“I am worth less than a shoe,” she said.
May 7, 2015 8:30 AM   Subscribe

The Price of Nice Nails; Or, Pay The Manicurist As if on cue, cavalcades of battered Ford Econoline vans grumble to the curbs, and the women jump in. It is the start of another workday for legions of New York City’s manicurists, who are hurtled to nail salons across three states. They will not return until late at night, after working 10- to 12-hour shifts, hunched over fingers and toes. posted by Major Matt Mason Dixon (125 comments total) 44 users marked this as a favorite
 
This is a really incredible piece of journalism.

And kudos to the NYTimes for publishing it in English, Korean, Chinese, and Spanish.
posted by entropone at 8:41 AM on May 7, 2015 [33 favorites]


I've only had a pedicure once, and paid more than 11.00 for it, but it just felt so uncomfortable to have someone crouch at my feet and do such hard, kind of gross work (my feet were clean, but still: they're feet). And the lady who worked on me could very easily be underpaid. Lots of salon workers are. I have no way of knowing what she gets to take home.

But of course I wonder about this story, because what's going to happen to the women if these places close down or hire fewer staff to pay them more? I assume a lot of them will just be deported. Is that better than what they have? But I don't want the exploitation to continue. If they're here illegally, with the way we treat immigrants, there's really no good result.
posted by emjaybee at 8:43 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


I recently read this article about Tippi Hedren and why so many manicurists are Vietnamese.
posted by gingerbeer at 8:55 AM on May 7, 2015 [24 favorites]


this is an incredible piece of work and i'm glad to have read it.

i do find myself confused about some of it though - how much of this is new york specific? i mean, in my town there is no place to get a $10 manicure - they're usually double that, the shops mostly seem to be family owned with one or two employees that aren't the owners. the demand is much, much lower, as is cost of living.

i'm torn - i go a few times a year, i always pay at least $50 before tip, usually more like $75 (mani/pedi, never acrylics), i always hand my tip to the people who did the work - i would be devastated to learn that the employees were treated like this article describes, but i'd also hate to think that's what's going on when it's not, and thus hurting a successful immigrant owned small business.

the other thing about this article that makes me wonder if it's northeast specific is the racial makeup of the owners and preferred workers - it's my impression that most of the country is still seeing the effects of tippi hedren and the vietnamese nail techs.

i would love to see someone else take this piece and do a wider look at it - what are the conditions of nail salons in california? nebraska? florida? is this problem mostly a big shops/chain store/big city type of thing, or is it how it is in the flyovers as well?
posted by nadawi at 8:57 AM on May 7, 2015 [4 favorites]


I am someone who indulges once or twice a year in a pedicure and after reading this, I feel that will go down to zero. This horrifies me and breaks my heart.
posted by Kitteh at 8:58 AM on May 7, 2015


what's going to happen to the women if these places close down or hire fewer staff to pay them more? I assume a lot of them will just be deported. Is that better than what they have?

Not sure why you think the women will be deported if they can't find work as manicurists. If you're here illegally, Immigration doesn't keep tabs on your income level.

More likely is that the women either find jobs doing other things, or they end up moving out of NYC to nail salons in other cities.
posted by joyceanmachine at 8:59 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


I don't get manicures or pedicures and I don't imagine (perhaps because I'd rather not) that it's like this where I live. However, the article doesn't really make it clear what people who do get manicures and pedicures should do to end this. Go to a more expensive salon? Go wherever and then tip absurdly high? Stop getting manicures and pedicures?

Also, this is yet another thing that makes me wish that labour law and hiring law enforcement worked by audit instead of being driven by complaints that must be filed by people who have too little power to risk filing a complaint.
posted by If only I had a penguin... at 9:09 AM on May 7, 2015 [11 favorites]


I'm torn about this. All through our kid's high school years our next door neighbors were the Nguyens and she worked the local mani-pedi place (unadornedly named 'Nail Shop'). Treated myself like twice a year, she always did it, all seemed fun then we'd go to the HS basketball game or something together. Never seemed like anything degrading on my part or humiliating on hers. Frankly, proctology, though more respected, seems worse. But this is clearly not that situation. It always seemed like such a fun, family kind of a profession. :(
posted by umberto at 9:11 AM on May 7, 2015


The juxtapositions in nail salon workers’ lives can be jarring. Many spend their days holding hands with women of unimaginable affluence, at salons on Madison Avenue and in Greenwich, Conn. Away from the manicure tables they crash in flophouses packed with bunk beds, or in fetid apartments shared by as many as a dozen strangers.

Ms. Ren worked at Bee Nails, a chandelier-spangled salon in Hicksville, N.Y., where leather pedicure chairs are equipped with iPads on articulated arms so patrons can scroll the screens without smudging their manicures. They rarely spoke more than a few words to Ms. Ren, who, like most manicurists, wore a fake name chosen by a supervisor on a tag pinned to her chest. She was “Sherry.” She worked in silence, sloughing off calluses from customers’ feet or clipping dead skin from around their fingernail beds.


It occurs to me that this probably happens - everywhere, but more in New York - as there is greater and greater income inequality in the US generally. Fewer good jobs, more super wealthy people, more obsessive body-culture nonsense enabled by increasing wealth for a few, the increasing pervasiveness of the idea that "everyone" (everyone who matters) should pay someone a ridiculously low wage to do their laundry, etc. Also economic insecurity so that people who are just working/middle class feel the pressure to do ever more expensive and precise body culture things to look like they fit in. All working together to drive wages down.
posted by Frowner at 9:11 AM on May 7, 2015 [16 favorites]


I think this article is, overall, somewhat overblown, particularly the pull quote. "I am worth less than a shoe"? No, if you damage a customer's property, you pay for it. Just like if you damage a stranger's property, they can take you to small claims court, and guess what? You pay for it.

The bit about 'Korean manicurists are free to chat' is also probably because they are speaking in Korean, a language not commonly spoken by most people. And they are often talking about the customers. And the instant that you betray that you speak or understand any Korean whatsoever, they get really embarrassed and stop talking. Spanish, on the other hand, is a much more common language and there's a higher chance of it being understood by a random person who comes in.
posted by corb at 9:11 AM on May 7, 2015


I think this article is, overall, somewhat overblown, particularly the pull quote. "I am worth less than a shoe"? No, if you damage a customer's property, you pay for it. Just like if you damage a stranger's property, they can take you to small claims court, and guess what? You pay for it.

But at higher-status jobs, "breakage/mistakes by employees" is a category that is written into expenses and anticipated, not taken out of wages - the idea is that in any business, no matter how good the employees are, sometimes they will break things or lose money. In fact, I know a guy at a financial firm (doing fairly low-level stuff, not a broker) who once lost the company something like $10,000 through an error. He was a star performer; almost everyone else in his area had made similar or more serious mistakes. And these were not Goldman Sachs banker people, just white collar financial center workers. But did he have to pay $10,000 out of his wages? Hell no, because the company had anticipated that even skilled workers would sometimes screw up and budgeted for this.

Only people at low-status jobs where they can't actually do too much damage get this stuff taken out of wages - it's not because they broke a customer's possession, it's because they are too weak as workers to be treated as well as people in other jobs.
posted by Frowner at 9:16 AM on May 7, 2015 [170 favorites]


it's overblown that they pay for training, go weeks without pay, make less than minimum wage, work long hours without breaks, get denied advancement due to ethnicity, get stalked to new jobs, etc? are you saying it doesn't happen? much of this article seems very well supported by workers, former workers, lawsuits, and the labor department. or do you mean overblown as in they should just stop whining about it?
posted by nadawi at 9:20 AM on May 7, 2015 [52 favorites]


I feel about my couple of pedicures a year the same way I do about my housecleaners. I try to tip really well (like $8 on my $27 pedicure a week or so ago). But I still know that these situations/cash transactions are also making it so that workers could be exploited horribly (hence the asking for cash). But I also know that Not paying these people to do these things isn't helping them, either.

Which makes me think about government regulation, and how often Real regulation is considered Job Killing instead of, you know, protecting human health and living (well, Minimum) wages. Maybe it's the regulator in me, but I hope articles like this lead to more people clamoring for the kind of regulation that the privileged assume is going on all around them. Because unless the government steps in, it's pretty clear that there isn't a whole lot the customer can do to actually help the exploited workers.
posted by ldthomps at 9:22 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


No, if you damage a customer's property, you pay for it.

Ugh, no, no, no, no, no. If you damage a customer's property as one of the ordinary accidental hazards of doing your job, the company should pay for it. And if it's damage to your property and you have good reason to believe that a very low-paid worker is going to be made to pay, you shouldn't ask. (There's no evidence here that the customer did have reason to believe this.)
posted by oliverburkeman at 9:22 AM on May 7, 2015 [52 favorites]


This has appeared to be the case pretty much everywhere I've had pedicures, and also "reflexology" or foot massage places*. So yes: Southern California and Dallas/Fort Worth (though in Texas there were always a lot of cosmetology licenses on display, I don't know if they were real) at least.

*Which are very different from massage places, which come in both "exploitatively cheap but technically legit" and "human sex trafficking" varieties.

And when they talk about the hierarchies and how the Korean techs are free to chat, they mean Korean techs are allowed to speak to each other, but Chinese/Thai/Hispanic are not. It's not because of the language used, it's because they are too lowly to speak. (Though I don't know about NYC but in California you get stars reduced on Yelp if the techs speak to each other for more than brief job-related needs, Korean or not.)

I have, with some difficulty, occasionally found places that appeared to be low-exploitation (I mean, the salon-stall-rental situation in a lot of places is kind of a racket, but at least without human trafficking). They have a hard time staying open, though, in competition with the cheap places where some of the Big Job techs are very very good at what they do.
posted by Lyn Never at 9:25 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


This was 5 years ago, but a friend who worked at ME straight out of her LMT certification made minimum wage plus tip but kiiiiind of minus facility use. She made some money, it didn't all disappear into fees, but she realized quickly that you cannot earn a living wage doing hard physical labor for that kind of money.
posted by Lyn Never at 9:35 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


it's because they are too lowly to speak.

Is it odd that I'm embarrassed to relate my personal experience of this being true because, after typing it, it read as outrageously small-minded and racist?
posted by 1adam12 at 9:45 AM on May 7, 2015


Is it odd that I'm embarrassed to relate my personal experience of this being true because, after typing it, it read as outrageously small-minded and racist?

I think feeling at a minimum embarrassed about racism and small-mindedness is certainly not odd.
posted by anthropophagous at 9:52 AM on May 7, 2015


More likely is that the women either find jobs doing other things

If there are better paid options for the women out there, why aren't they doing those "other things" already?

I am someone who indulges once or twice a year in a pedicure and after reading this, I feel that will go down to zero.


Sounds like it would make more sense to keep going but to make sure you find a salon which either charges (and pays its staff) reasonably or allows workers to keep your (generous) tip.
posted by yoink at 9:53 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


> i do find myself confused about some of it though - how much of this is new york specific? i mean, in my town there is no place to get a $10 manicure - they're usually double that, the shops mostly seem to be family owned with one or two employees that aren't the owners.

Similar, here in Philadelphia. Also, echoing that Tippi Hedren story, the owners are often Vietnamese. At the slightly larger places where there are a few more non-family employees, they're often Vietnamese, Cambodian and Indonesian in my South Philly neighborhood. (Reflecting the nearby Asian population.) They live locally as far as I know --I see my regular pedicure guy in my neighborhood all the time. IIRC in Center City there are more Korean employees and owners.
posted by desuetude at 9:54 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


This is a fantastic article and superior piece of journalism. I'm very glad you posted it. Thank you.
posted by zarq at 9:57 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


To people who are saying they aren't going to get manicures anymore, I wonder how different this is from the restaurant industry?
posted by Bee'sWing at 9:58 AM on May 7, 2015


overblown that they pay for training, go weeks without pay, make less than minimum wage, work long hours without breaks, get denied advancement due to ethnicity, get stalked to new jobs, etc

I believe that many of them make less than minimum wage, but I don't see the difference between them and waitresses or bag boys or exotic dancers. Heavily tipped occupations normally do make less than minimum wage, because it's assumed that they are being compensated with tips. And I find it hard to believe that tips would not amount to minimum wage, which is 7.25. If you do three manicures an hour, they'd only have to tip about 2.50 on each one even if they were getting paid nothing, which is under average.

Likewise, exotic dancers also generally pay stage fee in order to dance at the club, and they make it back with their own tips and work. Sometimes they actually owe the house.

I suppose I'm not sure I see why manicurists have it any worse than other primarily-tip occupations. And 'long hours without breaks'? Isn't that most of us these days?
posted by corb at 9:59 AM on May 7, 2015


Yeah, personally, my takeaway isn't "I need to stop getting the occasional manicure" but "I need to tip a lot better than I have until now."
posted by Shmuel510 at 10:00 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


I go to a little nail salon near my home in California. The services cost a lot more than the prices quoted in the article, and the manicurists have their licenses posted by their work stations. I am assuming - hoping - that this indicates that the salon is on the up-and-up more than the ones in the article. FWIW, the workers are all Vietnamese, AFAIK. (And I do tip generously - anyone who handles feet for a living deserves a good tip!)

I wonder if New York is uniquely bad or if salons here in CA are, too, or if it varies? And, JMO, I don't know if refusing to patronize nail salons is the answer, unless we can somehow muster a widespread boycott. And female guilt is a terrible thing to witness in any case (if the services were primarily geared to men would there be as much guilt? Probably not. Women are encouraged to have superegos the size of a mountain.) I surmise that the solution would lie in more and more efficient regulation, as well as amnesty for all immigrants who are already here - thus taking away a powerful weapon of "If you don't do as we say you will be deported."

And yes, tip well! People who touch your crusty feet deserve a generous tip!
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 10:04 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


Minimum wage in NY is 8.75. And living on minimum wage in NYC would be...well, pretty much what these women go through.

I am not averse to saying that strippers and waiters are getting ripped off as well...I don't think it diminishes their problems to say this group is getting heavily exploited.

Isn't that most of us these days?

I would be surprised if anyone here on the blue is working 6 24-hour shifts a week without weekends or vacations for $3.00 a hour doing manual labor in abusive conditions, so no. It's not most of us. If you mean "In the US" well, ok, there probably are a lot of undocumented workers undergoing similar abuse, but it's still not seen as the norm for Americans to accept that kind of treatment.
posted by emjaybee at 10:08 AM on May 7, 2015 [39 favorites]


"I need to tip a lot better than I have until now."

It also sounds like you should tip in cash and put the cash into the hands of the person who actually did the work. Tips on credit cards are more easily docked or withheld by the bosses.
posted by yoink at 10:11 AM on May 7, 2015 [5 favorites]


So those of you who are just going to tip better, are you okay with that even if your nail tech is in the country illegally and living in a bunk bed in someone's basement?

While there are a lot of illegal employees back of house in restaurants, my understanding is that they are generally there under their own steam (though possibly in debt to the coyotes who got them into the country) and have a say in where they work/who they work for.
posted by Lyn Never at 10:12 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


Thanks for the advice about carefully choosing my next pedicure outing. Having worked in a tipping job before, I always make sure I tip incredibly well for a lot of things (been there, done that, know those feels, happy to do it).
posted by Kitteh at 10:12 AM on May 7, 2015


Also, while nobody specifically said it in the article, I suspect that a lot of these women are searched/forced to turn their pockets out so that the owner gets a share of their tips. Do tip cash, and do hand it directly to the person who did the work, but do assume they are not keeping all of it.
posted by Lyn Never at 10:14 AM on May 7, 2015 [8 favorites]


In California, many nail salons are informal Vietnamese family networks--one person hires a cousin of a BIL and sponsors them for immigration and so on. The owners regular salon sent their daughter (a classmate of my kid) through UCLA and then med school, and she worked in the salon every weekend. Being a manicurist doesn't require much English, and the exam in CA is given in multiple languages. Lots of service jobs involve touching another person or animal, and I don't see the same level of hand-wringing about dog grooming. I'd heard the Tippi Hedren story before, and I think it's very interesting.
posted by Ideefixe at 10:14 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


I would be surprised if anyone here on the blue is working 6 24-hour shifts a week

Straight? No. But sleeping in a barracks directly above my job and being shaken awake when there was work to do and being constantly available and being paid less than minimum wage sounds exactly like my time as a young private in the military. Which - I suppose my real issue with this is that if we accept that there are some people it is okay to treat in those ways, some people for which these are acceptable conditions of labor, I find it really weird and jarring when people choose individual professions and say 'well, it's not okay for THAT profession.' Either these are immutable rules of labor or these are not.

And I suppose if I unpack it a little more, I'm uncomfortable, given the fact that these violations of these rules of labor that people expect are much more universal than would appear per the article, with the article focusing on the things that women use, the things women prioritize. Trying to make women, who already bear the majority of emotional labor and guilt, feel guilty yet again for patronizing an establishment which for many women is necessary for gender presentation so that they themselves don't get fired - it just really rubs me the wrong way in all kinds of directions.
posted by corb at 10:17 AM on May 7, 2015 [8 favorites]


the article straight up says that when they make less than minimum wage once they account for tips they are not compensated up to minimum wage, which is the law - so no, i don't agree that they're all just raking in the tips and that accounts for all the disparity.

i think dancers and other tip heavy industries are often exploited as well, doubly so when the workers tend towards undocumented and paid off the books. i think we should absolutely remember those other industries when discussing these things, but their suffering doesn't mean that the things detailed in this article are "overblown" - it means that poverty sucks all over. i don't really understand thinking it mostly all works out in the wash, because it most assuredly doesn't.
posted by nadawi at 10:17 AM on May 7, 2015 [9 favorites]


but it doesn't rub you the wrong way that it's women mostly being exploited in this industry? that's a weird place to draw the line...
posted by nadawi at 10:20 AM on May 7, 2015 [25 favorites]


My back makes hard for me to bend down and cut my own toenails, so ten years ago I started going for a mani-pedi on a regular base. The first shop was large, with twenty or so chairs, very clean, very professional, but I started to feel uncomfortable when I noticed that the only two people talking were two males. The half dozen female workers were always very quiet, just smiling in reply to questions.

The place I patronize now is owned by a vietnamese lady, has only four chairs, and her husband helps her by maintaining the mechanicals and by pitching in when she has a rush of two clients. I know her life story (a refugee) and she knows mine. I know the names of her children and followed their school careers and their getting jobs and moving to Chicago, she knows all there is to know about my children school, careers and troubles. She was there for me when I lost my husband, I was there for her when she lost her mother in Vietnam.

She makes a living (I'm curious and we talked finances when I helped fill the FAFSA for her youngest child), but it doesn't run to Cadillac SUV's. On the other hand, she is cheerful, happy, and looking forward to retirement and to move to Chicago to help with her three granddaughters.
posted by francesca too at 10:20 AM on May 7, 2015 [14 favorites]


The Kitchen Sisters had an episode of Fugitive Waves about manicurists. I think it was called the Long Shadow of Shirley Temple? It was a good listen.
posted by KernalM at 10:21 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


So those of you who are just going to tip better, are you okay with that even if your nail tech is in the country illegally and living in a bunk bed in someone's basement?

I'm certainly not claiming that tipping better will make everything okay. But faced with the question of not getting any more manicures, or getting them and tipping more, it does seem to me that the latter is probably better for the workers. (Provided that they actually get the tips, granted.)

I'd certainly support the city cracking down on establishments to ensure that at least minimum wages are paid, working conditions are safe, and tips go where they belong, but I'm not the mayor.

Are you proposing a better consumer-level solution?
posted by Shmuel510 at 10:24 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


And I suppose if I unpack it a little more, I'm uncomfortable, given the fact that these violations of these rules of labor that people expect are much more universal than would appear per the article, with the article focusing on the things that women use, the things women prioritize. Trying to make women, who already bear the majority of emotional labor and guilt, feel guilty yet again for patronizing an establishment which for many women is necessary for gender presentation so that they themselves don't get fired - it just really rubs me the wrong way in all kinds of directions.

Corb, thank you for articulating what I was trying to put my finger on and couldn't quite articulate. I would not want to patronize an establishment that treated its workers like the ones in the article, and if I knew/found out that my favorite nail salon was treating its workers badly, I'd find another one. And, obviously, this industry exploits and abuses women - it's an industry that caters to women and exploits them as well, so there's a lot of intersectionality issues to unpack there. But industries catering to women are always the ones under attack for some issue or another that is overlooked in male-oriented industries, because Women Are Frivolous Airheads unless they are selflessly catering to their families. And women who spend money on themselves are selfish!

I wish there was a way to know or find out whether one's nail salon treats its workers well, or not. I'm going by the prices, the certification, and the fact that the salon I patronize has workers who chat with one another and their customers. I don't know if it's a family business, but I wouldn't be surprised if it was an informal family network business like what Ideefixe described.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 10:27 AM on May 7, 2015 [4 favorites]


i think this article is good, especially for people (mostly women) in new york, who get manicures to think about their choices, think about if they know enough about where they receive services like this. i think avoiding the chains mentioned specifically in the article is also a good step. i also hope this article pushes better regulation because at the consumer level there's only so much we can do.

i think we can be troubled with how women are often encouraged to shoulder the guilt for bad working conditions, even though it's something that happens in a lot of industries, but i don't think that absolves us of trying to work out how to make better choices.
posted by nadawi at 10:33 AM on May 7, 2015 [5 favorites]


patronizing an establishment which for many women is necessary for gender presentation so that they themselves don't get fired

Is this really a thing? There are professions where having a professional manicure/pedicure is REQUIRED? You can't even just paint your nails at home? I seem to be living more and more out of the world as I get older.
posted by JanetLand at 10:34 AM on May 7, 2015 [9 favorites]


I think the NYT piece is really more a reflection on how recent immigrants get stuck in low-wage jobs when they owe money to the people who got them into the country in the first place. Here in California, it's more typical of farm workers from Mexico and Central America than China, but it's the same idea. Nail salons aren't any more or less exploitative than other forms of labor that require long hours, physical work and not much English. Nail salons are cheaper to set up than sweat-shops for garments, for example.
There's a whiff of the Buzzfeed "Read This and You'll Never Get a Pedicure Again!" about the whole piece. I can't imagine that the NYT editors have just discovered cheap labor practices in the outer boroughs.
posted by Ideefixe at 10:35 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


Would I be some kind of dangerous radical if I said that employers who illegally underpaid their employees or who used their employees' immigration status to threaten them should go to prison? A "consumer-level" solution seems to be wanting to take political-level solutions off the table for some reason.
posted by Space Coyote at 10:37 AM on May 7, 2015 [51 favorites]


Straight? No. But sleeping in a barracks directly above my job and being shaken awake when there was work to do and being constantly available and being paid less than minimum wage sounds exactly like my time as a young private in the military. Which - I suppose my real issue with this is that if we accept that there are some people it is okay to treat in those ways, some people for which these are acceptable conditions of labor, I find it really weird and jarring when people choose individual professions and say 'well, it's not okay for THAT profession.' Either these are immutable rules of labor or these are not.

Race to the Bottom: The Ethos of Champions
posted by Rustic Etruscan at 10:38 AM on May 7, 2015 [43 favorites]


Would I be some kind of dangerous radical if I said that employers who illegally underpaid their employees or who used their employees' immigration status to threaten them should go to prison?

Yes.
posted by Ray Walston, Luck Dragon at 10:38 AM on May 7, 2015


There are professions where having a professional manicure/pedicure is REQUIRED? You can't even just paint your nails at home?

Yeah, I was typing a similar comment. I have absolutely painted my nails to appear more feminine before (job interviews and such) but not a manicure? I've just had those in the past when I wanted to feel fancy, at least as a white collar type. Plus a bottle of drugstore nail polish is going to be cheaper than routine manicures, even at bargain basement NYC prices.
posted by jess at 10:39 AM on May 7, 2015


getting a professional looking manicure at home is a learned skill and kind of difficult work, especially if you don't have perfect nails. there are absolutely professions where your nails have to be as on point as your makeup or clothes or whatever else we're being judged on that's not "how we do the job."
posted by nadawi at 10:40 AM on May 7, 2015 [23 favorites]


I was struck by the article, because having a pedicure every few months is a way of giving myself a treat I discovered about a year and a half ago and have enjoyed since. It's disheartening to know how poorly the workers are often treated.

It does answer a question I'd asked my self, as the two different salons I visited in Sunset Park (a neighborhood where Spanish is the primary language of a majority of residents) exhibited the same division of labor; there were both Asian and Hispanic workers, but Asians performed all the manicures while all the Hispanic workers gave pedicures.

It is difficult to know what to do with this information, but I think the takeaway for me is to tip better. (I so enjoyed the pedicure that I've been tipping 20%, but given that I only do this 3 or 4 times a year, going up to 25% or even 50% isn't that big a deal.) It seems to me that's the best chance I have of personally making working conditions a little better for someone who's doing a difficult job and not getting much from it.
posted by layceepee at 10:42 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


there are absolutely professions where your nails have to be as on point as your makeup or clothes or whatever else we're being judged on that's not "how we do the job."

What would be a good specific example of a profession in which a woman will get fired if she doesn't get her nails professionally manicured?
posted by yoink at 10:44 AM on May 7, 2015 [4 favorites]


corb: Straight? No. But sleeping in a barracks directly above my job and being shaken awake when there was work to do and being constantly available and being paid less than minimum wage sounds exactly like my time as a young private in the military.

Voluntary, indentured military service cannot and should not be be compared to a civilian job. One signs up for military service, and in doing so signs a binding contract that controls and manages all aspects of one's life, including and up to a very real risk of being killed during one's service. Indentured service of that type in civilian jobs is now basically illegal in the United States. If such service is coerced, then the employer can and would be held liable under Federal law. See the 13th Amendment. See The Trafficking Victims Protection Act of 2000.

I believe you are comparing two things that are not equivalent and should not be compared. And I suggest to you that if you see comparisons between indentured servitude and what these manicurists are dealing with in their non-military, civilian jobs, then that speaks volumes toward why their working conditions are injust and terrible.
posted by zarq at 10:45 AM on May 7, 2015 [74 favorites]


A "consumer-level" solution seems to be wanting to take political-level solutions off the table for some reason.

Well, if we're playing straw-man games why not flip that one around and say that the insistence on only considering political-level solutions is a convenient way of refusing to consider your own individual praxis?

Or, you know, we could assume good-faith on both sides and say that it's perfectly possible to both push for political-level solutions AND try to think what is the best course of action to take as an individual consumer until such time as those political solutions are enacted.
posted by yoink at 10:46 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


A "consumer-level" solution seems to be wanting to take political-level solutions off the table for some reason.

I agree with this. While a consumer-level solution of patronizing the places that treat their workers decently would help - as long as the consumer had that information! - I don't think it is adequate. It will take a political-level solution to solve this kind of problem. Punish the exploitative owners and enforce health, safety, and labor regulations more effectively. (And given the conditions detailed in the article, some of these salons seem like an outbreak of infection waiting to happen.)
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 10:46 AM on May 7, 2015


I do feel like the employees should be working in this country legally, either because they are citizens or have gone through the proper procedures. If they are legally allowed to work, it is at least feasible that things can be done about fair pay and conditions. I know they're shitty regulations, but they at least exist if you formally exist.

I understand that working illegally in the US for pennies as a nail tech is preferable to some if not all of their other options, but I'm not sure that my support of illegal workers is - though it may mean someone gets my pennies when they otherwise might not - an appropriate justification for participating their exploitation.
posted by Lyn Never at 10:47 AM on May 7, 2015


corb: "I believe that many of them make less than minimum wage, but I don't see the difference between them and waitresses or bag boys or exotic dancers. Heavily tipped occupations normally do make less than minimum wage, because it's assumed that they are being compensated with tips.. "

Nobody should have to work for tips period. A minimum wage should mean there is a reliable, predictable income in return for time spent and work done, regardless of whether or not you had more or less customers that day and/or smiled a little more or less. It should NOT mean that a big part of your minimum wage income turns into some sort of reward that is voluntarily given to you by customers on a case by case basis like you're some kind of dog who's being given a treat because you wagged your tail in particularly cute way. It's a totally perverted system.

If a business owner makes enough to pay minimum wage straight up but doesn't they're scum. If they don't make enough to pay minimum wage without faking it through tips... then their business probably isn't viable.
posted by Hairy Lobster at 10:47 AM on May 7, 2015 [26 favorites]


What would be a good specific example of a profession in which a woman will get fired if she doesn't get her nails professionally manicured?

like a lot of the sexism stew, these are unwritten rules and women are cast as crazy for noticing them. will someone be told that they were fired for not having nice nails, probably not outside of image conscious jobs (hostess, card dealer, dancer, etc), but they will be not hired, not promoted, the first to be let go over all sorts of stuff that boil down to not having the right image, which pretty much always comes down to preforming femininity correctly.
posted by nadawi at 10:52 AM on May 7, 2015 [34 favorites]


My nail shop is fantastic. It's owned by a Vietnamese couple, and employs about 20 techs across two shifts. About half the techs are Vietnamese, the rest are pretty diverse. I have been going there for 15 years now. All of the techs have their licenses displayed on their desks. They're chatty, cheery, and they take a lot of pride in the work they do. Brandon likes to talk computers and internet with me, Michael and Mindy like to talk about food and wine. Sarea is all about the hair colors. And all of them are so very gentle with my wretched hands - I can count on a fingertip to elbow massage when my arthritis is acting particularly assholey and making it hard for them to do their work, and I tip the hell out of them for that. I won't allow any other shop to touch my hands.

I am horrified by the shops talked about in the article. Sure, $10 for a manicure sounds grand, but half a second's thought should give you pause. These folks are performing a fairly intimate service for you, the least you could do is make sure that you're patronizing a shop where the workers are being properly paid. That cheap price isn't enough to make you think?

There are professions where having a professional manicure/pedicure is REQUIRED?

Yep. Full face of makeup, too.

Harrod's Department Store made the news a while back for requiring full face. I worked in a couple of places in college with similar policies. Men, of course, didn't have to abide by such nonsense, but it's apparently vital for women to be painted to a fare-thee-well in order to function correctly in some jobs.
posted by MissySedai at 10:53 AM on May 7, 2015 [23 favorites]


I suppose I'm not sure I see why manicurists have it any worse than other primarily-tip occupations. And 'long hours without breaks'? Isn't that most of us these days?

"Horrible job is as horrible as other horrible jobs" hardly means the article is overblown.

And, yeah, you can compare the military to abuse of undocumented women when these women get healthcare and pensions.
posted by Mavri at 10:55 AM on May 7, 2015 [4 favorites]


"But someone else has it worse" is NEVER a good reason to ignore someone's troubles. "I had it worse once" is an even more terrible reason.
posted by jess at 10:57 AM on May 7, 2015 [25 favorites]


In California, tipped employees still must get minimum wage. Another thing Cali does right is forbid employers from taking a surcharge out of credit card tips. I think having all states require that tipped employees get a minimum wage would be a step in the right direction. As would assurance that any immigrant could step up and demand their wage rights without fear of being deported.
posted by Rosie M. Banks at 10:58 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


The "fight for fifteen" campaign is having success, hopefully the organization of marginalized labour can spread to other industries as well.
posted by Space Coyote at 11:01 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


it's nice to say that you think people should legally be in this country, but that's rarely down to the people and often down to horrific immigration policies and all of us just looking the other way. the only way to avoid benefiting from undocumented labor is to become a naked breatharian who builds their own house and goes no where.

we have to keep putting pressure on our government and the corporations to change how this works and keep making the best choices with the knowledge in front of us to reduce harm whenever we can. if you personally want to decide to not get manicures, i support you. if you want to stop going out to restaurants because you can't be sure that all the workers are documented, i support you. but don't act like we aren't all benefiting from undocumented labor, no matter where we draw our personal line.
posted by nadawi at 11:03 AM on May 7, 2015 [6 favorites]


Mod note: Couple of comments deleted; the "compare and contrast civilian jobs and military jobs" thing is kind of a sidetrack here.
posted by LobsterMitten (staff) at 11:04 AM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


like a lot of the sexism stew, these are unwritten rules and women are cast as crazy for noticing them. will someone be told that they were fired for not having nice nails, probably not outside of image conscious jobs (hostess, card dealer, dancer, etc), but they will be not hired, not promoted, the first to be let go over all sorts of stuff that boil down to not having the right image, which pretty much always comes down to preforming femininity correctly.

Yeah, this is something I actively worry about all the time. At my current job, there are three women in the office (including me). A few weeks after I started, there was the serious suggestion that we would be asked to wear a dress or a skirt no less than twice a week because it presented the right image for women in the office. Unbelievably the comment, "now we're not singling the girls out, the guys have to wear suits too" was made and I said something. I even brought up the Ontario Human Rights bit that stated that unless this was a job with a uniform, I would not comply with having to wear dresses and skirts because it is how a woman is supposed to look. The update to that is that we got to rewrite the dress code (the women in the office, not the men) to suit us instead of suiting the men.

I guess I was being long-winded to say that I actively worry about being feminine enough for the workplace all the time and since I don't wear make-up, I am dreading the day someone points that out too.
posted by Kitteh at 11:04 AM on May 7, 2015 [33 favorites]


Thank you, LobsterMitten.
posted by zarq at 11:08 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


The bit about 'Korean manicurists are free to chat' is also probably because they are speaking in Korean, a language not commonly spoken by most people. And they are often talking about the customers. And the instant that you betray that you speak or understand any Korean whatsoever, they get really embarrassed and stop talking.

Hey, I remember that Seinfeld episode!
posted by mudpuppie at 11:09 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


nadawi: "how much of this is new york specific? i mean, in my town there is no place to get a $10 manicure - they're usually double that, the shops mostly seem to be family owned with one or two employees that aren't the owners."
Ideefixe: "In California, many nail salons are informal Vietnamese family networks--one person hires a cousin of a BIL and sponsors them for immigration and so on."

Yeah, I think it's more of a New York problem, and definitely more of a big-city problem. Manicures run about $18 in Peoria, so I'd expect to be paying at least $30 for something legit in NYC. Everywhere here is family-owned, virtually all by Vietnamese (unless they're part of a big spa chain like Aveda) ... the state even gives the certification test in Vietnamese. I'm SURE that some of the employees have a more tenuous family connection than they claimed for immigration purposes, but in a small town like this ... all but two of the women at my usual nail salon have kids in the public school system and I see half of them at PTA meetings, so it's not quite so stark a divide and I'm pretty sure they're actually married women living in post-war bungalows with regularized immigration status and that's not a facade. But I was once in a nail salon in an East Coast city when INS (so this was a long time ago) came in and demanded papers from everyone, and not everyone had them, and it was horrible ... I've been a bit more aware and a lot pickier about salons since then. (Well, first it put me off beauty services completely for like five years. But then I got pickier and smarter.)

(Actually my regular pedicurist, who has very strong opinions on everything and is very hilarious in general, just started studying for her US citizenship test and likes to chat about it, since she knows I'm an American history/politics buff and I will be enthusiastic about it. So she saw a painting of the Constitutional Convention at Philadelphia and I'm not sure what she thought the Founding Fathers looked like, but she was pretty freaking indignant about it and had been googling portraits to get a closer look, and last time I was there, she wanted to talk at length about male American hairstyle choices of 1787 because she did not approve, Tommy J! She was saying how she really enjoyed reading about Ben Franklin -- he's her favorite Founding Father so far -- but he had VERY BAD HAIR and she wanted to know if I knew if he was married because she didn't think a man with a wife would have such bad hair, even in 1787. I told her to go look up a portrait of John Adams and that he was definitely married and his hair was way worse. I was like, this is literally the best pedicure conversation I have ever had. This is probably in my top five conversations of all time. Someone who wants to simultaneously debate American Constitutional history and mock late 18th-century fashion is obviously my people.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 11:13 AM on May 7, 2015 [102 favorites]


And the instant that you betray that you speak or understand any Korean whatsoever, they get really embarrassed and stop talking.

About half the ladies at my nail place are han chinese and they love it beyond imagining when my mandarin-fluent cousin comes with me for a pedicure; we've reached the point where they are now actively disappointed in me that I don't also speak mandarin. I tip $20/h though so I feel like it all works out in the end.
posted by poffin boffin at 11:15 AM on May 7, 2015 [6 favorites]


My daughter (13yo) wants a manicure/pedicure 3-4x a year. She pays for this usually with chores or lawnmowing. I make sure, however, to give her tip money (usually $10 USD) in cash and make sure she gives it directly to the person doing the work.
posted by Fuka at 11:17 AM on May 7, 2015


Yeah, I think it's more of a New York problem, and definitely more of a big-city problem. Manicures run about $18 in Peoria, so I'd expect to be paying at least $30 for something legit in NYC.

I wonder if it has to do with the perception of them being a luxury or a necessity?
posted by corb at 11:17 AM on May 7, 2015


This is an article about a form of indentured servitude, where people work twelve hour days for zero dollars a day in the HOPE of someday making $30 a day (A DAY. A DAY), and the idea that anyone would find this to be anything other than horrifying makes me want to cry.

Do I want them all to make an actual minimum wage? Yes. Do I want everyone everywhere to make at least the minimum wage instead of being treated like disposable nonhuman commodities? Yes. Do I want the minimum wage to be high enough to live on? Yes. Do I think that being treated terribly in any work situation, including basic training, is horrible? Yes.

Sitting on tiny stools and not being allowed to move or take breaks, being kicked and verbally abused, being poisoned with the chemicals that are used to perform the manicures and frequently paid zero dollars, while being treated to racism like "people of your race are just naturally dirty and lazy", being stalked and threatened by your former boss if you dare to quit working for that boss-- I cannot believe anyone is reading the same article and feeling blase about it. I say this as someone who gets frequent pedicures and once spent six months getting regular gel manicures (for work reasons, so there's that too), so this is not an attempt to shame women for their women things.

Humans should not be treated this way. And when they are, all the other humans should be upset about it.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 11:25 AM on May 7, 2015 [58 favorites]


What would be a good specific example of a profession in which a woman will get fired if she doesn't get her nails professionally manicured?

I often see this kind of grooming code with higher-end service professionals, such as real estate agents, or some of the vice presidents I used to work with when my main client was a bank. It may be an unwritten code, but it's still very much expected.
posted by vignettist at 11:34 AM on May 7, 2015 [10 favorites]


Part of me is a little surprised that people didn't realize the treatment of workers at cheap nail salons was so bad. This might have something to do with the fact that I'm second-gen East Asian with family in the working class parts of Bronx and Queens, but yeah, nothing about this is a surprise, particularly if you know about the intense level of 'FUCK YOU GOT MINE' found in first-gen East Asian communities, with a tasty side-dish of open racism.

But yeah.

I assumed that white Americans knew, but chose not to think about this in the same way that white Americans know, but choose not to think about industrial meat production or the horrific conditions that go into industrial fruit and vegetable production. Reading this thread has been eye-opening for me.
posted by joyceanmachine at 11:39 AM on May 7, 2015 [17 favorites]


corb: "I wonder if it has to do with the perception of them being a luxury or a necessity?"

I think actually the more interesting comparison would be, why are there so many more nail salons in NYC than Chicago, and why are working conditions worse in NYC (aside from glut driving prices way down)? (Since somewhere like Peoria is literally small enough for everyone to know everyone ... I have a friend who works with illegal immigrants here, and she says they are very hard to hide in the mainstream economy, because everybody notices when you have a new dishwasher or a new nail tech, whereas in a city like Chicago it's much easier for an illegal immigrant to slip in and out of employment unnoticed even in customer-facing positions. (Around here they end up doing dangerous agricultural work, that's where nobody notices.))

I was shocked when I saw in the article this is the first time the NY DoL has gone on an enforcement spree against nail salons, so that might be part of it; nail salons are frequent targets of enforcement actions around here because it's a low-wage, high-tip industry that has to meet health standards and that's primarily staffed by immigrants ... the department of labor, the health department, and immigration are all checking them out like all the time. When I lived on the East Coast I saw salons cut corners on sanitation things all the time (cleaning metal tools between customers, using new disposable files, etc) -- I never see that here, ever. I assume some of it is customer expectations, but I suspect more of it is "the health department checks" and without a race to the bottom in prices, there's not much incentive to risk your licensing over it.

(I actually think the beauty sector in Illinois is relatively over-licensed and over-enforced -- do barbers really need continuing education credits? really? -- but I'll take it over the sorts of abuses I read about in the sector in other states where enforcement is so lax that 15 people in a salon can trade around a pair of licenses. That's crazy.)
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 11:40 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


As to women who need to keep their nails manicured for a profession -- is there really that much of a qualitative difference in doing your own manicure, and keeping it straight? I know it's a mess and requires more upkeep, but on the few occasions I've had a professional manicure, I've noticed that it wasn't any better at not chipping than my own paint. That's assuming you go for quality polish. Wet 'n Wild is not going to cut it, but Guerlain can go a week without chipping. Gel is surely better, but why go for it if it entails human suffering?

The only mani-pedis I've had were presents or perks, and I was nervous. I hated feeling that a hard-working woman was literally sitting at my feet. The shops didn't seem like sweatshops at all, but there's absolutely no telling from a fine facade, and I won't patronize one again without a strong assurance.

I am lucky enough not to have had jobs where this level of nail care was necessary, although I do recall an argument about whether a lilac shade of polish was acceptable or too close to purple for a professional. I prevailed. These days, I keep my nails cut to the quick so I can use touchscreens well. I haven't paid good enough attention to my fellow female professionals to see if this is a trend -- I'm not that good at womaning, sometimes -- but I do know that in this area, long glossy nails are a low class marker.
posted by Countess Elena at 11:45 AM on May 7, 2015 [4 favorites]


Given that there are jobs in this country where women have weight limits and have to get management approval before they can change their hair style or color, I don't find the idea that a manicure could be required that bizarre.
posted by KathrynT at 11:47 AM on May 7, 2015 [10 favorites]


is there really that much of a qualitative difference in doing your own manicure...

I've known women who could not for the life of them paint their nails tidily. Like, it's always a disaster, looks like a child did it, bad. Even women who otherwise have good fine motor control. I'm not sure what the disconnect is, but yeah -- it's not easy for some people.
posted by LobsterMitten at 11:49 AM on May 7, 2015 [17 favorites]


Ha, I can paint my left hand with relative ease, but yeah, it's a big ole mess when the left hand tries to paint the right.
posted by Kitteh at 11:52 AM on May 7, 2015 [8 favorites]


Gel is surely better, but why go for it if it entails human suffering?

Gel manicures last for 4-6 weeks, usually with no chipping at all. I once hit one of them with a sharpened santoku knife, and it didn't even leave a mark.

I don't think I would go "full-time" with the gel again. Also, this was at a family-run salon where customers invited the staff to attend local events, where customers would help the owner's daughters as they worked on their homework, and where we would have frequent conversations with the staff about their immigration process, their families back home, their feelings about America. I certainly can't guarantee that it wasn't all a sham facade to cover up human rights abuses, but it seemed unlikely. (Also, it wasn't in a major city, where the situation seems much more dire.)

(If by "suffering" you mean the chemicals the workers were potentially inhaling, that's why I stopped getting them, even though the staff there were given safety gear.)
posted by a fiendish thingy at 11:55 AM on May 7, 2015


I do my nails at home, and it's really a matter of having the tools, a decent amount of practice, and some coordination to apply polish smoothly. That, and not having arthritis or other similar impairments, which is why I used to do my grandmother's nails. Having a base and top coat that work well are more important than the polish itself as far as chipping goes -- I use dollar store polish and OPI and Chanel and there's not a whole lot of difference.
posted by rewil at 11:55 AM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


> What would be a good specific example of a profession in which a woman will get fired if she doesn't get her nails professionally manicured?

Banking. Law. Department stores. Car dealerships. Real estate. But banking and law are probably the most restrictive, actually.

Yes, written codes.

Well, the rules often just say "manicured," but standards count, and a sloppy manicure won't fly. And it is actually pretty damn difficult to give yourself a really neatly applied manicure or pedicure. Interestingly, the relaxation of the pantyhose requirment in recent years often comes with a pedicure rule: example.
posted by desuetude at 11:56 AM on May 7, 2015 [17 favorites]


Sounds about right for all the small businesses I've worked for in my exp. It's one of the main reasons I refuse to work for family because there is no limit how much work is considered "enough."

It's beyond just going to different nail salons the problem itself is darker than what the article reports. I guess it'd be a good start to organize work unions and reform the idea of "tipped employees." But even then it'll take time and money for anything to change and it's not only NY too.

It's odd but after awhile people who work in these kind of situations stop caring (including me). It could be simply becoming indifferent to the negative aspects of life but humans are amazingly resilient.
posted by chrono_rabbit at 11:56 AM on May 7, 2015


i love nail polish, i love doing my own nails. i have 4 shoeboxes and one harry&james box stuffed with polish and other nail stuff. but - my hands shake, i'm bad at cuticle maintenance, i never seem to shape the (short cut) nail properly. i'm a housewife, so that's fine, my nails can be messy for a day or two while oil/showers/picking at them cleans them up enough around the edges and the polish pulls away from my cuticles, but it's no where near the quality of a professional manicure.
posted by nadawi at 11:58 AM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


There's a nail salon near me that opened a few weeks ago, within walking distance, and I've been thinking of checking it out. I haven't been to a real salon since I was... 16 maybe?

How do I figure out how legit the new salon is? I'm pretty sure I'd miss all the signs you normal people would catch (although this article definitely helps). I can't give myself a decent pedicure no matter how I try, and it's getting warm out here and I like... really want decent looking toenails.

I glanced in at some point and it looked like there was a sign that incentivized positive Yelp reviews. So yeah, no idea.
posted by erratic meatsack at 12:00 PM on May 7, 2015


Countess Elena: " is there really that much of a qualitative difference in doing your own manicure, and keeping it straight?"

Yes, because I have no fine motor skills to speak of. Basically self-care attempts at my fingernails all look like these Nail Fails. (Except sadder because I'm just trying to paint them a plain nude pink.)

As a normal thing I just keep my nails extremely short and unpolished, but sometimes I do feel that I have to get my nails done professionally for my professional obligations -- if I'm going to be arguing in court, yes, I am going to have my messy-ass cuticles cleaned up by pros. My good friend and I always go right before she goes to Chicago to start the appellate argument season before the 7th Circuit. When I ran for office, I had them done a couple of times because I was literally shaking hands all the time and speaking publicly at least three nights a week. Before job interviews. I often actually get a "no-polish" manicure where they clean up and moisturize your cuticles, cut and shape your nails, and buff the whole thing, so your hands look neat and professional, and then I have no polish applied whatsoever. (When I do have polish applied on my nails, which is rare, 90% of the time it's clear; 10% of the time it's a very pale pink that barely shows.) For me it's not even having "done" nails -- in fact having obviously feminine nails might be a drawback! -- it's having neat, professional-looking hands.

I have very messy cuticles and unusually dry skin; but also I have two kids and I like to garden, so my hands get a bit more torn up than someone who pays more regular attention to personal grooming and has less-dirty (literally!) hobbies. I really prefer to pay someone $20 to have them do a really nice job making my hands look perfect than to fuck around with it myself and make a mess of the thing. (And just so you know how low my standards are, I cut my own hair. I'm not a fancy lady by any stretch.)

I see male lawyers in the salon too, getting no-polish manicures when they have big cases coming up. And springtime always means lots of dudes in the salon getting sandal-season no-polish pedicures, because getting your own feet all cleaned up is hard to reach.
posted by Eyebrows McGee at 12:02 PM on May 7, 2015 [11 favorites]


One of the awesome things I have done in my marriage is introduce Shepherd to the joys of having a pedicure. Initially he was worried that if other guys found out they would think him less manly and my reaction was "Fuck those people. You'll be the one with good-looking/feeling feet and those suckers are just missing out."
posted by Kitteh at 12:05 PM on May 7, 2015 [4 favorites]


But banking and law are probably the most restrictive, actually.

Yeah, I work in law. At this point, I am fairly senior.

One of the perks is that when I paint my nails or get my nails painted, I don't have to get a demure little pink or clear coat anymore. I can, if I want, do a light gray or brown. Or sparkly! One day, I was feeling particularly idgaf and I did BLUE SPARKLY.
posted by joyceanmachine at 12:10 PM on May 7, 2015 [9 favorites]


My nails, fingers and toes, and my hideous feet just stay in better shape if I have periodic skilled mani-pedis. I don't ever get fake nails, but I have an extremely unhelpful non-dominant hand and I am a fat lady with long legs so any detail work on my feet has to be done by someone else's hands (and those spa chairs do a better, more comfortable foot soak than any of the furniture in my house does).

Also, as long as you're not weird about getting your feet touched, that's a really nice 45 minutes or so where you literally can't do anything else, except chat to a friend if you brought one, get a nice hot foot soak and perfunctory hand and foot rub, and feel a little pampered. The nicer nail mills will give you a glass of box wine or hot tea, too. I like going with a girlfriend, or even my husband periodically. It's an indulgence that's allowed for women, and I know a lot of women for whom the twice-a-month nail trip really is their only "me time", and it's only accessible to a lot of those women because the cost is so trivial.

I used to live near a decent family place and there was a certain period on late Saturday afternoons - a little too late for women who had other getting-ready-to-go-out tasks - where all 10 chairs would be dudes getting the Man Mani-Pedi Special (no foof, 15 minutes in-and-out, and apparently what you did was drop your car off next door at the hand-wash, get your nails done, and then go pick your car up) for going out and then going to church, or vice versa for those who were hitting the Saturday vigil instead of Sunday morning mass.

It's not a service without worth - just like haircuts and car washes, you could live without but most people have to tend to those chores occasionally. But they've been commoditized to the point that you can't stay in business if you do it legally and ethically.
posted by Lyn Never at 12:13 PM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


is there really that much of a qualitative difference in doing your own manicure, and keeping it straight?

Yes?

I have RA, holding the damned tools is just not in the cards. But even for able-bodied folk, sometimes the coordination is just not there. I don't pluck my own eyebrows, either. It's either pay the threader, or stab myself in the eye with tweezers.

But that's all really beside the point. I've been subject to WRITTEN policies requiring professional manicures, so.
posted by MissySedai at 12:21 PM on May 7, 2015 [8 favorites]


Ugh, no, no, no, no, no. If you damage a customer's property as one of the ordinary accidental hazards of doing your job, the company should pay for it.

Which is actually the law here in the Netherlands (barring some specific circumstances): the employee is never responsible for damage; their employer is.
posted by MartinWisse at 12:42 PM on May 7, 2015


I love doing my own nails. I think its because I don't do it inside (the fumes are too much) so I get to hang out outside for a bit. My secret (that I share with everyone) is that I do not try even in the slightest to paint inside the lines, which means my fingers usually end up with a significant amount of polish on them. The cool thing is though, if you wait a couple of hours and then do something like shower or bathe or something else that soaks your hands, the polish on my skin comes right off, easy peasy.

My best friend hates that I have polish all over my skin and so of course when I send her a pic of the finished nail job its always before the extra polish comes off.

Also, I never have been able to free-hand anything more complicated than just a single color. For more complicated things, tape is my best friend.
posted by LizBoBiz at 12:42 PM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


Hi! I actually MAKE indie nail polish - the quality between nail polishes is negligible. Some polishes do respond better to different people's body chemistry when it comes to chipping. But mostly, the 'quality' is generally all contained in the brush instead of the polish itself. Also, a base and top coat make all the difference.
posted by Windigo at 12:44 PM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


if you like to do your own nails - amazon sells seche products in huge quantities for a tiny amount of money. seche restore is one of the best products you can buy if you like to get a lot of nail polishes but hate when they dry out.
posted by nadawi at 12:51 PM on May 7, 2015 [3 favorites]


As if on cue, cavalcades of battered Ford Econoline vans grumble to the curbs, and the women jump in.

Man, this brings back memories. I have gotten on one of these vans before. Not the exact same situation, but similar enough. I was in a small city in the north of Massachusetts visiting relatives from Guatemala, and since I was spending some time with them I asked if I could maybe also do some of the under-the-table work on which they survived.

They called their "boss" and the next morning I was standing next to my auntie at 4:30 AM on the cold sidewalk, because the van's driver did not like to wait while people came out from their houses. We climbed into an old white Econoline among several other immigrants. Not a word of English was spoken in the van; the atmosphere was actually very jovial as the other riders were obviously well-acquainted.

We were actually the last people to climb in, after which the driver got on the interstate and drove straight north into New Hampshire. At roughly the break of dawn we arrived at a large warehouse in the middle of nowhere, deep in the New England wilderness. The business turned out to be an industrial laundry, the kind that washes large amounts of hotel and restaurant linens.

The mood in there was as somber as it was raucous in the van. I was the only newbie that day, and while everyone headed straight to their machines I was led to my own place in the machinery: a spot at a kitchen rag folding machine. Another Guatemalan was the machine's "operator", and as the de-facto leader of our 4-person team he explained --in Spanish-- what the job consisted of: Behind me was a large bin full of rags still warm from the dryer. I was to turn around, grab a rag, and quickly inspect it: Was it the same kind as the rest? Not too big or too small, same color? Not too dirty? A certain loosely-defined level of dirtiness was acceptable. Did it have too many holes? Were the holes too big? Again, inexact parameters roughly illustrated with a few examples. If the rag passed muster then I needed to place it properly on the conveyor belt that folded and placed it neatly on a stack of inspected rags.

Where the rags came from, or where they went to after my inspection, I did not know. I didn't need to know. All I needed to know was that I had to process at least 12 rags a minute in order not to be considered "too slow" if I wanted to be called back the next day. I did the math quickly: this was 5 seconds per rag. Shit. This was hard. I was doing roughly 5 rags per minute at first. It was harder than it looked, there were many decisions involved and the parameters were not what you would call clearly defined.

Still I soldiered on, in absolute silence as that's how everyone else worked. After maybe 2 hours it started to become automatic. You can imagine the tedium -- at some point I swear to you I felt something in my brain "click" and I was on machine-mode from then on. Like my brain just knew that it needed to shut off some functions if I was going to be able to do this goddamned repetitive task all day long. Turn around, grab rag: too big, too small, too dirty, too torn up? Yes, left bin. No, place carefully on the conveyor belt. Again! Quickly, you're being timed. Turn around, grab rag...

I'd like to say that I toughed it out and that I lasted longer than a week. Or that I never "broke character" and did not surprise a floor manager on day 2 by asking in English for a face mask --which nobody else wore-- to protect myself from inhaling the nasty dust that came off the rags. I, luckily, had a career I could return to back home. The same couldn't be said for my relatives, who have had no choice but to endure the same type of menial, below-minimum-wage bullshit job for well over a decade now.

At least even though I was a newb I still got paid more-or-less the same as everyone else, which was actually close to minimum wage at $8/hour or so at the time. I am not surprised to learn that things are worse for some of us these days. At least I had something to show for my few days of hard work. I did have to pay a hefty fee for transportation though, just like the other riders in that raucous van, chatting and joking, heading north to play our parts as cogs in the machine in that New Hampshire winter of 10 years ago...
posted by papafrita at 1:09 PM on May 7, 2015 [32 favorites]


I've never met a high-end saleswoman or realtor who didn't have a manicure; they shake hands and have people sign papers all day, how polished and professional they look is a big part of their job. (They tend to wear a lot of rings and bracelets too). My mom was a realtor and she didn't give up her fake nails, she kept them up till the day she died.
posted by emjaybee at 1:16 PM on May 7, 2015 [4 favorites]


patronizing an establishment which for many women is necessary for gender presentation so that they themselves don't get fired

Is this really a thing? There are professions where having a professional manicure/pedicure is REQUIRED? You can't even just paint your nails at home? I seem to be living more and more out of the world as I get older.
posted by JanetLand at 1:34 PM on May 7 [4 favorites +] [!]
In NYC? Yes, this is absolutely a thing. I have been working for a year to get my shitty at home manicure to look like "the real thing." I have had people at interviews tell me that I should "go get a manicure" before my next interview. This makes me a die a little inside because I cannot afford a manicure. I've done it three times in the past year, on days when the place by my apartment has a special (mani/pedi for $14, I only go when I can afford to tip at least $10). I see the ladies arrive to open the shop and they laugh and joke together.

I just learned a trick for dealing with streaky polish, that I am going to share here because it makes my life so much easier. And I sincerely believe that this improvement to my self care routine landed me the (better paying! but my commute is still an hour) job offer I received yesterday.

This is how it normally went for me:

Ok, so I have my base coat on and dry. Then I would apply my first coat of nail polish and it would look streaky. That's ok, because the second coat is supposed to look good. So I applied that, making sure to be patient but not too slow. And it still looked streaky. Damn. I guess it's going to be a third coat. Again, patient, steady hand. What the hell. Still streaky. In fact, there would be a noticeable texture from the brush bristles. Whatever, I've been working on this for an hour now. Just put the clear quick dry top coat on and go because I am late.

But NOW,

base coat
first coat of polish color
layer of Matte effect top coat
second coat of color
final top coat in whatever formula you like/have on hand

A few weeks ago I was starting to think that the problem was the age of my polish, since I haven't bought a new one since Christmas time. But I thought, before I go buy a bottle of nail polish thinner, let me see if there are other solutions to this issue. And sure enough, there was a youtube tutorial. Who knows how long that bottle of matte top coat has been kicking around with me, but it is amazing.
posted by bilabial at 2:14 PM on May 7, 2015 [14 favorites]


I have hardly ever had a manicure either. One thing I have to do at work is pick stickers off old books. I also do a lot of cooking.

I have always wondered about the economies of these salons and whether the manicurists get poisoned eventually from breathing the solvent fumes. If they weren't recent immigrants, I have fantasized about entire generations of families where (to represent cisgender stereotypes) the women paint nails and the boys and men build model airplanes and detail cars. Men tie fishing flies and women make earrings. The products you need are carefully differentiated, but remarkably similar. Tying flies is the only time cisgender men get to do things with pink marabou feathers and gilded, sparkly bits of metal.

The political economy of the nailcare industry, however, is much more global and brutal.
posted by bad grammar at 2:16 PM on May 7, 2015




I think what is up here is plain old human trafficking, the wonderful new modern iteration of slavery. There are two major forms of human trafficking, which are not mutually exclusive. There is sex trafficking, and there is labor trafficking, and what is happening in these nail salons is labor trafficking. Working for no or utterly inadequate pay is slavery. And the employers who exploit these workers are violating a lot of laws. Sadly, from what this article says, many of the obvious law violations, of wage and labor statutes, are clearly not being investigated or punished in any real way.

As usual it is heartening that the reaction of most MeFites is horror, but I'm in agreement that consumers can't solve this problem alone. Of course we can choose to not patronize establishments that offer a ridiculously low price for services, and make sure we really know the people who perform services for us, and ask questions, and spend our dollars with the employees who treat employees lawfully, but the real solution has to be broader. We all need, as citizens and voters, to support legislation and social action to fight human trafficking, and support full enforcement of labor and wage laws.

This article is a great case study of one regional industry, but there are plenty more that rely on trafficking, including the business entities that grow our food, process it, and serve it, as well as those that operate motels, hotels, and other hospitality companies.
posted by bearwife at 3:15 PM on May 7, 2015 [25 favorites]


My personal experience with nail salons has been my sister, who once owned one. It was only her, her husband and my nieces. The article was startling to me because I have not equated forced servitude with the nail salon industry but small proprietor owned. My niece is still in the business and she gets way more than minimum but then again, she can do hair in addition to everything else.
posted by jadepearl at 4:16 PM on May 7, 2015


I can paint my nails fine, but I am completely incapable of filing them so they're all the same shape. Luckily, I don't have a job where anyone cares about the state of my nails past them being clean and not raggedy, because I couldn't afford professional manicures where I live. Manicures cost at least twice as much out here in podunk as they do in New York, which is striking, because almost everything else is much cheaper here.

This was really excellent reporting by the Times, and I am especially glad that they made it available in multiple languages. I'm happy that it seems to be getting so much attention, because it vindicates the idea that people do want to read investigative reporting about on-the-ground economic stuff.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 4:40 PM on May 7, 2015 [1 favorite]


Dispiriting to see all of the NYT comments along the lines of "Immigrants have always started from the bottom, this is no different, no one is forcing them, maybe it's all they deserve/are capable of."

Almost as dispiriting as the self-serving bullshit the masters dish out: "you don't know how hard it is to run a small business/why should I pay them while I train them/I charge a 'deposit' when I train them in a new skill so they won't take their new talents to another shop."

People can learn to justify any kind of inhumane treatment if it makes them a buck.
posted by etherist at 6:36 PM on May 7, 2015 [7 favorites]


I'm not really sure what the solution is. In an ideal world, the government would force all the establishments to pay a living wage, all the workers would be wealthier, and nobody would lose their jobs. Of course, that's not how things work in real life. The only reason so many of these nail salons can exist is because their costs are dirt cheap. If prices are raised across the board, many of these nail salons would go out of business.

The article points out the relative wealth of a few owners, but this is honestly a red herring that's just pandering to people's sense of inequality. That's how small businesses work; they either tend to be highly profitable for the owner, or a disaster that leaves them in debt. In an ideal world, the owners would share as much of the profits with the workers as possible. But in reality, when divided among all the workers, that would still probably not amount to much of a pay increase, and if forced to do so I suspect most owners would not even bother running the business. Sure, some of the owners are driving around in Benzes, but I'm sure a lot of them have huge debts and are barely scraping by. And that doesn't even count the ones who went out of business.

Should customers tip more? Sure, but it won't fix the problem. There is only a fixed amount of money that people are willing to spend on nails. If you usually paid $20 and now you pay $60, it doesn't matter whether that extra $40 is coming from you tipping or the owner charging more. Either way, you probably get your nails done less often. And the owner is most likely stealing the tips.

In the end, it boils down to what we want to allow in our society vs. what the workers are willing to put up with. Let's say we enforce pay and labor regulations, most of the nail salons shut down, and the ones that are left pay high wages and treat their workers well. That's great, but what about all the people who lose their jobs? Most of them are here illegally and don't have many other options. Presumably since they're still here, they would prefer working long hours for low wages rather than going back to their home countries. So it boils down to: do we let them make their own choice, or do we make that choice for them? It's really a question of how much immigration we want to allow, if at all, and being a second-gen American that honestly makes me queasy - because it's one of the few issues where I've seen nominally liberal, progressive people suddenly start sounding very right-wing.
posted by pravit at 8:13 PM on May 7, 2015 [2 favorites]


Part two is up. It's about health hazards that the to workers.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 4:55 AM on May 8, 2015 [2 favorites]


Ms. Otavalo, a 39-year-old Ecuadorean immigrant, was usually stationed at the first table. She trimmed and buffed and chatted about her quick-witted toddler, or her strapping 9-year-old boy. But she never spoke of another dreamed-for child, the one lost last year in a miscarriage that began while she was giving a customer a shoulder massage.

At the second table was Monica A. Rocano, 30, who sometimes brought a daughter to visit. But clients had never met her 3-year-old son, Matthew Ramon. People thought Matthew was shy, but in fact he has barely learned how to speak and can walk only with great difficulty.

A chair down from Ms. Rocano was another, quieter manicurist. In her idle moments, she surfed the Internet on her phone, seeking something that might explain the miscarriage she had last year. Or the four others that came before.

Similar stories of illness and tragedy abound at nail salons across the country, of children born slow or “special,” of miscarriages and cancers, of coughs that will not go away and painful skin afflictions. The stories have become so common that older manicurists warn women of child-bearing age away from the business, with its potent brew of polishes, solvents, hardeners and glues that nail workers handle daily.

A growing body of medical research shows a link between the chemicals that make nail and beauty products useful — the ingredients that make them chip-resistant and pliable, quick to dry and brightly colored, for example — and serious health problems.


Just in case Part I wasn't horrifying enough.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 5:33 AM on May 8, 2015 [5 favorites]


Part II is actually, in a sense, much more hopeful. At the end of Part I, you're left kind of wondering what you could possibly do to improve the situation of the workers. Part II covers a clear failure of regulation, which some people are trying to fix. Government agencies have very little oversight of the cosmetics industry, which essentially self-regulates. There are harmful substances that are illegal in Europe and Australia but are widely used in American nail care products. You can call the Personal Care Products Council, the industry lobbying group, and tell them that you're horrified by their efforts to curtail regulation of their industry, and you can call your representatives and tell them that you support efforts for strict oversight of the chemicals in cosmetics. If you're in California, you can seek out one of the nail salons that the state recognizes as a "healthy nail salon."

I'm going to go back through and see if there's a good organization that's advocating for better regulation. They mention the Breast Cancer Fund, and their webpage mentions that they co-founded the Campaign For Safe Cosmetics, but they seem to be more involved in pressuring individual companies to clean up their cosmetics, which doesn't seem likely to be effective here. This is a failure of government oversight, and it has to be changed with new regulations and new regulatory authority.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 5:46 AM on May 8, 2015 [4 favorites]


I'm going to go to work and show this to my colleagues who work in biomonitoring and see if we can get some initial traction on studying the health of salon workers in our area.
posted by entropone at 6:03 AM on May 8, 2015 [13 favorites]


For people living in California and asking what they can do, Part 2 has a link to an initiative where participating salons offer better working conditions.

Also, a San Francisco focused effort by the city, and one in San Mateo.

PDF guide by the CA Healthy Nail Salons initiative on better practices for nail professionals, which would be helpful to consumers in assessing their local salons.
posted by joyceanmachine at 6:32 AM on May 8, 2015 [8 favorites]


Thanks for posting Major Matt Mason Dixon, well written and eye opening and all around disturbing. Puts some perspective on my "problems" this morning.
posted by whitetigereyes at 6:48 AM on May 8, 2015


Sounds like someone could knock up an app that uses Google maps API for locating and ranking non-exploitative nail shops from user reviews and other information, such as the initiative joyceanmachine mentions.

Previous articles on this subject from 2010, 2011, 2012, and 2013.
posted by asok at 6:50 AM on May 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


So wait, does this mean that when my mother thirty years ago told me if I used nail polish I would have health issues, she was actually right?
posted by corb at 9:13 AM on May 8, 2015


It seems like the scale of exposure from painting your own nails (even daily!) is very different from anything salon workers would be exposed to. I've slacked on my own mother's advice to always open a window, though; I might start doing that again now.

I wonder how similar the risks of exposure to other chemicals used for beauty procedures are, like the brazilian blowout/japanese straightening chemicals or even hair dye?
posted by R a c h e l at 9:17 AM on May 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


My curls-only hairdresser is a huge hippie by her own admission, but over the course of about 4 years she
a) stopped working in salons with nail services
b) stopped using any color except one specific organic brand
c) stopped doing color at all, and stopped coloring her own hair
d) already didn't use products with silicones (that's a curl thing) but stopped using all but a handful of low-fragrance lines of products

The big impetus for her was what she felt like was a real quick ramp-up in her incidences of dermatitis, colds/respiratory infections, headaches, and things like that after the birth of her daughter. And then she just started thinking "what am I bringing home on my clothes and skin and touching her with?" and decided to bail. She already hated perms and similar, just from knowing how they work and how harsh they were on her hands and towels and capes and stuff.

She said the varicose veins were an occupational hazard she was prepared for but the rest stopped being okay anymore.

I think I got acrylic nails 3-4 times before I realized I was sitting, unmasked, across from a woman in a mask who spent all day every day creating airborne acrylic particulate with a Dremel, and how generally gross the air was with 5-6 women all Dremeling acrylic powder into the air constantly. It was too creepy to keep doing, and I was also terrible at having long nails.
posted by Lyn Never at 9:28 AM on May 8, 2015


The larger beauty organizations in the US and Europe have been focusing on health risks to salon workers and customers for several decades. The PBA is one of the largest. They lobby at a federal, state and local level for better labor practices against many hazards, potentially including working with various chemicals in hair products, artificial hair color and nail treatments as well as the high frequency of carpal tunnel / repetitive stress injuries common to stylists. These organizations and the trade magazines that cater to the professional beauty industry (ex. Modern Salon, American Salon, Beauty Launchpad, Nails, etc.,) also try to educate salon workers and help them stay healthy.

This is also why in recent decades, beauty product companies have tried very hard to eliminate ingredients from their formulas that might be problematic. In nail polish, the three big ones are Toluene, Formaldehyde and Dibutyl Phthalate (DBP). Formaldehyde is a known carcinogen. DBP has been linked to fertility issues in pregnant women. Large concentrations of toluene have been shown to affect the nervous system.

The industry can be extremely lucrative. And dangerous when unregulated. It's good to see someone paying attention to those who aren't being reached by industry initiatives. Those on the lowest rungs, so to speak.
posted by zarq at 9:35 AM on May 8, 2015


What a weird comment, zarq. Did you read the piece? The PBA, the industry lobbying group, doesn't come off well in it. And your comment makes me wonder if you have some sort of stake in the industry!
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 9:44 AM on May 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


And your comment makes me wonder if you have some sort of stake in the industry!

I'm only about a third of the way through the second article. Haven't gotten to the end. Didn't realize the PBA was mentioned later on. (Or maybe I missed it?)

In the past, I've worked in the industry. However, I'm not a salon or spa worker and have never worked in one. Have attended a lot of conferences/conventions over the last 20 years, such as the Cosmoprof, IBS and Premiere shows. I have sometimes sat in on safety and health oriented classes in those shows, produced by various distributors, manufacturers etc., aimed at professional colorists, stylists or manicurists. It's been several years, though.

In that respect I am knowledgeable.

I don't have a "stake" though. Professional, financial, or otherwise.
posted by zarq at 9:57 AM on May 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


Didn't realize the PBA was mentioned later on.

PBA, and the distributors and manufacturers, are all featured as orgs determined to whitewash problems, stonewall attempts at reform, and uninterested in implementing updated standards. They say they are interested in safety, but their conduct as described by this investigation portrays them as much more invested in portraying themselves as interested in safety while continuing to enable unsafe practices.
posted by a fiendish thingy at 10:03 AM on May 8, 2015 [3 favorites]


PBA, and the distributors and manufacturers, are all featured as orgs determined to whitewash problems, stonewall attempts at reform, and uninterested in implementing updated standards. They say they are interested in safety, but their conduct as described by this investigation portrays them as much more invested in portraying themselves as interested in safety while continuing to enable unsafe practices.

Thanks for clarifying. Yeah, that's not at all surprising.

Also worth noting that the classes offered at various industry conventions aren't aimed at the lowest tier of salon workers -- the ones who are clearly being mistreated and exploited. It costs money to go to those events and take classes. They're not offered for free. (Visitor packages for Cosmoprof North America range from about $50 to hundreds of dollars, and then classes often cost money on top of that.) A challenging hurdle for people working horrible hours, making less than minimum wage and who may have poor English skills.
posted by zarq at 10:14 AM on May 8, 2015


Based on that acrid smell that gives me a headache after twenty minutes, I somewhat suspected but didn't know the true extent of physical danger involved with working regularly in the average nail salon. I've been to a ton of these places and in thinking hard about it, only once or twice did I see an employee expected to wear any semblance of physical protection (mask, gloves) from the chemicals in use. Who knows if that's even enough defense against the materials used in nail maintenance performed day in and day out? I suppose it's not surprising that long-term employees of these shops regularly experience repeated miscarriage or cancer they wouldn't have otherwise faced, to the point that doctors as a group have noticed a freakin' trend.

It upsets me to see privileged, middle-class feminists like myself saying "well, patriarchy hurts us all" as an excuse to continue participating in a system that evidently exploits its economically vulnerable, largely female workers to the point of miscarriage, cancer and early death. The response to this piece should not be to throw up one's hands and say, "women will get fired for not performing gender and the salon employees will get deported if I don't keep getting a $20 mani-pedi". Doing so reinforces the status quo. Reducing the demand for this industry might result in a net good for other women or it could likely end up worse with employees exploited in some other way, but it wouldn't be what happens presently, and what's happening at present should not continue to happen.

With the facts laid out before me, it's obvious to me that this particular way in which I spend money in search of a little stress relief hurts other women. I know that I can't contribute toward a fix for this political issue beyond contributing my vote. But I can – and will from now on – withdraw my contribution to demand for an industry that exploits women by causing them actual physical harm. I can relieve stress and perform gender in some other way. They can't get new bodies.
posted by theraflu at 10:21 AM on May 8, 2015 [15 favorites]




corb: "So wait, does this mean that when my mother thirty years ago told me if I used nail polish I would have health issues, she was actually right?"

Are you making light of the plight of the women featured in these pieces, or are you not grasping the difference between your experience and theirs? These workers are exposed to harsh chemicals and particulate matter 12 hours a day, six days a week. That's not in any way comparable to the occasional coat of polish you might find yourself using.
posted by Conrad Cornelius o'Donald o'Dell at 9:21 PM on May 8, 2015 [10 favorites]


I've never had a manicure, partly because the stink of chemicals that wafts out of those shops and the sight of young women bending over feet is not at all appealing, but also because as a library worker my hands are tools to sling big dusty books and binders. To consider my nails during the course of my work duties would be to hinder the effectiveness of my tools.

So it's really disheartening to read that a nice pair of nails is often necessary as part of the presentation of a professional. I'm interviewing for jobs, not necessarily in library work. I'm competent, dedicated, educated, and experienced. Now I have to consider this? My goodness, I thought a haircut and a suit would be sufficient.
posted by goofyfoot at 10:12 PM on May 8, 2015 [1 favorite]


I think that in New York, having manicured nails is pretty much expected of most women, and having non-manicured nails might read as un-professional. But I think that expectation can only exist because of the exploitation discussed in the articles, which makes possible the really cheap manicure. In other parts of the country, where manicures are more expensive, they're really considered luxuries, and in most industries you wouldn't need to get manicures to be considered professionally dressed. (There are probably some exceptions, but they're industries that put a high premium on appearance in general.) Probably, New York is going to have to become more like the rest of the country, and people are going to have to let go of the expectation that manicures are a standard part of female grooming.
posted by ArbitraryAndCapricious at 7:48 AM on May 9, 2015


I think that in New York, having manicured nails is pretty much expected of most women, and having non-manicured nails might read as un-professional.

I've lived in NYC for over 20 years, and have not found this to be true of "most women." Some professions, yes, but I've been in social services and legal services and it certainly wasn't true in either of those.
posted by Mavri at 3:47 PM on May 9, 2015




i hope to god they follow this : The agencies involved in the task force do not inquire about workers’ immigration status as part of their investigations, the governor’s office said.
posted by nadawi at 7:09 AM on May 11, 2015




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