Should minimum wage be abolished? Raised?

[glen]

Originally posted by: glen
Raising minimum wage will cause unemployment to rise.

Doesn't anyone understand this?
It WILL help a few folks, but it will knock others out of a job.
Looking at it like it makes some dude go from $6 to $7 per hour is a fallacious.
It does that for some folks, BUT others just get fired, with the slack taken up by the guys who got a little raise. Some folks go from $6 to $7 and some go from making $6 to, "You're fired."

 

[acemcmac]

Originally posted by: glen
Raising minimum wage will cause unemployment to rise.

This man speaks the truth. U.S. companies are only looking for a reason to increase mechanization and lay off more people.... consider steel unions the end result of raising your minimum wages enough to afford "good living"

 

[Svnla]

Minimum wage is just that, "minimum". It is the minimum standard. It was NOT create so a family (with several kids) can live on. I believe it was set up so the working poor would not get screw in the 30s (correct me if I am wrong).

I believe it should be left alone or maybe a little adjustment (base on cost of living/regional).

 

[glen]

Call center with 100 employees making $6 per hour and the minimum wage is raised to $7 per hour.

That is $1 x 40 x 100 x 50 = $200,000 MORE!

What keeps the owner from moving the call center to India and laying off 100 folks instead?

Increasing minimum wage increases unemployment.

 

[AgaBoogaBoo]

Leave it how it is

 

[Yzzim]

For those saying it should be abolished:

What about the cheap Mexican labor that is coming into the US? They are willing to work for $2-3/hour when the job normally pays $6-$10/hour. Any businenss would be stupid not to fire the $6-10/hour worker and hire the $2-3/hour immigrant if he's willing to work just as hard. But then what happens to the now unemployed worker? He's stuck looking for a similar $6-10/hour job but they've all been taken over by $2-3/hour immigrants.

Didn't the US have that problem back in the early 1900's when the Irish immigrants were coming in and working for pennies a day? Isn't that what started Unions and the minimum wage?

My mother and I always go back and forth and she always brings up the points I just brought up. Never did figure out how to answer her.

 

[alkemyst]

Originally posted by: PrinceofWands
I have no real problem abolishing the minimum wage...for one very good reason. If you don't offer enough as a salary, people won't take the job. Then you'll go out of business, and we'll laugh at you, and start our own versions of you business with more reasonable wages that will actually attract valuable employees and become succesful.

The issue is pretty much self-resolving, given a few years for it to reach homeostasis.

Another idealogy you propose but fail to acknowledge those that are not normal US citizens trying to scam the system.

There are a lot of people that will just take jobs to lose them at any price....there are also those that pay out in cash as a small business and have people abusing that aspect.

Fact is if US minimum wage was brought down to a buck or two you'd probably still have many wanting to work those jobs.....don't know how many would be americans though....no matter how illegal it is.

 

[jagec]

Originally posted by: PrinceofWands

*shrug* I've needed money too, but I always do what's right, no matter what. If people don't have the integrity to do that, then they deserve the lower wages anyway.

But it only takes a few people willing work for lower wages to screw over the people who would like to hold out for higher wages.

If you're willing to work for a given wage, you may deserve that wage, but does someone who wants a higher wage deserve unemployment?

A minimum wage is a good idea, but it should be a reasonable minimum wage. Enough to live on, but barely. What it's at right now works pretty well.

 

[glen]

Originally posted by: Yzzim
For those saying it should be abolished:

What about the cheap Mexican labor that is coming into the US? They are willing to work for $2-3/hour when the job normally pays $6-$10/hour. Any businenss would be stupid not to fire the $6-10/hour worker and hire the $2-3/hour immigrant if he's willing to work just as hard. But then what happens to the now unemployed worker? He's stuck looking for a similar $6-10/hour job but they've all been taken over by $2-3/hour immigrants.

Didn't the US have that problem back in the early 1900's when the Irish immigrants were coming in and working for pennies a day? Isn't that what started Unions and the minimum wage?

My mother and I always go back and forth and she always brings up the points I just brought up. Never did figure out how to answer her.

No.
If you raise minimum wage, you increase the pressure to hire illegal immigrants who will work for less money. Once again, unemployment of Americans increases.

 

[alkemyst]

Originally posted by: Eli
That is all it does..... I can't imagine what it would be like in areas where the minimum is $5.15. :Q Although I guess the cost of living should be cheaper in those areas, but still.

People that abuse it like that suck, and make the truely poor look bad.

Question, though.. they don't just hand out aide to anybody that asks, do they? I mean... aren't there minimum requirements? If those people can afford all that stuff, doesen't that mean they must be lying to get the aid? Or does the addition of the aid give them enough money to afford that stuff?

Yet people are asking for it to be able for someone to afford a mortgage.

They don't just hand out the money...however, many work for cash under the table...especially those in service/construction/mass employment positions. You make $15 per hour laboring in a skilled profession off the books where the legal guy wants $30 or so....you do 10-12 hours a day and cash out, Uncle Sam is none-the-wiser....now you go and say you are unemployed, get assistance with the requirement you look for jobs....you go to every fast food place, demand you cut to the front of the line, then tell them they *need* to hire you...they tell you to leave, you say you have no opportunity.

sucks but to the letter of the law except the illegal wage part.

 

[glen]

Originally posted by: jagec

If you're willing to work for a given wage, you may deserve that wage, but does someone who wants a higher wage deserve unemployment?

Sure he does.

I can hire 2 people - one will work for less:
Why would I hire the more expensive guy?

You can buy 2 video cards, they are the same, but one costs more.
Does the video card who wants a higher wage deserve unemployment(sitting on the shelf?)
Sure he does.

 

[Yzzim]

Originally posted by: glen

Originally posted by: Yzzim
For those saying it should be abolished:

What about the cheap Mexican labor that is coming into the US? They are willing to work for $2-3/hour when the job normally pays $6-$10/hour. Any businenss would be stupid not to fire the $6-10/hour worker and hire the $2-3/hour immigrant if he's willing to work just as hard. But then what happens to the now unemployed worker? He's stuck looking for a similar $6-10/hour job but they've all been taken over by $2-3/hour immigrants.

Didn't the US have that problem back in the early 1900's when the Irish immigrants were coming in and working for pennies a day? Isn't that what started Unions and the minimum wage?

My mother and I always go back and forth and she always brings up the points I just brought up. Never did figure out how to answer her.

No.
If you raise minimum wage, you increase the pressure to hire illegal immigrants who will work for less money. Once again, unemployment of Americans increases.

so you're saying minimum wage is a good thing if it stays where it is now

 

[glen]

Originally posted by: Yzzim

so you're saying minimum wage is a good thing if it stays where it is now

Yes.
If you increase minimum wage, you will increase unemployment.
And, over all it will slow down the economy.

Are you saying increasing unemployment and slowing down the economy are a good thing?

 

[cquark]

Entrepreneur Marshall Brain explains why raising the minimum wage isn't necessarily inflationary and why increasing wages doesn't have to slow down the economy in his essay What if we doubled the minimum wage?. Total wages have doubled in many corporations since 1980 ... but the increases have gone only to a few. Increasing the minimum wage could be done by reversing that trend and giving the increases to the many, not the few.

Here's an excerpt:

Imagine a hypothetical company with 20,100 employees. At the top are 100 executives who pay themselves an average of $4 million per year. The other 20,000 employees make minimum wage -- $5.15 per hour -- for 2,000 hours per year of work.

Those executive numbers sound top-heavy, but today they are not. Executive pay truly has been rising at a spectacular rate. For example, when Enron collapsed it had about 20,000 employees. According to the book Pipe Dreams by Robert Bryce:

"Enron filed documents in bankruptcy court that showed total cash payments of $309.8 million to a group of 144 top Enron executives during 2001. In addition, those same executives cashed in stock options worth $311.7 million."

That's more than $4 million per executive across 144 executives.

So in our hypothetical company, we have 100 executives making $400 million per year. We have 20,000 employees making about $200 million per year. If we simply cut the average executive pay from $4 million per year to $2 million per year, we can double the pay of rank and file employees in this company.

Could the executives manage to survive on $2 million rather than $4 million? Yes, they could. They could also survive on $1 million a year, or $500,000. Their pay is completely arbitrary. It has risen by a factor on 10 in the last 20 years -- In 1980, these same executives would have been making $400,000 instead of $4 million.

A common complaint about doubling the minimum wage is that it is "inflationary." The point of this example is to show that employee wages can be doubled without raising prices at all. Executives are now redistributing wealth from employees to themselves at such a remarkable rate that employee wages have fallen considerably. Simply by reversing this concentration of wealth, employee wages can rise to reasonable levels without changing consumer prices.

 

[Vette73]

Originally posted by: glen

Originally posted by: glen
Raising minimum wage will cause unemployment to rise.

Doesn't anyone understand this?
It WILL help a few folks, but it will knock others out of a job.
Looking at it like it makes some dude go from $6 to $7 per hour is a fallacious.
It does that for some folks, BUT others just get fired, with the slack taken up by the guys who got a little raise. Some folks go from $6 to $7 and some go from making $6 to, "You're fired."

Why not look up the TRUTH and stop babbling on with rush limbaugh "truths".

The last 2 times Min. wage went up, so did jobs. The overall price of goods also did not jump as was stated eariler.
A raise on the min. wage is juts that, a raise on the min. wage, not ALL wages.

http://www.theshortrun.com/articles/submit/mwkb.htm

 

[glen]

Entrepreneur Marshall Brain is an idiot and should read my posts in this thread.

 

[glen]

Originally posted by: Marlin1975
Why not look up the TRUTH and stop babbling on with rush limbaugh "truths".

The last 2 times Min. wage went up, so did jobs. The overall price of goods also did not jump as was stated eariler.
A raise on the min. wage is juts that, a raise on the min. wage, not ALL wages.

http://www.theshortrun.com/articles/submit/mwkb.htm

http://www.libertyhaven.com/th...ployment/wageplus.html


Heres a couple things that are not to bad.

I have never listened to RUSH.
The economy is very complicated, - imagine how much better we would have done had the wage been left alone.
Russia essentially had a fixed minimum wage and mandatory full employment.
You tell me what happened to their economy.

 

[SuperTool]

Should we eliminate small business loans and farm subsidies while we are at it?

 

[glen]

Originally posted by: SuperTool
Should we eliminate small business loans and farm subsidies while we are at it?

Backing off some farm subsidies would probably be a good thing.

 

[alkemyst]

Originally posted by: Babbles
If they can not live in an area due to cost of living, then they should move. I have been unemployed for about a month and I can't find jack when it comes to jobs in my field therefore I may have to move to another area. It is not government's responsibility to make sure I am all cozy and comfy.

I was there too....even when I went to college the first time I was told my parents should support my education based on their last year's income. However, they were both at the time critically hospitalized.

I made it then.

Last bout was looking for work after an unsuccessful self-employment....I was making decent money, but it was stagnant....I needed a lot of capital to grow it to the next stage....finding a job working for yourself 2 years is hard. I had almost 2 decades of both banking and computers (started both at 12 years old) and everyone was 'what have you done lately?'

Finally one company tested me and saw a good match. Took me 6 months + to find a job though that would pay what I wanted. Tons of IT/IS jobs out there at $6 to 12.50/hour though....

 

[Amused]

Well, I can speak as a small business owner who's starting employee wages are dictated by minimum wage + a certain % to stay competitive with other employers.

The day minimum wage is increased, so are my prices. I will not take the hit. Not only will my lower wage workers get a raise, but my higher wage employees will demand one so their cost of living needs will be met. To cover that, I will raise prices.

It is my opinion this will have a domino effect on the economy. As service and food sector employees get raises, prices on these goods and services will rise to meet the cost.

When prices on these go up, the cost of living for higher paid workers goes up. Therefore their current wages become worth less, lowering their standard of living, and they demand raises.

Folks, raising the minimum wage is a never ending cycle of higher prices and inflation. The higher wage workers will NOT give up their standard of living so the lower wage workers can have a higher one.

The key is making minimum wage jobs temporary through education and job training, as they are for most folks. Face it, if you are physically and mentally healthy and stuck for life in a minimum wage job, you have no one but yourself to blame. Most people work their way up from minimum wage and reach the middle class at least.

 

[XZeroII]

Originally posted by: alkemyst
Minimum wage should stay, however; I don't think it should be related to self-supporting.

Minimum wage people should still need help living. Whether this means parents, family or living with others, so be it. Too many people are thinking a min. wage job should entitle one to a life of independance with a home, car, etc.

Minimum wages should only entitle one to a life of food and shelter even if it means struggling.

The reality of the situation is those having to work at minimum wage don't have much to offer once past 18....they don't contribute much to our society and our society is about helping not supporting (This is the US...I am not assuming non-socialism/non-communism is worldwide).

The true messed up part is I know many people on welfare (my wife works retail fashion where there are a lot of 'problem cases' in life) that should not be, yet complain they are impoverished. The 'interesting' couple my wife is sort of p!ssed about gets food stamps, medicare, supplies for free, just bought a townhouse from the government at a steal yet he drives a Mercedes and she has a Lexus SUV pretty new, she wears real designer like Prada, LV, Gucci...but complains the government doesn't care about the poor.

:thumbsup:

 

[alkemyst]

Originally posted by: glen

Originally posted by: jagec

If you're willing to work for a given wage, you may deserve that wage, but does someone who wants a higher wage deserve unemployment?

Sure he does.

I can hire 2 people - one will work for less:
Why would I hire the more expensive guy?

You can buy 2 video cards, they are the same, but one costs more.
Does the video card who wants a higher wage deserve unemployment(sitting on the shelf?)
Sure he does.

This is a good and bad analogy.

The thing many people miss (I am not saying you are missing this point though, just adding to this) is that at minimum wage no one is talking about 'skilled' workers. No one will debate that a better worker is worth more money, however; for many jobs just reliable is all that matters. There is only so much skill needed to serve a soft drink from "Chinee Takee Outee", perhaps someone has a certain 'flair', but it doesn't sell more sugar water 😉

The problem minimum wage discussions have is many times they go into territory the 'audience' would not consider minimum wage nor would ever need too.

 

[PrinceofWands]

Originally posted by: Yzzim
For those saying it should be abolished:

What about the cheap Mexican labor that is coming into the US? They are willing to work for $2-3/hour when the job normally pays $6-$10/hour. Any businenss would be stupid not to fire the $6-10/hour worker and hire the $2-3/hour immigrant if he's willing to work just as hard. But then what happens to the now unemployed worker? He's stuck looking for a similar $6-10/hour job but they've all been taken over by $2-3/hour immigrants.

Didn't the US have that problem back in the early 1900's when the Irish immigrants were coming in and working for pennies a day? Isn't that what started Unions and the minimum wage?

My mother and I always go back and forth and she always brings up the points I just brought up. Never did figure out how to answer her.

Well, I believe that should be a class A felony and they should be shot on sight so it pretty much works itself out after that. 😎

 

[PrinceofWands]

Originally posted by: jagec

Originally posted by: PrinceofWands

*shrug* I've needed money too, but I always do what's right, no matter what. If people don't have the integrity to do that, then they deserve the lower wages anyway.

But it only takes a few people willing work for lower wages to screw over the people who would like to hold out for higher wages.

If you're willing to work for a given wage, you may deserve that wage, but does someone who wants a higher wage deserve unemployment?

A minimum wage is a good idea, but it should be a reasonable minimum wage. Enough to live on, but barely. What it's at right now works pretty well.

Again, they tend to work themselves out. At that wage few are truly outstanding employees. Continual problems will eventually cost the business owner and he will be forced to adapt or get out.