Higher Minimum Wages
cincybearcat
Posts: 16,492
http://news.enquirer.com/apps/pbcs.dll/article?AID=/20070330/BIZ01/303300033
When you add all the price increases I wonder if people making making more money is really giving them any more in their pockets.
When you add all the price increases I wonder if people making making more money is really giving them any more in their pockets.
hippiemom = goodness
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...are those who've helped us.
Right 'round the corner could be bigger than ourselves.
when it hits you, you feel to pain.
So brutalize me with music.”
~ Bob Marley
So you have to spend money to make money? I have and never will buy into the higher education thing. Sure it is there, but it is truly biased. Somehow I think the person who is coming out of school knows all of about nothing of the company they are going in to. But hey, they have an education for all that is worth. And yes I know that companies look for the already molded crew over somebody with just a normal view and brains. Just my two cents on a way to say education is the way to go.
All higher education does is show you are willing to make a long-term commitment (even longer for some) and follow it through. You do gain some valuable information regarding how you learn best and how you work best, which will ultimately help you down the line.
What would a company like in it's employees?
Dedication, foloow-through, loyalty, and a base from which to grow. College education gives you that.
BUt back to min. wage....it is yet another meaningless item that some politicans latch to to make you think they are 'For the People' 'For the little guy'. It's lazy government.
I hear ya Cinici....
As for the min wage and what is has to offer. It seems to me that the rate of inflation would and will offset any gains on having the wage go up.
Raising the minimum wage is like going to a dance club that lets you in for free.....they will raise the price of drinks to make up for the reduction in cover charges, so you end up spending just as much....you still leave with empty pockets.
Employment is a game, the rules basically say to make more money take a risk and go into business for yourself or get a professional deignation or a certified trades ticket. The rules won't change in my life time so I don't bother trying to fight them.
when it hits you, you feel to pain.
So brutalize me with music.”
~ Bob Marley
A degree or professional designation shows that someone has met standard, sometime minimum, requirements. This will get someone into a profession, but they will have to show more then minimum performance to progress.
perhaps they have it wrong...they should lower wages, so everything will be less expensive...
anyhoo, perhaps companies can look to lower costs elsewhere...just a thought...
Here's a crazy idea: allow the market to determine prices and dictate what should be "more expensive" and what should be "less expensive". But that would largely preclude people from being able to consume more than they produce, and we certainly couldn't allow that, could we?
whatever...
how about lowering everyone's wages, so things are less expensive...that's how it works....right..?
Yes. If you forcibly lowered everyone's wages, prices would be forced to follow in a similar manner to the way they rise when you forcilby raise wages. But forcibly lowering wages is just as stupid as forcibly raising them -- either way you are eroding the links between wages, value, and prices or, more aptly, pretending those links don't exist.
As much as I believe in a market-driven economy, there will always be a certain percentage of society that needs some help from the government. Lowering the minimum wage would just make more people eligible for government transfer payments.
As true as it is that people need to learn to survive for themselves, etc, lowering minimum wage would just make the divide between rich and poor that much wider.
Even if someone is against government assistance, they need to recognize that society as a whole suffers if the disenfranchised population continues to grow.
you're talking greek to me...
I thought the article posted pointed at the rise in minimum wages as the sole reason the cost of hamburger rising by 10 cents...
so there's more to it...hmmm...
I wonder, won't those other factors simply work out everything in the long run...?
So we should force individuals to suffer the costs of a minimum wage to prevent them from suffering the costs of welfare or public assistance? And there's no possible alternative to this?
Ok. Can you help me understand something? Why is it that people always damn the rich about the income value gap between rich and poor, but damn the poor about the labor value gap between rich and poor? How can the first be immoral, but the latter not be?
I don't deal in bribes. Sorry.
Your labor has a value. That value is measured by the value of your labor's output to someone else. If you simply raise the price of your labor, you don't magically raise the value of that output. With me so far?
Of course there's "more to it". The minimum wage isn't the only factor in pricing. In the case of a hamburger joint, the minimum wage might be one of the primary factors in pricing and a $.10 increase in the minimum wage might very well map to a $.10 increase in prices. However, in the economy as a whole, the minimum wage is typically a tertiary factor in prices. So overall a $.10 increase in the minimum wage leads to a $.04 increase in prices.
Not really, no. It's why you constantly have to raise the minimum wage. You're paying people a value greater than the value of their labor. That in turn allows people to consume more than they produce. A large part of their consumption is paid for by nothing more than paper without any appreciable labor to back it. This decreases the value of the money supply and contributes to inflation, in turn raising prices for everyone.
I appreciate your positions, which make perfect sense.
But, if the underclass population continues to grow, do you think that those people could one day revolt (in terms of violence, crime, etc), and thus, diminish your quality of life?
As an far-out analogy, imagine if you had neighbors who refused to cut their lawns, maintain their property, etc., and thus, it lessened the property value/ appeal of your neighborhood. Would you take any action?
Obviously, it is up to your neighbors to maintain their property, but if they refused, would you help them out so that you home would not lose property value?
Sure. But I also think the same people could revolt through political means and also diminish my qualitiy of life. Welfare, the minimum wage, universal health care, etc, are little different to me than basic armed robbery. The only difference is that the former is more orderly than the latter. And the mindsets and desires behind them are not going to go away regardless of what bribes we pay. The lists of demands and complaints will simply get longer and more shrill and, eventually, something will have to give.
No. Hence the word their. The suburban drive to maximize property values through the minimizations of individual freedoms are just as corrupt as the urban drive to maximize incomes through the minimizations of individual freedoms.
When I was shopping for my current house, I refused to entertain any home or property subject to restrictive covenant. I wish I had the same freedoms when shopping for a government.
In some cases, yes. But I would help them out through actions correctly classified as "help", not actions wherein I simply force them to do what I want with their properties.
What's up with this line of questioning? Are you that afraid, or is there some intellectual or logical purpose to the question?
This is a mafia mindset that I simply can't subscribe to. When one makes a deal with the devil, one is destined to lose. Footing someone's bill may buy you some time, but you'll likely lose it all in the end, just as you likely would in a revolt.
You correctly answered your own question here.
It is hard. If the people being paid minimum wage were being paid a wage that "reflects an individuals contribution to the overall production", there would be no need for a minimum wage.
A raise in the minimum wage results in a raise for everyone based upon what exactly? Based upon the whim of the government, it's not data/production driven.
What a great answer. Thanks for sharing.
Where exactly did someone mention the end of times other than you?
Wars have happened many times in the past and they didn;t result in the end of times, so stop worrying about Iraq.
Tax breaks have occurred many times in the past.....
Not a very good argument for anything.
Inflation. A raise is individual. this is across the board, if you are at the bottom, you are at the bottom for a reason. Rasing the floor eventually raises the cost of everything effectively negating any positive impact of that rise in pay level.
The only way for people to pull themselves out of the minimum wage is to make themselves more valuable, the vast majority of all wage earners, may start at minimum, and then through promotion, or merit raises based on time served experience etc (unless one is dumb enough to join a union and sign a contract procluding one from individual performance based raises choosing rather to base a salary on a minimum wage)
Basically unless something is physically or mentally wrong with you, there is absolutely no reason anyone will be a minimum wage earner for longer than about 6 months, If the company won't give you a raise after that, you need to go elsewhere. If something is mentally or physically wrong with a person, they should be collecting some kind of government benifit like diabled social security anyway
It's nice in theory, to raise the minimum, it's a nice thing to say..."I like to help people at the bottom or the common man" for a politician, in reality, it's simply short sighted, people might love seeing that extra 40 bucks in their paycheck a week, and vote for the ass hole that did it for them, but in reality, they haven't been pulled out of any situation, you still can barely live on the minimum (if you can currently) and it's still a shitty existance, so you've effectively emboldened a voter base, but you haven't really done anything but increase inflation and keep them where they are.
This is one reason I'm all about changing the taxation system. I'm all about teaching people how to live frugally, sensibly, responsibly. If you aren't living in debt you are never poor in this nation.
it's one reason the Fairtax is so brilliant. The prebate takes care of everyone's basic needs, there is no tax on used goods, embedded taxes are eliminated, the current ridiculously complicated tax code is eliminated, you can't supercede the tax code for wealthy individuals with good lawyers, you can't get around it and it's at least revenue neutral. So not only do we have our entire paychecks with some choice in how we pay our tax money, we also are giving the government at least as much as we are currently (probably more)
Hopefully the offer to help them would be an eye opener to them.
Unfortunately, that's backwards. The person who doesn't have their "eyes open" when asking for help is usually less likely to have the opened when you've done their work for them. What you're talking about is shame. As proven by the Catholics, shame can work pretty well in the context of control and self-restraint, but shame doesn't really make for healthy societies.