Cute! Now if only you could show that a minimum wage increase in small levels is a good thing, as one vitamin is. Otherwise, you're still proving your idiocy here.
POLL: $15 Minimum Wage
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Cute! Now if only you could show that a minimum wage increase in small levels is a good thing, as one vitamin is. Otherwise, you're still proving your idiocy here.
So why do you want to encourage them to do less? Minimum wage teaches people that no matter how hard they work, they are going to get paid. The more we give them, to do the minimum, that more that lesson is driven home.
Right now, if I could pay entry level HS kids what their job is worth ($6-$7) an hour as opposed to $8.25 I would be able to pay my key people more ($12-$13). If HS kid comes in and works hard, doesn't just do the minimum, more money will come their way. As it stands now, and especially with a nonsensical number like $15 an hour, a kid learns that no matter what they do or how hard they work, they are going to get paid $15 an hour and there isn't anything anyone can do about it. They dont' like cleaning toilets, quit and move on down to the next one. Instead of seeing that if you do a good job, you will get paid more.
You also seem to think that welfare is going to go away if minimum wage increases. Which tells me you really have no idea how inflation works, and what an increase like this will do to prices, and that a certain segment of society wants to work but they simply don't believe the current minimum wage is enough, and as soon as it is higher they will magically have a desire to put in 40 hours a week instead of watching TV all day. Not going to happen.
Thats a point for raising the wage. It's fun that you need to characterize people who work for a living as freeloading losers.
Easy, I described the situation as I would make it. Workers get above poverty level wages. Welfare provides a base level similar to what prisoners get. We're all just pontificating about how we would like the world to be. In my world, the min wage increase would cut welfare.
You could have carve outs for apprentiships for you to train HS kids, but HS kids shouldn't dictate public policy on living wages for adults. If you have a job that you need an adult to do, then pay them an adult wage or find a new business model. Maybe you could get all your pizzas made in a factory and frozen and delivered via a drone and not pay any wages. That minimum wage might turn you into a billionaire. If you make it happen, I want free pizza for life. Business will adapt, but my plan rewards labor and makes workers self sufficient.
It's even more fun that you think paying people more, by government mandate, for doing the same work, or even less, is going to improve the whole situation. You know what it does? It makes it worse and the proof of that is we have to continue to raise the minimum wage all the time. The wage amount is not the problem. Recognize the problem and stop treating symptoms.
That's not even remotely a good analogy. C'mon, now. We all want people to be able to survive. Again, I think you're blaming the business owners for trying to make a better profit. It's not that simple and not all business owners are crooks. You have to address monetary policy as well and none of you wants to do that. Keep jacking-up that wage by mandate and you'll just keep having to do it over and over and over and over. You're never treating the disease, only the symptoms.
If they want $15 an hour for flipping burgers they are losers. Too bad none of them felt so strong about school when they had the chance. I outlined my solution. It helps those who first help themselves.
You start paying $15 an hour two things will happen. College educated people will pick up a four hour shift on a Saturday to supplement their retirement or hobby. Taking away jobs from the those that can't do anything else.
Second thing is companies will hire less people and expect more which means the bottom feeders will be passed over by those who will go the extra mile.
Another thing is smart people will eat out less and stop doing other activities tied to minimum wage workers because it will cost a small fortune. Which I think Seattle found out the hard way.
You guys that are insisting on raising the minimum wage to $15... do you just want to keep raising it every 2-5 years, or every 6 weeks even? Is that what your solution is going to be for this every time? The solution is just raise the wage higher again and again and again?
It's not intended to be a living wage for adults. It's a minimum wage for an entry level job. And increasing it handucffs what a business can pay more skilled workers. HS kids ARE dictating what adults are making. For every HS kid I hire to answer a phone, bus tables, do dishes, clean a bathroom, at an artificial wage, an adult on staff wage suffers. Can I spell this out any different for you? People that work hard and do a good job, take on more responsibility would make more if entry level jobs weren't at a forced wage that is higher than what the market dictates. I'd be interested in your profession because your thoughts on how the free market works are quite backwards.
Okay... you're officially disqualified. Cure the disease, don't treat the symptoms. Familiarize yourself with monetary policy. Or, better yet, just remain here arguing with others who don't understand it either and it will continue to circle the drain.
So you want to raise the minimum wage to an outrageous level then replace people with machines to do the non-skilled labor that is currently being done by minimum wage workers? I'm sure half the workers at MN.HAWK's food joint that get fired are going to love that proposal!
Don't think for a second that Taco Bell and McDonalds wouldn't replace half their staff with a touchscreen if min wage went up to $15. Pretty sure you can already order with an app from Taco Bell.
Natural has no problem robbing from people as long as he believes he's giving to other people. He's still stealing, but his conscience is laid to rest at least. He THINKS he's stealing from the wealthy, but he's stealing from average citizens. Here's the main lesson, Natural: YOU CANNOT STEAL FROM THE WEALTHY! Okay? Got it? That's how they got to be wealthy!
That might be your intention, but it is mine. and we can address HS kids separately. If you want that phone job to go to a 16 year old at $6 an hour, turn it into an internship. Problem solved. The HS argument is a red herring, we set policy based on the needs of adult workers then you tinker with exceptions.
No. You are wrong. You don't just get to turn a job into an internship. What planet do you live on?
Oh, no. I don't grant that making above the poverty level is outrageously valuing labor. I can't believe you bought into that argument yourself. And why would I be against innovation? Are you suggesting we try to stall technology so that more people can flip burgers? Learn to value people more.
Of course you could do that. If we are putting together a bill to raise the minimum wage you just slip an amendment into it exempting HS kids and outline other policy tweaks. We could even put an amendment in there that allows an employer to count any welfare received as paid wages or if you are afraid people will double dip. This isn't that hard, we can imagine any sort of compromise system we like. My base value is that an adult working full time should make over the poverty level.
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Honestly, an increase in minimum wage in our current system is going to drive more automation and push more people out of work. An increase of 50% in the justification of automation will definitely cause a surge in automation. Perhaps I'm a socialist, but I think the minimum wage argument is very poorly thought through by the Dems. It WILL put more people on the unemployment lines. I would lean towards a single payer system which provides a living wage income for anyone willing to put in 40 hours per week. I would even increase the government kick-in for people with dependents. The wage paid by the employer could remain at $7.50 an hour, but the government would kick in the rest to make up for the short fall of what it would take to provide for the BARE necessities (food, clothing, water, shelter (150 sq ft per person or so)).
NAFTA was horrible for this country and so is our current trading situation with Asia. We have outsourced the middle class jobs and then wonder what happened to them. Ultimately, we found that we could manufacture and ship products and goods cheaper than what we could built them for here. As a result, the jobs went and products got less expensive. People bought the less expensive and the goods made here dried up. Having worked in the appliance industry for years I saw many a plant close simply because the labor rates were too high to be competitive with Asia/Mexico. You literally could not make a profit building in a mature competitive market with US labor rates. Capitalism did what it does. It seeks to maximize its profit for its shareholders. If not, the shareholders will go to the companies that will.
I'm not even slightly blaming business owners for wanting to make a profit. I'm just saying that full-time workers should be able to enjoy a decent (if frugal) lifestyle on the wages they earn.
Setting a minimum wage (and adjusting it to keep pace with cost of living) is simply setting one of the market parameters. Businesses that compete in that market will adjust. It's like the 40 hour work week, or requiring safe working conditions, or banning child labor. Or building public roads and running public power lines. Each of those sets a market parameter. And businesses adjust. Sometimes (as with public roads and public sewer and water) businesses are delighted that they don't have to foot the entire bill on their own. Other times the benefit goes a different direction.
We could get rid of all those market constraints. But most of us think those are good ideas that produce more benefit for more Americans than eliminating them. Minimum wage fits in with the others.
The problem we have with the minimum wage is not that America would be better off without it, and not that $15 would be too high (although I personally favor a lower number) but that at $7.25 it amounts to official permission to exploit human beings. You probably don't agree, but that seems obvious to me.
If we are going to have a minimum wage - and that battle has been fought and correctly decided in my opinion - what should it be? I consider 2 criteria to be obvious:
-- it should be enough for a full-time worker to live on (I like natural's wording on this, so check what he says);
-- it should significantly reduce (if not eliminate) the need for welfare for folks without special needs.
I imagine you agree that those simple criteria make sense. The first is merely reasonable. Try stating it the other way around. "People who work full time should not make enough to live on." Nobody is buying that as a reasonable statement. Sure, maybe for trainees for a brief interval, or something like that. But only a monster would say that's reasonable in any general sense. And the second is an argument for efficiency and actually encourages work over welfare.
I've asked this before, but how many ADULTS that work 40 hours per week are really making minimum wage?
My position is very, VERY few. If you are willing to put in 40 hours and can show up on time, clean/sober, you'll do better than minimum wage.
My position is very, VERY few. If you are willing to put in 40 hours and can show up on time, clean/sober, you'll do better than minimum wage.
No to minimum wage.
What I could be talked into is a tax on the true 1 percenters gross income. Give that money directly to everybody else that works 32 hours a week or more.
The true problem is the wealth gap. The super rich simply can't spend enough to drive the economy.
What I could be talked into is a tax on the true 1 percenters gross income. Give that money directly to everybody else that works 32 hours a week or more.
The true problem is the wealth gap. The super rich simply can't spend enough to drive the economy.
Minimum wage laws make 'criminals' of employers who have engaged in a mutually agreed upon contract for 1 cent less than the dictator's edict. Call it for what it really is...an unemployment bill.
Jan Helfeld is AMAZING! I have seen him grill one sold-out politician after another and he just OWNS them! They really show just how evasive and corrupt they are when he gets them to sit still.
Here is one of my all-time favorites:
I fail to see how this is correcting or even helping those 2 criteria. We still have both of them in abundance and you've been raising it over and over for decades.
You mentioned to "keep up with the cost of living." NOW, you're getting closer to where the problem really lies! Inflation tied-in with a horrifically-skewed monetary policy. That problem is rooted entirely in monetary policy, inflation, our currency and how it's regulated, debased, and even created. Until you remove the Federal Reserve, this is really a futile discussion. Creating "money" out of thin air, monetizing debt to back our currency, charging the US Government and it's people interest on their own currency forces the costs of EVERYTHING to rise and rise and rise. The commodities and services themselves, never change intrinsically. This entire problem rests on monetary policy and the failure of Keynesian economics.
Yes, getting the MW to a living wage is only part of the answer. Keeping it there is the other part.
It's like fixing broken windows in the winter. Fixing some of them is better than not, but won't fully keep you from being cold.
I don't want to get into yet another debate about the Fed here. You and I both have problems with the Fed, even if we don't fully agree.
As for Keynesian economics, it's merely an economic approach that works for some things and some circumstances - and (as far as I can tell) has nothing to do with the minimum wage.
MW should be a state / city issue and the federal government should step aside. All states and all cities within states are not created equal when it comes to cost of living. If the goal is a living wage then lets set it in the places people live.
I don't want people getting the shaft and being forced to live below a poverty level because their job doesn't pay well. I doubt anyone does. I don't really think your similes are really accurate (to me, anyway). I appreciate that you're trying. If there were some formula that would stabilize the whole thing, then it might be more feasible. I'm not sure that is possible. There are variables all the time that are making PEOPLE obsolete, too!
I still say that devaluation of the currency plays an enormous role in this whole thing.
No.
The immediate fix is to get the MW up to a reasonable level. People can disagree on what that amount is, but everyone understands that it hasn't even come close to keeping up with cost of living increases over the last several decades.
Once we've gotten it to a reasonable level, whatever that is, the "solution" is to peg it to cost of living increases. We already calculate that for a variety of things, so that shouldn't be a problem.
Part of the problem that worries businessmen like MN.Hawk is that we are attempting to play catchup. It's like giving a dehydrated person lots of water. He needs it, but give it too fast and you can cause harm. If the MW had been on a sensible COLA scheme, he would have already adapted.
Which is why I suggest that there ought to be programs to help businessmen get over the hump. Yes, that could cost money. But then we end up with workers getting more reasonable compensation and good businesses not going under in the process. That's worth spending some money in the short term.
Sounds good, but that's already available to states and localities. Nobody is stopping them from setting their own MW above the federal level. How well has that worked?
The best approach - for this and many other things - seems to be a national baseline that states can build upon. Which is what we have. But the baseline is too low and the states and localities are shirking their part of the bargain.
Alternatively, a national baseline with regional adjustments based on local wages and cost of living.
I think the national baseline is why the MW has lagged as much as it has. I could say the same about your argument on how well has this worked - how well has it worked with a federal baseline? This issue would be addressed faster on a state or local level without the cover of the "Federal Wage" for politicians to fall back on.
There are areas within states that need a higher wage than other areas in a state based on cost of living and that is the same problem that the national baseline faces - San Francisco compared to Modesto, Seattle compared to the interior of Washington state.
When the Fair Labor Standards Act was past I think the federal government was needed to get a standard set I just don't feel the federal government is needed now to maintain one.
There are areas within states that need a higher wage than other areas in a state based on cost of living and that is the same problem that the national baseline faces - San Francisco compared to Modesto, Seattle compared to the interior of Washington state.
When the Fair Labor Standards Act was past I think the federal government was needed to get a standard set I just don't feel the federal government is needed now to maintain one.
Minimum wage jobs are filled by individuals with minimum useful job skills. If we were to raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour what do you think the guy who currently makes $15 an hour would need to have? Wage inflation would work it's way up through the entire employment chain until eventually the $15 an hour minimum wage earner would once again be right back where he is now. The only solution is for these individuals to develop useful/marketable job skills......
I think I agree with this.
Minimum wage is, what, $16k/year right now? What's cheap housing, $5k/year? Most taxes should wash, food another what, $3k? Certainly doesn't leave a lot, but one certainly survives, until they have children.
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