Then let us do away with capitalism as quickly as we can–or at least with your version of it.
Not always. As I said, my husband is a paramedic. If your child is choking to death on a gumball, or your husband is having a heart attack, or you find yourself crushed into what used to be a sports car under the back of a semi, trust me, you want my husband to be the one on the scene. And he makes $14.00 per hour. AND he is a Field Supervisor; if he were a new paramedic, he would be making right in the neighborhood of $10.50 per hour.
Worth becomes pretty darn subjective when the going gets scary.
~k
Count yourself fortunate. In the 1970s, my mom, recently divorced, broke, with four kids to feed on a social worker’s salary, managed to support us and raise the kids with no help at all from family or friends, work fulltime, and go back to school to get her Associate degree in nursing. It can be done.
I find it very hard to believe that an intelligent person who can fill out the necessary forms and demonstrate eligibility cannot get financial assistance from local, state, or federal government. We lived on food stamps and wore second-hand clothes, but we survived. As far as education assistance, there are loans and grants you can apply for. My bf is getting his BS from Strayer and he’s paying for it through education loans and working fulltime. I got my college degree through hefty loans, Social Security checks as a dependent child, and working. I got absolutely no other help–nobody has ever given me a damn thing.
The reason why some jobs pay so little is that they require no skills and there is an oversupply of warm bodies to do them. As long as we have a flood of immigrants willing to work cheaply, we’ll have low wages for hotel maids and 7/11 clerks.
Now I certainly agree that we should not leave people to starve or go homeless, so you can count on me to support shoring up programs to help the working poor, but at the same time, if you increase a hotel maid’s salary to $20/hr, who’s going to pay for it? Money doesn’t just magically appear, you know.
OK, so we have people arguing that it isn’t ethical, moral whatever that people are working and still below the poverty level. But why on earth is it the business owners responsibility to provide that level of sustenance. I mean can I demand that you, Olentzero, provide me a living wage to keep the grizzly bears away from your home? i mean it is worth zero to you, but I will spend 40 hours a week on it and I have to live, don’t I? Well, Maybe I can be of more use, I can wash your car for you. So you tell me that is only worth $10 a week for you, I have to live, where’s my living wage?
The living wage is bad social policy because it doesn’t target those it is meant to help and it targets responsibility on those who really have no reason to be expected to provide.
What’s the point of your distinction? Does it even apply to most minimum wage workers?
I’m not sure why you won’t distinguish between a human being and a product. But you can spare me the rationalization.
I’m saying that the market forces don’t accurately reflect performance of the employee.
Look if you want to consider labor as simply a product, just think of the minimum wage as a form of collective bargaining. The laborers are setting their minimum price throught the ballot box. Their appointed representatives have determined that the cost to produce the labor (food, housing, health care, etc…) is too high to be covered by the current minimum wage. Therefore it’s not going to be sold cheaper. Now just like in any market model, if they guess wrong, problems will result. However, currently I don’t think you will find any minimum wage workers that are afraid that a raise in minimum wage will take their jobs away. I worked at minimum wage or near through a few a few hikes and never felt any fear of losing my job or heard any complaints from my employers.
Not all businesses sell 100% of their inventory. McD’s for instance throws away a large percentage of their food everyday(that’s why they often lock their dumpsters). They could offer their food at a cheaper rate and sell 100% of the inventory by lowering the price at the end of each day. But they don’t because they know that people will just wait for the cheaper price and it will cut into their profits.
The same thing happens with labor, only I don’t think we should throw people away. As long as they are making a reasonable effort to get back into the job force I have no problem paying taxes for a reasonable safety net (although I guess that’s another issue). So by raising prices society assures that they can meet costs and they aren’t selling for less than they should.
ElJeffe
Offer to pay 10.30 an hour for a burger flipper and you will find a more superior, efficient, and timely employee that may even have some management skills. Offer something closer to the current minimum and you will probably be able to find someone who is better in proportion. Whether or not you can take advantage of this employee’s skills for the full amount depends upon your business model.
Business models improve all of the time, we’re not doing business in the 19th century. A rise in labor cost is just like a rise in any other cost. Electricity prices keep soaring probably faster than minimum wage, but sucessful businesses find ways to adjust. Unsuccessful ones do not.
That is true. You are paid what your employer thinks your skill is worth (other abilities may also come into play such as personality).
Work is not about the moral value of something, it is about the monetary value of something. We do not work for pats on the back and other things that might give us a boost in self-worth. We work for money. We are paid in the same currency that we are earning for the company. Some people do indeed feel that a human life is “priceless” and therefore no amount of money is equal to a human life. But Capitalism deals with the practical side of living not the ideal side of living and in a practical sense, you are only worth the money bring in.
I have nothing against credit. Private companies issue it out and take all the responsibilities involved. I am only against the government stealing the money of the citizens to give it to someone else.
Fire hazards are the exact reason. And what a ridiculous reason it is. If I choose to live in a hazardous environment, that is my right. And no one is entitled to anything they cannot afford, including food and shelter (but fortunately in America, people are so rich that they give food and clothing away freely to those that need it).
The inherent value of life is not something that is measured in money. That is why people are unable to put a monetary figure on the value of a human life (that is why murder does not simply carry a fine). And because inherent value is not measure in money, a human life is worth no money at all. Money is a separate form of value. Human life may be worth feelings and emotions, but only the actions we take are worth money.
There are socialist countries swarming with governmental interference, but America was created on the principle that governmental interference should be avoided as much as possible.
The problem is there are plenty of people willing to work for less, but the government won’t allow them to.
ElJeffe, this budget of yours is to laugh. First of all, when you rent an apartment, you don’t just pay the first month’s rent. At the very least, you pay a security deposit in addition to the first month’s rent. Many landlords require first month, last month, plus a security deposit before you move in. So your theoretical worker has to pay closer to $1000-$1200 before she can get her studio apartment. That’s more than a full-time employee making $5 an hour makes in a month. That’s very close to what someone working $8 an hour makes in a month.
Transportation: I don’t know about Sacramento, but in most circumstances, biking to work is not feasible. What if you live ten miles from work? What if you work the graveyard shift and don’t feel safe riding your bike in the dark? Assuming you live in an area with reliable public transportation, you can use that, but that’s a cost you didn’t factor into your budget. A bus pass here costs $30 a month and the buses stop running at 7pm. Again, not so good for 2nd and 3rd shift workers.
Health insurance: If you’re making $5 an hour, I can guaran-damn-tee you, your employer is not providing health coverage. Your budget provides no allowance for health insurance or medical costs. As a temp, I make $8.50 an hour. I can’t afford health insurance, which scares the hell out of me.
I don’t want to make this long post even longer, but I can easily think of other examples where this budget is unrealistic to say the least. I don’t mean to be impertinent, but what do you do for a living? You don’t seem to have a very good grasp of what it’s like to be a low-wage worker.
- I am only against the government stealing the money of the citizens to give it to someone else. *
Not even when the fat cats with the money are using the government to articifially restrict markets? I note that the USA Today article cited in the OP says that the Santa Monica council had restricted the number of hotels that could be built in the town in the first place. It appears that the bosses have no problem when the government interferes in the market to eliminate their competition, but they’ve got a major problem when the government says they have to share the goodies with the grunts.
Anyone who thinks Joe Sixpack got anything like a decent standard of living through the free market alone is at best naive and at worst willfully denying reality.
- The inherent value of life is not something that is measured in money. That is why people are unable to put a monetary figure on the value of a human life (that is why murder does not simply carry a fine). *
And that is exactly why all our political and economic decisions shouldn’t be made solely on the basis of money.
Before this turns into another capitalism vs whatever thread, let me just say that the basic laws of economics apply regardless of what system you are living under.
Yes, at the other 99% of the time, a paramedic is worth zero to most people because they are not injured. Over time, it averages out.
Air is a primary need as well. We don’t have to pay for air.
Do I not benefit from working for my current employer? Just because I don’t make as much money as they guys at the top does not mean that I don’t get to live a comfortable lifestyle. Corporation aren’t split into minimum wage workers and super rich owner. There are generally a lot of people in between.
And which specific skills benefit capitalism? Entrepreneurship, creativity, intelligence, analytical ability, leadership. This skills are a lot more rare and valuable than an ability to change a bedsheet or flip a burger. Capitalism is a pretty good system for meeting our needs. All you need to do is figure out a way to provide a need or want for more than it costs to provide it.
Markets are complicated and there are a wide variety of forces that influence it.
I don’t think anyone is saying that poor people deserve to starve. I can’t imagine anyone being against raising minimum wage if they thought it would provide an agregate benefit to the poor. Things are diferent though when you are dealing with millions of people instead of a few families. Most of the evidence I’ve seen tells me that raising minimum wage would benefit some people but end up leaving others with no jobs at all.
Why don’t you explain the diference to me?
I don’t buy this blanket statement–either the percentage or the “most people” assertion. To me, as a parent and homeowner, paramedics, firefighters, and police officers are worth a LOT. I want them on duty 24/7, I want them on the scene in a heartbeat if I need them, and I want them trained in the very latest techniques and technology. My husband has saved more lives than any podiatrist, CEO, or pop singer that I know, but he still makes about the same as I do as a newpaper carrier. (I work fewer hours, but hey! it averages out.)
If someone could figure out a way to package it, prettify it, and make it a luxury item, we would be. At least, those who could afford it would. Everyone else would have to make do with the store brand air.
Actually, I think Procacious comes very close to saying exactly that:
I’m not even touching that one. Nor am I getting into a whole capitalism vs whatever debate; this is not my field and I’m not much of a debater for precisely the reason some of these statements bother me: I look at situations from a standpoint of compassion and humanity first, and some of these views come off as very cold-blooded. You are talking about abstracts; I am talking about people who have to live under those terms.
Wow. We made it to page two before being treated to personal stories of hardship, along with a plea that we heartless capitalists bastards somehow learn to feel your pain.
Frankly, I don’t give a damn. If you want to compare personal stories of economic woe, let’s go. I can beat anything you want to throw on the table. I was DIRT poor for the first 25 years of my life. And I have been against minimum wages since I was 16. Quite frankly, your argument holds absolutely no sway over me.
But if we are going to talk about hardship, how about we talk about your poor neighbor, who was also just barely getting by, and who was fired and wound up on the street because YOU took HIS job by getting the government to force your employer to pay you more? After all, the money had to come from somewhere.
Oh, and before you get to feeling too damned sorry for yourself, how about we send your comments off to Haiti and let someone living in a packing crate read about how hard your life is? You do know, of course, that the minimum wage in the U.S. is just about double the world median income, and about ten times higher than the median income for the third world, right?
God, I hate it when discussions get derailed into competitions to see who has the more ‘valid’ argument based on who’s life has been tougher.
I know this message is going to come off as being horribly cranky. Sorry about that, I just spent two and a half hours in a dentist’s chair getting a root canal. Frankly, I think the government should make cavities illegal. Think of all the pain in the world that could be eradicated with the stroke of a pen.
sigh I’m not asking for your sympathy. No matter how bad my life or yours or anyone else’s is, there is someone out there who can trump it.
I was simply trying to point out that lee and others, including myself. might possibly be looking at this whole issue from a different perspective, and we must strive to not let our feelings be hurt by what might come off as cold-hearted. I don’t think anyone here IS cold-hearted, I just think the subject lends itself to that tone, because some people can look at this dispassionately and some people can’t.
And frankly, I don’t expect to sway anyone in any direction. I have yet to assert how I feel about the whole minimum wage debate. I’m just the softy, touchy-feely, liberal-leaning, artsy-fartsy, group-hug special ed teacher-type on the sidelines, feeling a little protective when people start taking swipes at the working poor.
If all these remarks are directed at me personally, Sam… Well. I don’t know what to say. I don’t usually piss people off that badly just by being my usual bleeding-heart self.
Hope the tooth is better tomorrow.
Health insurance: If you’re making $5 an hour, I can guaran-damn-tee you, your employer is not providing health coverage. Your budget provides no allowance for health insurance or medical costs. As a temp, I make $8.50 an hour. I can’t afford health insurance, which scares the hell out of me.
When I first moved to WV, as some of you may know, my first boss was satan. Evil, horrible man. Paid only minimum wage.
He did, however, provide Blue Cross.
Here’s the catch:
The deductible was 5 freaking hundred dollars.
Nobody could use their insurance because they couldn’t freaking afford to!
That asshole!
Apparently you’ve never been to an oxygen bar. 
I am no business owner. If the government removed all the laws that I felt were inappropriate, my income and benefits would plummet. What I believe in and what is best for me do not always coincide.
I wouldn’t use the word “decent,” but I do believe that most Americans don’t know what true poverty is. Just the fact that most people think they are entitled to a roof over their heads shows how spoiled most Americans are. They have no concept of how exceedingly wealthy we are. I have never seen even one American that was starving without its being intentional. You know what starving people look like. Their stomachs stick out (similar to that of a pregnant woman), but all their limbs are as skinny as can be. The only people I know that have ever been anywhere near starving in America are people with eating disorders that refuse to feed themselves. Sure people go hungry. They may even pass out on occasion. But to go a week or more with no food…not in this country. If you look to Third World you can see how poor people actually live. Minimum wage gives a sweet life by comparison.
I have no contempt for the poor, but am not all that compassionate. I have no problem with private charities or people that choose to help those in need, but to have the government make these choices for us is unacceptable. I felt that way when I was poor, and I will continue to feel that way all my life (even though it is looking like I will be poor again).
I am not saying they deserve to starve, I am saying they don’t deserve to be fed (I will not stop anyone from performing a service to earn food or even from accepting food from a private citizen).
It is my opinion that the government should be looking at abstracts. Compassion should come from the people, not the government.
<hijack> Uh, yeah…we are talking about people starving here. Or close to it. A recent studyby The U.S. Department of Agriculture shows that 33 million Americans – 13 million children and 20 million adults – live in families that suffer from hunger or live on the edge of hunger. Sure we’d love to think that no-one goes hungry here in the good ole US of A…but there’s a whole 'nother America that most of us aren’t exposed to very often. </hijack>
I’m so amazed by the number of people in this thread that not only think that a “living wage” is a bad idea…but that the minimum wage itself is wrong! Sorry, I just don’t understand what is so wrong with mandating that people should be paid enough to avoid complete poverty?!?
What makes me laugh is that every time an increase in the minimum wage is proposed, conservatives & businesses all go into a tizzy. They pull out their charts and graphs and wave their hands claiming that any increase will lead to mass unemployment and economic ruin. And what usually happens? Nothing really. Maybe a small percentage of people do lose their jobs (I’d still like to see a cite on that!), but they eventually get other jobs–at the increased wage. The last increase in the minimum wage didn’t effect our booming economy in the slightest. All this bluster against paying people enough to survive is just a red herring, IMO.
I know this book has already been mentioned in this thread, but I really think some people here should give it a look. Especially those of you who have added some figures up and concluded that it wouldn’t be so difficult to survive on a minimum wage. Read this book by someone who actually attempted this, and then come to your own conclusions: **Nickel and Dimed: On (Not) Getting By in America
**by Barbara Ehrenreich
Finally, I’d be willing to concede that my stance on a living wage isn’t set in stone. It’s really not that necessary, and it doesn’t really need to be implemented. As long as: We increase subsidized housing, give everyone Universal Health Care and expand the Food Stamp program.
Those of you who are taking such a hard economic view of this situation need to look at it this way: By increasing the overall standard of living, we’ll be making an investment in our future and will lead to a stronger economy. A better diet & living conditions will decrease illness giving us a healthier workforce. The children of minimum wage earner will also have an increased standard of living, allowing them to do better in school which will give them more opportunities in the future. Thus strengthening our overall economy with a healthier, more educated workforce.
OK, back into the fray!
So… Procacious is making a distinction between the value of life (which he sees as a moral value) and the value of labor (which he sees as a monetary value). For a moment, let’s consider the fact that it is life that makes action possible - in fact action is inconceivable without life. If life and action are indissolubly bound, where is the dividing line established between the moral and the monetary values?
Secondly, what is meant by “action”? Breathing is an action. Do we get paid for breathing? Sleeping is an action. Do we get paid for sleeping? Blinking is an action. How much is a blink worth per hour?
Presumably, then, Procacious means “productive labor” when he says “action”. Work, therefore, is given wages in exchange for its performance. Which explains how things are now, under modern society - but does that make it a universal, absolute truth?
Let’s take a Paleolithic hominid. What were his wages for chipping an arrowhead out of flint? What were his wages for starting a fire? What was the going rate on prey hunted for dinner? Simple answer: There wasn’t. Society back then was collectivized, primarily because there wasn’t enough goods to set by as a surplus. Labor wasn’t divided, with perhaps the exception of pregnant women not going on the hunt. Everyone made arrows, everyone started fires, everyone harvested fruits and grasses and everyone hunted game. Everything was shared because every available pair of hands was needed to get the work done, and that meant everybody got to eat. This was first postulated in Friedrich Engels’ The Role Played by Labor in the Transition from Ape to Man based on the evidence at hand back in the 19th century and has been borne out by further anthropological study and findings since.
Therefore, if at one time society did not place a monetary value on work, such a value is a social construct that arises only when society assumes certain forms (like feudalism or capitalism) and is not an absolute. It is thus arbitrarily determined by those at the top of society with a view to what benefits that class the most.
I don’t know about rare, since it seems every college that advertises around here in DC offers advanced business degrees. They seem pretty easy to get, that is if you have the money and time to take the classes.
As for creativity, intelligence, analytical ability, and leadership - everyone is born with those qualities. They’re not the provenance of some select portion of the human race. Such assertions smack to me very much of The Bell Curve. In any case, not everybody has equal opportunity to develop those qualities - Bill Gates probably wouldn’t have been able to become a computer programmer if he had to start picking strawberries 14 hours a day for a living starting at age 6.
And yet in this very same thread there are those who are saying “Quit bitching, at least you’re not in Africa starving.” If capitalism were a pretty good system for meeting our needs, such a rebuttal, pitifully weak as it is, ought to be unthinkable.
And, finally, this:
So is water. And yet in Bolivia, the government tried to privatize the water supply as part of an agreement for IMF loans. Fortunately, those who would be most affected by the plan (i.e. the working class and the poor) organized to successfully stop it. If a profit can possibly be made off of something, capitalists are certainly going to try.
As an additional thought: if air is a primary need, and we don’t have to pay for it, why should we pay for a primary need such as food?
A few random thoughts:
Not as spoiled as many Europeans. As I understand it, they actually have government legislation providing for housing subsidies. We can’t be all that spoiled if we only think we’re entitled to this without actual guarantees of it.
Yeah, those people in the 19th century who didn’t have a minimum wage and worked for whatever they could get had no idea what trouble they would cause for their great-grandchildren when they decided to organize for better wages and safer conditions.
And it doesn’t ensure that you do, either. True, corporations aren’t divided solely between the superrich and the minimum wage earners, but that doesn’t mean the people in between don’t have money problems whatsoever. My story isn’t as bad as some that have been posted in here; I make $20 an hour and my wife makes $23 an hour, both working full time. We’re not starving, we can afford decent after-school care for my stepdaughter, and we have a comfortable apartment that’s warm in the winter and cool in the summer. But we have jack sh*t in the bank - we always end up in the red every pay period. Either of us loses our job, and it all comes crashing down real quick and real nasty.
And if we’re living paycheck to paycheck on that kind of salary in a city where those kind of salaries are available, I shudder to think how people who make minimum wage in DC have to live and how ill-equipped they are to support a family.
Just because you’re not part of the minimum-wage crew doesn’t mean they don’t exist, and just because you’re living a decent life on your salary doesn’t mean they can do the same on theirs. It’s all well and good that the lot of you on the other side of the debate have done quite well in your individual interactions with capitalism, but there is not guarantee of that for everyone. A living wage still won’t bring about that guarantee, but it would be a damn sight better than what most people have now.
Not all places require first and last month’s rent plus deposit. Many places geared for lower-income types require no deposit of any sort, and just lease month to month. If you can’t afford to live by yourself, get a roommate. Basically, all you need is a bed, a bathroom and a stove, and you’re set.
First off, ten miles on a bike is nothing. I used to ride that to work by choice, because the weather was nice and I liked the exercise. Took about half an hour. What if you work twenty miles away? Better leave early. Thirty miles? Leave a lot earlier, or move closer.
So don’t get sick. 
Realistically, though, I believe most reasonably sized cities have charity-based hospitals that perform services for free, or next to free. And there’s always Medicaid (not that I like Medicaid, but if the service exists, may as well get back some of the value of your tax dollars). What if you get sued? What if you get mugged? What if your complex burns down? Right now, if I got slapped with a frivalous lawsuit and was forced to pay lots of money to someone, and had my wages garnished, I would be in financial trouble. Better have the government demand that I get paid more just in case, right? There are always uncertainties.
Unrealistic? What if I told you that I lived essentially on that budget for about a year? The only difference was that I had a car payment, and received just enough beyond that budget to pay for it, plus gas and car insurance. And I still had enough money to occasionally go to a movie, or splurge by eating at Wendy’s.
You know that most of the people who claim they live below the poverty line own a car? And a TV, with cable? And a microwave? And a phone? A lot of them smoke. Cigarettes are expensive. None of these things are necessary, yet most people who complain they can’t make ends meet still have them.
Jeff
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I make $20 an hour and my wife makes $23 an hour, both working full time. <snip>But we have jack sh*t in the bank - we always end up in the red every pay period.
[/quote]
How is that possible, even in DC, unless you’re not managing your money well? My BF makes 20/hr, I make 12/hr (I work for a nonprofit), we pay rent, car, clothing, and food, yet we manage to bank money from each paycheck. Surely, the Tzeroling isn’t that expensive to clothe and feed?
Part of the problem with Americans is that we are too fond of having it all now, even if we can’t afford it. I agree that working people should be paid enough to cover basic necessities like rent and food, but I don’t agree that the taxpayers should step in to transfer money to the poor to pay for luxuries. You can’t afford a car? Take a bus, carpool, or walk. Want an apartment? Live at home or with a roommate and save money for a deposit.
Hey, I want a bigger TV set, but I told the BF that we have to wait until there’s a sale or we have more money put away. People have to learn the difference between a want and a need. I need a roof over my head and food in my belly, and clothes on my back. Anything else is just a want.
And I live in Fairfax County, VA, which is just as expensive as DC (although we get better value for money and we only have a 4.5 percent sales tax)