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Message: <blockquote data-quote="brocknroller" data-source="post: 3226123" data-attributes="member: 665">Sounds like a lot for unskilled labor, assuming they do not have technical training and were hired for assembly jobs, so do the food service workers you mentioned. From what I've been researching and told by workforce experts I've interviewed, in the U.S. today it takes some type of technical training beyond a H.S. diploma to get above minimum wage to a "family sustaining job." This is a big issue in the U.S. right now, which is why some states have raised the minimum wage. I also have two young neighbors who are living proof of this, they both work two jobs, because they can't make ends meet with one minimum wage job (one actually makes less than minimum because he works in a restaurant and relies on tips to make up the difference, which depending on the day and the weather, he might or might not). U.S. law states: An employer may pay a tipped employee not less than $2.13 an hour in direct compensation. The other guy delivers pizzas at one job, not sure what he does at the other. He went to college for a year but flunked out. It wasn't this way in the days of unions, a man alone could make enough to feed, house and clothe his family, but those days are on gone, or nearly gone, today most families need two working parents. Half the states in the U.S. are "right to work" states (a misnomer if ever there was one) including Texas. Certainly compared to what they pay the Chinese (even though Chinese factory worker wages are rising at a much faster pace than comparable American workers), that's still a big difference in wages in Austria. It's also likely that Swaro pays its workers more than average, and some of them, no doubt, are skilled workers, who earn high wages. You're right about QC in Chinese-made bins. Frank D. can attest to that. So could a guy named John Cota, who often bought three, four or five samples of the same bin to get the best sample. But even alphas have sample variation, so you're not immune even if you spend $2.6K, it's just less likely. Japanese optics used to be the best buy, because you got good quality control without it costing you and arm and a leg, but less and less bins are being made in Japan. Brock</blockquote>

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