He has more people to take care of. Alice only has one dependent, Flo and Vera had no dependents so all their money was for them. The man on the otherhand was the head of household and had to feed not only the wife but the kids. Not sure why Alice couldnt understand that

And he was only getting 15 cents more:lol:

In the 1977 episode of Alice titled "86 the Waitresses", Mel Sharples hires a new waiter named Kenny and pays him more than Alice, Flo, and Vera.
While your memory of Mel’s logic captures the era’s "head of household" sentiment, the episode actually highlights the unfairness of this double standard:

The Pay Gap: According to the script, Kenny was actually being paid 25 cents more per hour than the women, not 15 cents.

The "Logic": Mel justifies the higher pay by claiming that "men need more money" because they are providers.

The Conflict: Alice finds this reasoning absurd precisely because she is a head of household—a widow raising her son, Tommy, on her own.

The Result: When Mel refuses to match their pay, Alice leads the others in quitting, eventually forcing Mel to realize he can't run the diner without them.

In the 1977 episode of Alice titled "86 the Waitresses", Mel Sharples hires a new waiter named Kenny and pays him more than Alice, Flo, and Vera.
While your memory of Mel’s logic captures the era’s "head of household" sentiment, the episode actually highlights the unfairness of this double standard:

The Pay Gap: According to the script, Kenny was actually being paid 25 cents more per hour than the women, not 15 cents.

The "Logic": Mel justifies the higher pay by claiming that "men need more money" because they are providers.

The Conflict: Alice finds this reasoning absurd precisely because she is a head of household—a widow raising her son, Tommy, on her own.

The Result: When Mel refuses to match their pay, Alice leads the others in quitting, eventually forcing Mel to realize he can't run the diner without them.


The man still had more people to support. The wife and kids needs. Alice only had one dependent. The same way a woman with kids gets more money back after taxes versus someone who is single

While I usually always sided with Alice, Vera and Flo/Belle/Jolene, there were times I thought they were unreasonable, like then they made such a fuss about Mel putting in a timeclock, I mean HELLO, what business doesn't require you to clock in and out? :rolleyes: No matter how "family-like" a business is, I've never seen one that doesn't keep record of your hours. Now of course when Mel wanted to exploit their labor by not paying them overtime when they worked during their days off, brought be back to the waitresses side, but just having a timeclock shouldn't have been an issue

While I usually always sided with Alice, Vera and Flo/Belle/Jolene, there were times I thought they were unreasonable, like then they made such a fuss about Mel putting in a timeclock, I mean HELLO, what business doesn't require you to clock in and out? :rolleyes: No matter how "family-like" a business is, I've never seen one that doesn't keep record of your hours. Now of course when Mel wanted to exploit their labor by not paying them overtime when they worked during their days off, brought be back to the waitresses side, but just having a timeclock shouldn't have been an issue

Yeah you definitely can not pay over time lol