I knew a woman who worked on cruise ships and she said staff had really awful below decks rooms but the food was good. She didn’t make much money either, but didn’t care, just wanted to see the world.
And another woman reportedly sold her home to live on cruise ships for the rest of her life. That was years ago. No clue whether current employees will ever get paid. Passenger refunds? Good luck with that.
I read one of the reasons cruises offer really great amenities like teams of helpful wait staff,
who do housekeeping and laundry, etc, is that they recruit help from very poor countries.
They pay the help something like $2 per hour plus food and a room......which they are glad to get.