The poor don't work because it doesn't make economic sense to hold a job

[dmcowen674]

In a real free market, with no welfare programs, the people making less than a living wage would not be able to live.

But you know what they could do?

Break down that flimsy gate at the entrance to your gated community and TAKE your assets by force, in order to live.

Not a question of will this happen, it is a just a matter of when now.

The time is getting closer by the day.

 

[dmcowen674]

Our economy is just not sustainable like this. The cost of living is too high for everyone to be "comfortable" as we define it. Something is going to have to give.

The amazing thing is you still have Republicans claiming the rich trickle down and invest to make jobs.

You see them on here still saying that same old crap just like them still saying gas prices have to do with supply and demand although not many of those left.

 

[PingSpike]

Gas is very rough, and yet it is so essential. For the folks making 8$ a hour and have no busing option, they really do feel the pinch. Of course gas is expensive for us all but even more so for minimum wage people..

I have alot of respect for people who work for minimum wage instead of giving up though. The opposite are the sponges, people who do their BEST to not work a job but instead spend time plotting how to maximize the amount of welfare and other freebies they can get...I really detest them. Those folks also tend to have 7 kids to further exploit the system [the kids will also likely growup to become leaches], and the people paying for it [minimum wage folks included] is the taxpayer.

But as far as welfare itself goes and minimum wage people getting it, minimum wage pays only $7.25 in most states, welfare has to be a option since that is chump change. If MW was increased to something more reasonable like 14$ a hour then welfare could have a more solid argument against it.

I'm not sure why you detest them so much. A system was designed with perverse incentives and they responded to it. Rich people maximize their wealth and limit their tax liabilities all the time, why can't welfare bums do the same thing? It seems like the idiot lawmakers who designed the system and moreover make no real attempts to fix should be the main recipients of your contempt.

If lawmakers thought everyone would sit around not taking advantage of these programs so they could hold the moral high ground then they might have spent most their lives in some magical land of virtue the rest of us never lived in.

 

[jackace]

We have a very real problem in our country with all of this. On one hand we want people to go out and be productive, but on the other how logical is it to work full-time with no benefits and make less than you would being on welfare.

I agree that income distribution is the key to this problem. The bottom earners of this country have steadily earned less and less over the last 30+ years while those at the top have see massive increases. The only fix I see for this problem is to fix the income distribution in this country. How you fix it I don't much care, but that is the only answer that makes any sense.

 

[peonyu]

I'm not sure why you detest them so much. A system was designed with perverse incentives and they responded to it. Rich people maximize their wealth and limit their tax liabilities all the time, why can't welfare bums do the same thing? It seems like the idiot lawmakers who designed the system and moreover make no real attempts to fix should be the main recipients of your contempt.

If lawmakers thought everyone would sit around not taking advantage of these programs so they could hold the moral high ground then they might have spent most their lives in some magical land of virtue the rest of us never lived in.

I should have made it more clear. I can understand people who would work for a reasonable wage but cant find a job that pays a fair wage, so they end up on welfare. But I do detest those who just dont want to work at all and instead "play" the system and soak up free handouts, they make playing the system a personal job so to speak.

I grew up in Western PA and there was an obscene number of generational "welfare" families there. They do what their parents do, dont work, dont want to work either and live off the system. Cant fix that problem it comes with Welfare but I dont have to love them either.

 

[Jeff7]

Gas is very rough, and yet it is so essential. For the folks making 8$ a hour and have no busing option, they really do feel the pinch. Of course gas is expensive for us all but even more so for minimum wage people..

I have alot of respect for people who work for minimum wage instead of giving up though. The opposite are the sponges, people who do their BEST to not work a job but instead spend time plotting how to maximize the amount of welfare and other freebies they can get...I really detest them. Those folks also tend to have 7 kids to further exploit the system [the kids will also likely growup to become leaches], and the people paying for it [minimum wage folks included] is the taxpayer.

But as far as welfare itself goes and minimum wage people getting it, minimum wage pays only $7.25 in most states, welfare has to be a option since that is chump change. If MW was increased to something more reasonable like 14$ a hour then welfare could have a more solid argument against it.

Be sure to offer at least as much contempt for those at the top of the ladder who also do their best to squeeze as much out of the system as possible - the large companies who pay hundreds or even thousands of accountants and lawyers to help ensure that they pay $0 in taxes, and to get back tax benefits in the process, so that their net tax rate is negative. (And of course they don't just work to take advantage of the system as it is, they also use their political influence to make it easier to dodge taxes, and to dodge anything resembling regulation.)
A welfare leech might get a few tens of thousands a year, but the large companies can milk out hundreds of millions of dollars.

 

[HendrixFan]

No credit is due - Clinton campaigned on welfare reform independently.

The Republicans have had majorities since Clinton left office but did absolutely nothing to get people off of welfare and into jobs. The Republicans would rather pay a small portion of our national budget out to poor people because it gives a strong platform to stir up the angry masses to vote for them to "punish" welfare moms and the like. Only it never happens. Just a consistent scare tactic to win over voters, but if they actually fix the problem they "lose".

Clinton was a true fiscal conservative, and it is sad that there aren't more blue dog Democrats to keep his work going. Neither party gives a crap.

 

[ConstipatedVigilante]

Last I checked, in Florida it is $2.00 to take a bus.

So 4$ back and forth a day, x 10 days if the person is being paid bi-weekly and works 40 hours a week, 5 days a week = $80 every 2 weeks to use the bus.

80x8 = 640

Minus taxes and you might be looking at $550, perhaps less.

-$80 and that check is down to $470.

The bus is still a huge hit for a person working $8 a hour.

-edit, double or triple the $4 amount if the person is not using the bus to get to work. So for gas, it might end up being $160 every 2 weeks or $240 every 2 weeks to get to work. In the latter case a MW worker spends close to half their check on gas to get to work. Pretty fucked up when the numbers are crunched.

I don't know where you got those car numbers. Gas is about $50 every 2 weeks, plus $100 in insurance premiums. And when you're talking about the bus, no one who takes it regularly pays $2/ride. They buy a bus pass, which significantly lowers the cost. Or they get their employer to buy a bus pass.

 

[Infohawk]

NM

 

[dmcowen674]

I don't know where you got those car numbers.

Gas is about $50 every 2 weeks

WTF are you smoking?

$50 will not even get you a full tank

 

[3chordcharlie]

Of course people have to do those jobs. It makes sense for them to be paid less than a living wage because it is totally 100% UNSKILLED.

If I can plug a high-school drop-out with the IQ of a moron into a job and get him to ask "Do you want fries with that", there isn't a chance in hell that job should pay a living wage.

You completely sidestepped the reality of the situation: just like any commodity, there is a job MARKET. Educated, high skilled individuals in a certain profession make a certain amout: that amout is what the market can support. Uneducated unskilled individuals make far less, because to make a crappy cheeseburger that costs $1.00, you can't pay your workers all that much money.

It's simple market economics. Our disagreement goes far far deeper here. You believe socialism works. Most rational people understand that it doesn't.

Up the minimum wages, and the price of a Cheeseburger goes up. If the price of a cheesburger goes up, then the prices of the higher-quality products will go up (or NO one will buy cheeseburgers). This is simply supply and demand economics. It's pretty much a natural law.

Screwing around with the lower payscales, in the end, simply creates inflation. Pay inflation and product cost inflation. It's a never ending cycle. Unless of course you go that step further that all socialist countries do and start putting price limits on everything. Then no one ends up being able to make a living wage, and you create artificial shortages, bread lines, and disaster.

Socialized economies /DO/NOT/WORK.

Ever worse is the 'why should I get an education effect'. See what the high pay rates that the unions managed to negotiate have done. We have a chunk of the population that dropped out of school and went work. They are now largely uneducated, almost totally unskilled, and most are on unemployement now as those high-paying unskilled jobs disappear (welcome to the free market at work).

This is one of the stupidest posts I've ever seen on AT.

You do have a good grasp of econ 101 though, so congratulations.

In a real economy, if you aren't getting a 'living wage' one way or another, and cannot improve your outcome legitimately (better job, social assistance, whatever), you either improve your outcome by force (crime), or you die.

You may even be so callous as to prefer that anyone in this situation would actually starve to death, but in the general case, that isn't what will happen. Crime will happen.

Now you get to pay for more police, more prisons, more security, etc, and you know what? It still won't work! IN the extreme case, don't forget that guns are very cheap.

 

[alkemyst]

If living on welfare is so awesome, why wouldnt everybody do it? The sad fact of welfare is that it is not evenly distributed nor is it equitable for people in varying situations

The amount of food stamps you can rake in is quite astonishng. Combine that with relatively easy access to medicaid you could feasibly live a life that many retirees try to invest for.

The main problem is you are not flexible on where you can live. Its probably going to be a nasty area with bad schools, neighbors and crime. Unless you have the luxory of staying with relatives.

What i really dont like is how people who dont need it seem to get it and people who do, don't.

We just need a clear mission amd staffing that can consistantly deliver on that through the application process

When you are a criminal welfare gives you an income base. Around here sadly many on welfare are also dealing drugs and in stolen property.

 

[kubani1]

the uk does something that makes sense, depending on your age, there are different minimum wages.

this means that your high school equivalent gets paid less than a 18 year old student who gets paid less than your 25 year old uneducated but needs to make a living adult.

it makes it more possible for businesses to hire younger workers for reduced wages and allows a realistic minimum wage to be set for those who need to make a living.

the best idea i have heard so far though is from a post somewhere in this thread, base minimum wage on the fiscal health of the company. Walmart can afford to pay people more, the mom and pop shop cannot.

 

[Zorkorist]

Minimum wage is a aborition to exonomics.

The real minimum wage, is the minimum wage that a person pays someone else, OUTSIDE og Government forced wages.

In effect, Minimum Wages should be described as Government wages.

-John

 

[dmcowen674]

If I can plug a high-school drop-out with the IQ of a moron into a job and get him to ask "Do you want fries with that", there isn't a chance in hell that job should pay a living wage.

So what would you pay the French Fry frier?

25 cents an hour?

Is that low enough?

 

[Zorkorist]

Minimum Government Wages

Congratulations... you are in America.

-John

 

[Zorkorist]

So what would you pay the French Fry frier?

25 cents an hour?

Is that low enough?

Is there another high-school drop out that can do it better? How much would you pay him?

-John

 

[Zorkorist]

Keep in mind that being good at something, demands better wages.

-John

 

[Zorkorist]

Unlike minimum wage, where just by being there... you get this wage.

-John

 

[alkemyst]

Unlike minimum wage, where just by being there... you get this wage.

-John

not necessarily. However, if managers fired workers more then minimum wage would rise and production would be equal with less workforce and about equal costs IMHO.

You don't always make more for being better though.

 

[alkemyst]

Minimum wage was never designed to be an income to live independently.

It's a minimum to prevent companies from unfairly paying a worker.

 

[Zorkorist]

Which is against every principle apon which America was founded.

-John

 

[3chordcharlie]

Minimum wage was never designed to be an income to live independently.

It's a minimum to prevent companies from unfairly paying a worker.

True. There aren't many places that minimum wage is a true living wage, and that's as it should be.

 

[Zorkorist]

True. There aren't many places that minimum wage is a true living wage, and that's as it should be.

What's it's purpose, then?

-John

 

[alkemyst]

Which is against every principle apon which America was founded.

-John

Well not really. I am not sure if you read the book "The Jungle"...if all Americans did the right thing we wouldn't need to have such thing as a minimum wage, OSHA, and the like.