, fuck, yeah.
Like, putting together their dad's self-published book, and he paid them in a house.
That's amazing like of course like we said of course this is uh the savvy dad this is part of his stunt this is a savvy dad stunt this is like look these tips work for my kids this this self-help stuff i'm putting out works for my fucking children get it together Their parents covered the rest.
Oh, and the kids are on track to purchase their next investment property using the equity in the mortgage of the current house.
Demonic.
Demons.
Family of demons.
I'm sorry.
The children are now tainted.
The children are now, they're no good.
You know what's funny about this is like, so I bought a house when I was 13.
I don't know if you knew that.
I bought a house when I think I was 13 or 14.
I was 13 or 14.
I bought a house.
Um, I bought a little house in Del Rosa.
Cute little house.
Nice.
One, one car garage attached to it.
A little back patio.
Del Rosa must have been pretty inexpensive back then.
Well, no, not then.
No, it was, it was three bedrooms.
It was, it was, it was kind of, it was, it was a nice little place.
Well, well, I didn't know that I bought it.
It's just that when my parents, when my dad and my stepmom bought it, they basically just bought it using my information.
So I bought a house.
Well, there you go.
You got a brilliant head start, Tony.
I know.
I know.
And that's why I need to acknowledge that privilege sometimes.
I forget that I was at one point a homeowner.
And it's funny because like, how is this any different?
Yeah, that's a good point.
How is any different than that fucking like crime that happened to me?
Well, I don't think the dad here stole his daughter's identity to do it.
I think it's more like there's like a rich person way to do this, Tony, where you like buy it, but you put control of it into a trust that matures when they hit a certain age, yada, yada, yada.
It's like, it's like buying your daughter.
It's like naming a star after your daughter or whatever.
It's like, It's like getting a convertible and giving her her little steering wheel toy to play with while she's in the passenger seat.
But the thing is, when you're driving the car and she has the fake steering wheel, when you get in a car accident, she still gets hurt.
So, like, does she have protections for when, like, the market crashes?
When you get into the car accident, you put her in the driver's seat, and then she can't be tried as an eight-year-old.
What jury's gonna convict?
Oh, fuck.
That's exactly what it is.
So, yeah, we're good.
Their parents covered the rest, yada, yada, yada.
Uh, all of their names are on the title.
Ruby told female.
I don't know why it's called female.
Daily male.
Oh, because it's women's empowerment.
It's eight-year-old women's empowerment.
Oh, that's the name of this subdivision of Daily Mail.
It's called F.E.M.A.I.L.
F.E.M.A.I.L.
It's all about gold.
It's all stories about gold, whose, of course, the atomic symbol is F.E.
F.E.M.A.I.L.
Do you get it?
Do you get it?
Yeah.
Oh, that's iron, not gold.
Sorry, everybody.
Yeah, so this is like the woke Daily Mail segment where it's like, look at this.
Eight year old girl boss evicts tenants with bluey bluey pad notepaper.
Yeah.
That's that's yeah, that's.
Insane.
How do you like to get a text from her being being like?
I have somebody coming over to work on the cable at 3 a.m.
tonight.
Yeah.
But it's like sent from a jitterbug or whatever.
Yeah.
And you're like, Hey, um, I don't know if you knew this, but like, there's like, there's a leak in the ceiling and they write back.
Oh, no.
You're like, Oh fuck.
I think that's just an Australian in general.
That's why you wouldn't want to have an Australian landlord.
Yeah.
I would never.
Okay, I get it.
Ruby told Female it's, quote, pretty cool being a landlord and admitted she hasn't told any of her school friends yet.
Yeah, Doug, kick the shit out of you.
Don't do it.
This poor girl.
The property, spanning over 200 square miles, is positively geared, meaning the rent is higher than the mortgage repayments.
This means it doesn't cost the family anything to hold it.
Whoa, that's sick.
That's so smart.
Wow, I never thought of that.
It's positively geared.
Can you imagine?
Hey, I noticed that, I don't know, I looked into this and I'm paying like a lot more than you guys are paying in mortgage.
You're like, oh yeah, no, no, it's positively geared.
Yeah.
Why would we not do that?
I like coming up with a technical term for the only way landlording works.
That's like all landlording is, is taking in more money than you're paying on the house.
So to call it like quote, positively geared, that means there must be some really bad landlords out there.
That means they have to have a term for a landlord who's just not doing it right.
Who's actually like losing money on being a landlord.
That's negatively geared.
Yeah.
This dumbass.
Cause they have too many empty ones.
That's why.
Dumbass found a way to lose money on property.
Uh, we're calling that negatively geared.
No, no, no.
We're not profit-driven.
We're positively geared.
Their dad, Cam, 50, the CEO of property investment company OpenCore, taught his children the basics of investing and why debt can, quote, be a good thing.
The rationale when you see them, that's funny when they talk about debt being a good thing.
They mean like more a mortgage payment.
They mean like having, you know, taking out a loan for your giant, for I don't know, for expanding your company or something like that.
They don't mean the credit card debt that everybody else has to incur.
Just to survive.
The rationale behind the idea is to get their kids into property is to give them a head start.
In 10 years time, when our kids might start looking to buy their own homes, the deposits are going to be $200,000.
There's no way kids of today are going to be able to afford a home without help from mom and dad, Cam said.
Quote, we have four kids and might need to fork out $800,000.
So the obvious thing to do is to use one small deposit now, buy a property, Let it double in value and then sell it, Tony.
That's the smart thing to do.
What's this thing where like every kid's like, you might have this shell at $200,000 for every kid?
What's happening?
He's talking about down payments for homes.
The amount that you're going to have to put down on a home is going to increase and so he's factoring in a $200,000 down payment for each of the kids to get them each a house or whatever.
I really am doing it all wrong.
I know that I'm not in a position to buy a home, but I really should be thinking about getting P to buy a home.
Well, see, that's the thing is like, if you don't start thinking about buying a home, you're never going to be able to buy a home.
So what you have to do is you have to start thinking about buying a home now, which you do by buying a home.
And then later when that home is worth more, then you can buy a home.
Then you sell that and then you buy a home.
That's exactly, exactly.
I love it so much.
Uh, The obvious one thing to do is to buy one now before they get more expensive.
Whoa, that's crazy to think about.
The family will keep the property until Lucy and Angus are in their early 20s, which will mean they've waited one, quote, full growth property cycle and hope it will reach $1 million.
Full growth property cycle does sound like terminology you would use to describe the development process of like an alien creature.
You know, something like, Otherworldly.
Full growth property cycle.
I don't like it.
It sounds like it's an evolution to the next step.
It now has different properties than before.
Yeah, now it's blood is acid.
Exactly, yeah.
Now actually the single family home buyers market can actually directly install its eggs in your abdomen.
Yeah, exactly.
Once sold, the children will receive an equal portion of the profit after tax.
Historically, every 7-10 years, property doubles in value, Camp said.
I've been investing for 30 years, and now is a great time to invest, based on inflation decreasing and the prediction of interest rate drops.
I love that.
You should definitely invest when you think the interest rate is going to drop.
That's like, you're like, I think we're coming up to an all new low in interest rates, which is why I'm going to take out a loan now.
Yeah, absolutely.
I mean, don't get me wrong.
I'm going to refinance it when it drops.
For sure.
Before buying the property, Cam said he guided the kids through the process using lots of illustrations to help them understand, but with Ruby being just six at the time, he admitted she didn't grasp how it all works.
That shouldn't be legal.
For some reason, like nine, I was like, whatever, that's just dumb.
But six is like, that should be, that's not okay.
No, straight to jail.
That's not okay.
That's exploitation of some kind.
I don't know.
Absolutely.
A six-year-old can't consent.
They can't consent to anything and that includes buying property.
This is like LinkedIn grooming.
Absolutely what that is.
It's not right.
It's illegal.
I'm sure it's already illegal.
We just need to find the applicable laws.
Yeah, OK, but with Ruby being just six at the time, he admitted she didn't grasp how it all works.
I love like drawing and crayon my money laundering scheme to my daughter that she's now a principal in.
He had to keep telling her that she can't go live at the property or take her friends there.
She's got a point!
She's got a point.
Why the fuck not?
Beautiful.
Unlike that idiot child in the first segment of this episode who thought unions were bad for giving co-workers a living wage, this intelligent child is like, why do I want a house if I can't go there?
What's the point?
What's the point?
This seems very odd.
It seems like something a homunculus would do.
You guys are always making me clean my womb.
And so I have my own house.
And I'm just going to go live there because I'm tired of it.
And I own a house.
So fuck you.
That's going to do terrible things to the power dynamic when they're teenagers.
You know?
How so?
Because when a teenager, you always have the power dynamic of saying, you know, like, listen, as long as you're under my roof, as long as you're living in my house, you're going to listen to my rules.
You always have that power dynamic, you know?
But they're going to be like, actually, I can just go kick my tenants out tomorrow.
Yeah, they'll have to get a lawyer or something.
It'll take them forever.
It'll be worth at least a couple nights.
Yeah, yeah.
Yeah, this guy's been exploiting his children for this for a while, it seems like.
After buying his first property, he put everything he learned into the book, quote, my four year old, the property investor, which became a bestseller.
So he's been like fucking, he's been flogging his fucking daughter's, uh, whatever in existence, at least since she was four, uh, to, to make real estate money off of just Jesus fucking Christ.
This is the worst kind of person.
Not only are you a landlord, property developer, asshole, but you're also one of these sick freaks that exploit your kids.
It's like, come on.
You can't, you can't, you can't do that, you know?
And I want to say this guy's even below property developer.
I think he's just a property investor.
I don't think he even like develops anything.
He just moves money.
I don't think he's creating jobs.
He just moves money around and it gets bigger.
Ugh.
That's it.
That's it.
I did have a couple responses to this that were very funny.
Like, overwhelmingly, People did not like the Lil Landlord.
Good.
You know, people were not pleased to be... I guess there's like a housing crisis in Australia right now.
People were like, really?
This is... I mean... This is fucked?
I mean... I mean, sounds like it, according to the prices we just heard.
Yeah, yeah.
And the rate of interest.
It sounds fucking crazy that, yeah, these are like $600,000, $900,000 homes.
That's like what...
A home goes for, you know, I don't know.
I think, I think the state, like the state of Mel, uh, whatever.
Is Melbourne a state?
Melbourne's a capital, right?
I don't want to pretend like I know anything about that country.
Whatever state this is in, people were like, I'm going to, I'm going to go cross, cross the state line or whatever, whatever they say.
Um, okay.
But, uh, let me pull up.
Does it mean we have to like make like a little guillotine?
Yeah, she gets the chop, folks.
I'm sorry.
Sorry.
Will Fisher-Price guillotine?
I'm eight years old and I've already falsified email exchanges with my tenant to get them evicted.
With AI, it was really easy.
Chat CPT, you can do anything. - Harry Flashman says, "Well done, Ruby.
So well done to the eight-year-old landlord.
Well done, Ruby, but beware of fortune hunters in a few years.
Dot, dot, dot.
Beware of your brother and your siblings.
Okay, so that's what I thought.
Like, oh, he means like, you know, people looking to whatever, yeah, exploit her or take her wealth and yada, yada, yada.
And it's like, well, she's from wealth.
I think she'll be, I think she'll be all right.
But no, when he says in a few years, dot, dot, dot, dot.
Oh my god.
That means, that means sex.
Yeah.
With the eight-year-old landlord.
Uh, but she'll be in a few years, she'll be 11, Tony.
So... Be careful, someone's gonna try to marry you in a few years.
For money.
Just like everybody else is like...
Surely the signs of a dying empire.
The fact that, you know, the 1% are now, like, waving their 8-year-old children in front of us, buying up the properties that we need to live.
And Harry Flashman is like, three cheers for old Ruby!
However, she looks like she'll be causing a bit of her own trouble in about six months from now.
You're gonna have to make, you're gonna have to really put them through the test and make sure their love is real.
And they're not just trying to access you for your fortune.
Ruby, I'm willing to donate my services as a 100% disabled veteran.
I will screen any potential suitors for their, for their sincerity.
I'm surprised there's not something like, it's gonna take a real, it's gonna take a real alpha Take a real alpha to step up to Ruby.
Sorry.
Hey, hey, Buster, you know what?
If you're intimidated by an eight-year-old girl just because she's a landlord, maybe women aren't for you, pal.
All right?
Like, trying to, like, wokely convince it's the right thing.
Yeah.
Justifying.
Sassy Zen, this is the other comment I got.
Sassy Zen says, problem with that is they don't Problem with that is they don't get their first buyer's assistance when they go to buy their first home without siblings.
We found out the hard way when dad put our names on an investment property.
Okay, so on the one hand, this is kind of like what we were talking about earlier.
Like what are the legal ramifications of having, you know, your children's names on a property or whatever.
It turns out one of them is, oh, you don't get the first-time buyers, home assistants, when you actually do need to buy a house for real because you want to live in it or whatever, which is, yeah, something that like various federal governments will offer.
The U.S. offers that as well.
And it turns out if you were part of some like LinkedIn, TikTok, real estate viral video, you actually don't qualify for the first-time buyer's assistants.
Yeah.
On the other hand, I don't think Ruby's going to have a problem.
Exactly.
Ruby might even be means-tested out of that fuckin' first-time home buyer's plan.
You know what I mean?
I would hope so, yeah.
But yeah, well, this may seem all well and good.
Oh, she's got a house.
Eight years old or whatever.
Yeah, well when you turn 21 and it's time to buy another house Well, guess what?
You're not gonna get You're not gonna be allowed to like what waive your down payment Yeah, I guess so That's part of what like the first-time buyers program does in the US is that it it allows for a lower down payment which usually has to be like 20% Which, again, she's not going to have to worry about because, like, even if she doesn't have it at the moment, she's probably going to get it from Pops.
Yeah, man, it's 20% of $600,000?
Is that... Man, that's crazy.
That's a lot of money.
I think it's like $120,000 or something.
$120,000 or something.
Yeah, insane the price of homes and insane that, I don't know, In saying that our elites, our social betterers, are flaunting this.
I don't think you should tell anybody about this if you do it.
No.
No.
I never want to feel that way about a child.
You know, don't do that.
That's not cool.
Yeah.
Alright, well, I hope everybody's been uplifted by this female story of success.
Yes, don't forget, you know, girl boss, gatekeep, landlord.
Lil Ruby, she broke the glass ceiling on landlording and then repaired it with scotch tape and didn't tell the tenant.
Yeah, and then used some infomercial sealant tape, the same stuff they built the boat out of.
Oh, I wish, I wish.
Yeah, she'd be so lucky.
Yeah.
Okay, that's the episode.
Remember, folks, you can support us over at patreon.com slash MinionDeathCult.
That episode, that link will be in this episode's description.
You get two bonus episodes every week, a regular formatted MinionDeathCult episode, as well as a live stream we do every week with listeners, Saturday at 5 p.m.
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Lots of good stuff going on.
I think this week we're talking about, gonna talk about how I saw Dune last night in IMAX.
Oh, yeah.
The only way to see it.
We're going to talk about a Metalcore song called Trigger Warning that Tony found, which seems great.
We're going to watch a video of a UPS customer putting herself underneath a UPS package car because he wouldn't deliver her Lazy Boy to her, like, on the street.
Pretty good, pretty good stuff.
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Sign up there.
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Find us on social media at MinionDeathCult.
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Also, shout out Lizzie for the eight-year-old landlord story.
I think I forgot to mention up Up top that Lizzie is the one who posted that in the Facebook group, Minion Death Commandos, so you can join there and share funny or distressing content as your heart desires.
And I am at FLELD on Twitter, F-L-I-E-L-D-Y, Tony is at, word is Bond.
Anything else?
No, no, thanks for coming by.
Yeah, come hang out at the Death Chat.
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