What should the minimum wage be in the United States?

[NaughtyGeek]

Acceptable to whom? To you? If an unskilled 17 year old gets a job offer for $1 an hour, should it not be his or her decision to take it or leave it?

No, we need the government to tell us if it is ok or not. We are nothing without the state telling us what we can and cannot do.

 

[brycejones]

The minimum wage in Bangladesh comes out to about $.09/hr and the Central African Republic is about $.10/hr. For that matter, there are several countries with no minimums. If we want to stay competitive in the world economy, we really need to get as close to that $0/hr as we can.

So you want to live in a country with the economic development level of Bangladesh or the CAR?

 

[NaughtyGeek]

So you want to live in a country with the economic development level of Bangladesh or the CAR?

It is our corporate responsibility to exploit the lack of economic development in areas such as Bangladesh and the CAR to minimize and stabilize labor rates with the infrastructure to support our manufacturing operations. When it is cheaper to build out infrastructure and pay $.09/hr for labor, we are required to do so by corporate and governmental mandate.

 

[DrunkenSano]

Why do people keep thinking that they need to make minimum wage at a level that can a person can make a living off of it, or worse, a family? Minimum wage is not suppose to help on pay off the mortgage while covering all their expenses.

If you have no skills, then you should be two jobs to make ends meet. Not feeling entitled to working a minimum wage job and expecting to be paid big bucks.

 

[Paul98]

8 or 10 an hour nationally for minimum, then adjusted up locally if wanted, adjusted yearly based on specific costs.

 

[justoh]

Why do people keep thinking that they need to make minimum wage at a level that can a person can make a living off of it, or worse, a family? Minimum wage is not suppose to help on pay off the mortgage while covering all their expenses.

If you have no skills, then you should be two jobs to make ends meet. Not feeling entitled to working a minimum wage job and expecting to be paid big bucks.

In English, please?

 

[realibrad]

In English, please?

If you cannot understand what he wrote, then perhaps you need to learn. His statement, while flawed, was easily understandable.

 

[justoh]

If you cannot understand what he wrote, then perhaps you need to learn. His statement, while flawed, was easily understandable.

I don't get it.

 

[Pr0d1gy]

This is true, but nobody is gonna raise it that high ever. That would actually start to force layoffs.



A lot of these companies are built from the ground up to exploit cheap labor and the current low wage. The walmart business model may not even be viable without underpaying workers.

Agreed, the problem is you and I are paying the bonuses to Wal Mart because you're paying for the food stamps, welfare, gov healthcare, and eventually disability of millions of employees. Companies have to be held to a higher standard. I posted an article in this forum a few months ago that showed a raise of prices of one single penny, across the board, would allow wages to go high enough to get all Wal Mart workers off gov't assistance.

Companies, through many legal maneuvers, have tipped the balance completely back in their favor and overturned their burden to you to be paid through heavy taxes.

The Wal Mart model is not viable, period. It is anti-humanity, anti-dignity, and anti-American. It is everything this country was built to escape from. It is the model of a corporate legal system.

So you want to live in a country with the economic development level of Bangladesh or the CAR?

No, they want to be part of a dynastic family in a country like that. They want to be the Last King of Scotland.

 

[pete6032]

I picked $0. Let the market decide. It's called economics. Let supply/demand of products dictate price as well as let supply/demand of skills and people dictate the wage they make.

If two factories sit side by side, one pays $2/hr, and the one next door pays $15/hr, where do you think the talent is going to go? The other factory will have to raise its wages if it wants any decent employees, and it will. Unless a monkey can do the job, and why pay $15 if it only takes a monkey?

If two factories sit side by side and one pays $2/hr, and the one next door pays $15/hr, then $15/hr factory is going to decrease its wages to just marginally above $2 per hour to attract the talent.

 

[realibrad]

Agreed, the problem is you and I are paying the bonuses to Wal Mart because you're paying for the food stamps, welfare, gov healthcare, and eventually disability of millions of employees. Companies have to be held to a higher standard. I posted an article in this forum a few months ago that showed a raise of prices of one single penny, across the board, would allow wages to go high enough to get all Wal Mart workers off gov't assistance.

Companies, through many legal maneuvers, have tipped the balance completely back in their favor and overturned their burden to you to be paid through heavy taxes.

The Wal Mart model is not viable, period. It is anti-humanity, anti-dignity, and anti-American. It is everything this country was built to escape from. It is the model of a corporate legal system.



No, they want to be part of a dynastic family in a country like that. They want to be the Last King of Scotland.

I think you are going a bit far.

If workers wanted to get paid more, then find another job that pays more. If there are no other jobs that pay more at your skill set, then why is Walmart at fault for that?

Walmart undercuts prices, because its very efficient. Their model wastes far less in thins like fuel and labor, so for that we all should be very happy. There is nothing stopping another company from opening up and paying more, other than people would not shop there most likely. And you may think this is a bad thing, but I dont. I like the fact that Walmart is so efficient at what it does, because it means more goods and fewer resources being used for those goods/services. Society should want more of this type of behavior.

The issue is that people like you think that Walmart's success comes at the detriment of other businesses. All those mom and pop stores close down because they cannot compete. The benefit we all get, is a far greater selection at much lower prices. That is amazing.

The real issue is that we have a huge glut of low skilled labor, and society cant find anything productive to do with it. Why pay a worker 8/hr, when a robot can do it for 7/hr? If you want wages to go up, find a way to make workers more productive.

 

[momeNt]

So 35% of people in America actually support slavery.

You realize that many people will accept jobs completely unpaid under the premise that "if they work hard they may get paid" and eventually the entire lower and middle class will be an unpaid workforce.

Bring back the breadlines, bring back Rockefeller being "magnanimous" for tossing dimes out of his gilded carriage.

I'm physically sick right now thinking about the destruction that these people want to bring to America, the land of the free.

 

[nehalem256]

Agreed, the problem is you and I are paying the bonuses to Wal Mart because you're paying for the food stamps, welfare, gov healthcare, and eventually disability of millions of employees.

Wrong. You are paying for the food stamps, welfare, and Medicaid for the bastard children of WalMart employees.

 

[realibrad]

So 35% of people in America actually support slavery.

You realize that many people will accept jobs completely unpaid under the premise that "if they work hard they may get paid" and eventually the entire lower and middle class will be an unpaid workforce.

Bring back the breadlines, bring back Rockefeller being "magnanimous" for tossing dimes out of his gilded carriage.

I'm physically sick right now thinking about the destruction that these people want to bring to America, the land of the free.

Too true. Because slavery back in the 1700s is totally the same as working 40hrs at Walmart. Electricity, running water, medical care, cell phones, TV, cars...

 

[Sheik Yerbouti]

Wait, now wally world employees get medical care?

 

[momeNt]

Too true. Because slavery back in the 1700s is totally the same as working 40hrs at Walmart. Electricity, running water, medical care, cell phones, TV, cars...

Electricity, running water, medical care, cell phones, TV, cars. All provided for by minimum wage laws. Eliminate those, and you might be lucky to be able to cobble together some scrap for a shanty, and Walmart MIGHT let you construct it in their employee hovel zone if you forego any sort of raise from completely unpaid to paid for a year.

 

[realibrad]

Electricity, running water, medical care, cell phones, TV, cars. All provided for by minimum wage laws. Eliminate those, and you might be lucky to be able to cobble together some scrap for a shanty, and Walmart MIGHT let you construct it in their employee hovel zone if you forego any sort of raise from completely unpaid to paid for a year.

You cannot equate slavery, a system that excluded all of those things with Walmart. Slavery was forced, and Walmart is not. Nobody is forced to buy, nobody is forced to work, nobody is forced to sell though Walmart.

You find Walmart sick, and I find the idea of Walmart being modern slavery sick.

You pretend like Walmart valuing its labor at 7/hr is something horrible, yet you do it as well. I would be willing to bet that you buy things on sale as well. Those goods/services you purchase at a lower price, push down the cost of production. One of the costs is labor. If you as a consumer choose the same good, at a lower price, you drive down wages. Yet Walmart is Evil as slave owners, and you are just a consumer.

 

[Rakehellion]

It is better that unskilled people remain unemployed (and as a result inexperienced) than work for wages their betters consider exploitive.

Unskilled people need to eat too.

 

[Rakehellion]

Acceptable to whom? To you? If an unskilled 17 year old gets a job offer for $1 an hour, should it not be his or her decision to take it or leave it?

What if it's a 30-year-old with a degree in engineering and the decision is whether to work 80 hours a week or steal for a living?

 

[Rakehellion]

You cannot equate slavery, a system that excluded all of those things with Walmart.

A lot of those things didn't exist in the 1700's.

Slavery was forced, and Walmart is not. Nobody is forced to buy, nobody is forced to work, nobody is forced to sell though Walmart.

You're forced to work somewhere. Survival isn't optional.

You pretend like Walmart valuing its labor at 7/hr is something horrible, yet you do it as well. I would be willing to bet that you buy things on sale as well. Those goods/services you purchase at a lower price, push down the cost of production. One of the costs is labor. If you as a consumer choose the same good, at a lower price, you drive down wages. Yet Walmart is Evil as slave owners, and you are just a consumer.

So the other option is to boycott Walmart, so they have to lay off employees?

 

[crashtech]

So 35% of people in America actually support slavery.

You realize that many people will accept jobs completely unpaid under the premise that "if they work hard they may get paid" and eventually the entire lower and middle class will be an unpaid workforce.

Bring back the breadlines, bring back Rockefeller being "magnanimous" for tossing dimes out of his gilded carriage.

I'm physically sick right now thinking about the destruction that these people want to bring to America, the land of the free.

Hysteria can be funny! That's why I am quoting this, so I can return to it and laugh once in a while. Also, I am hoping you feel slightly victimized by this.

 

[Victorian Gray]

Wrong. You are paying for the food stamps, welfare, and Medicaid for the bastard children of WalMart employees.

Is *that* the problem? You're a 'Walmart bastard' with a chip on his shoulder?

btw, simple assault?

 

[homebrew2ny]

Minimum wage should be the minimum amount a company needs to pay to get what is required to complete the task(s) needed competently. The fallacy that a set minimum wage somehow helps anyone is based in ignorance.

 

[homebrew2ny]

Unskilled people need to eat too.

The question is how well though? If I had to I could feed my entire family for less than $40 a week. Sure it would be lots of rice, raman noodles, and water, but we will survive. Unskilled people need to realize that they are not entitled to anything more then they are worth. In fact, everyone needs to realize that.

 

[mrjminer]

The question is how well though? If I had to I could feed my entire family for less than $40 a week. Sure it would be lots of rice, raman noodles, and water, but we will survive. Unskilled people need to realize that they are not entitled to anything more then they are worth. In fact, everyone needs to realize that.

You could do it for way less than $40. Get a container of vitamins for the family for the month at around $10 or less. After that, I'm guessing $15, including snacks; couple of boxes of Little Debbie snacks for around $3, 2 pound bag of rice for around $2, few loaves of bread at $3, jar of peanut butter for $2.50, jar of jelly for $2.50, 12 pack of ramen for $2. Can really just mix these things around for caloric intake, possibly dropping the snacks for another few pounds of rice.