Most businesses are keeping all minimum workers just under the hours needed to require healthcare coverage. That aisde, those plans are not at all economical. A few places I’ve worked at even offered it at a higher cost than my private policy, which is currently 165.00 a month and subject to increases twice yearly regardless of claims. I have keep it in case of a catastrophic injury, but have never met a deductible, nor even come close to it.
A theory? Only if simple math is just a theory. It is a zero sum game, no matter who owns the business. Increasing worker’s wages decreases owner profit (be they stockholders, privately held or Mom & Pop). Workers spend more, owners spend less; no inflation.
Now, if they would just not rather lower their standard of living so their workers can make a living wage, that is a different debate altogether. But your inflation argument just doesn’t hold water.
Unless you’re living in 1970s Hong Kong, this is baloney. The United States has TONS of regulations on its capitalism. Whether they or good regulations or not, or the right ones, or enough, is another issue. But we do NOT live in anything like a completely free market, and have not for generations.
Oh get off it. No one said it was a free market. It is obvious though, that what regulation we do have is either unenforced, or so full of loopholes that it is unenforceable providing that the big companies don’t just buy off whoever they need to. Pretty much anything but the most blatant transgressions get a big “meh” from law enforcement.
I was unaware that they kept people beneath the minimum, I worked at Mcdonalds full time from the ages of 16-21 (some of that was only during summer and christmas break but a solid two years full time before I went to college) and I was working 40-45 hours (yeah I got overtime cause I actually worked), so either they knew I was on my parents insurance and would never apply or they though it was worth it to give me insurance if I needed it. (I also got a fifty cent raise with in my first year).
My point is i see no reason for a living wage, I see no real positive effect. I do realize that people come under rough times and some would have much difficulty living on current minimum wage standards, and I strongly believe that as a human i am morally obligated to help these people. On the other hand i am strongly against the use of force or threat of force in helping these people. I actually think that if we increased minimum wage it would cause less entry level jobs, people would find a way to not have to hire them thus being a net negative rather than a positive.
I strongly disagree with this statement. our biggest problem is laws concerning unions more than any other thing. The biggest problem is poor regulation and too much regulation rather than no regulation.
Things do not have to work the way your theory says they should. There is no requirement that a company accept lower profits due to paying higher wages. They can, and many will, raise prices to consumers. If the stockholders are displeased with lower profit, they can vote out the board of directors, and vote in people more likley to increase profit…either by reducing costs or raising prices.
Companies cannot make up profits paid as higher wages by simply raising prices. In a free market, raising prices in the absence of increased demand will result in fewer sales as consumers seek out competitive prices. The only way to compete is to accept lower profits. Stop digging, Oak.
Until it actually happens, it’s a theory. Once it’s happened, it’s history. The point under discussion was a living wage for all minimum wage workers. My theory is that will cause prices to rise on everything. I see no reason demand would increase or decrease in this hypothetical. Supply remains the same, Demand remains the same, cost of production goes up, prices go up. MickeyD’s is still competitive with Burger King, because they both have the same labor cost increase. Oak’s Burger Joint may go bankrupt, because my margins are slimmer than the big players. Oak’s former employees are double screwed, because now they’re unemployed and things cost more. Oak’s former employers vote against President Acid Lamp next election. Oak now becomes President. (Cue Ewok Celebration).
In your world all people have the ability to do sophisticated jobs. They have the intelligence to do college and obtain skills that will make them fiscally fine. Who waits tables in your world. Who cleans places up . Who takes care of the sick.
Some don’t plan on mopping floors,they just have an IQ of 80. I suppose they should commit suicide. They sure can not expect to live and raise a family. They do not deserve that.
Or, alternatively phrased as a question: why does anyone pay above minimum wage or give out benefits?
Ever watch Dirty Jobs on TV. There are a lot of dirty nasty jobs that deserve good pay. They do not require intelligence or a degree. Most of you would starve before you would do some of those jobs.
You would argue that they should get paid minimum wage .
Probably came out of the time when the boss was the owner, someone who started a biz from the ground up and has his fortune at stake , as opposed to some one off the street who goes home for the weekend and thinks nothing more of the place until monday.
While those places probably still exist, todays boss has more likely parachuted in, and has a background in some manufacturing , personel management , accounting and workplace related legal understanding.
Declan
The quote wasn’t about supporting a family. It was about someone being able to support themselves. And I fucking grew up in poverty because my mom is slow and couldn’t acquire those skills so had to stick to unskilled labor.
Did I deserve that childhood? Tell me. Did I deserve having to learning to deal with missing out on all that special stuff familis do with their kids cause my mom couldn’t afford it? Did I deserve going to bed hungry because sometimes we couldn’t afford food?
cite?
I was under the impression the American way was we’re all equal and we get ahead by hardwork whether at school or at the foundry. Not school people are better then those street urchin working class people who don’t even deserve to feed their kids.
I’d be willing to reconsider if you have a cite.
Hmm just a thought, but couldn’t you let the free market decide if higher pay grades are worth their requested price?
Setting the bare minimum doesn’t define the maximum. Just because you could hypothetically support a family with the basics working an unskilled job doesn’t mean you wouldn’t want to strive for more.
Most people have ambitions beyond 50 cent mac and cheese dinners and $6 clothes from family dollar.
A fitting end to your largely fairy tale understanding of economics.
It is pretty clear . Some people think you have no reason to breed. Those who make less should not have children. They should have no expectations. We will have to pass laws to keep people who make less than 40 K from having kids.
It is time for debtors prison to come back. Some of the old ideas are the best. Can’t pay your bills, straight into jail with you. Lose your job, lose your children.
My bad; you said “unregulated capitalism.” Would you like to explain the big difference between “unregulated capilatism” and “free market?”
You see many 12 year olds with jobs?
Lots of employers letting people work over 40 hours without overtime?
Most businesses ignoring required licensing?
Ignoring EEOC rules?
Ignoring zoning laws and health codes?
Ignoring product-safety rules?
Just an example. What percentage of the stuff you buy is labor intensive?
As for Intel, I was part of the labor cost. Check out the cost of a fab these days. In the design process, most of the cost is (high priced) labor. There is a bunch of computing cost, and the facilities, but it’s mostly labor. Once you go into production it is highly automated. There is some labor of course, and engineering costs for yield improvement and debug, but new fabs cost a billion bucks, and labor is nowhere near that high.
New processor pipelines cost a bunch, but most of the processors you buy are derivatives - that is slight speed bumps from finding slow paths or moving to a new process. The labor cost for those is very small. In 1996 they were still selling some Pentiums, but there were about 4 people in Santa Clara working on them. The very last one moved into my group.
I have no idea of the economics of a hamburger place, but say there are 5 people at $10 / hour for 16 hours. That’s $800 a day, or about 80 average transactions. Is one a minute at high times reasonable? Labor would be 25% of total costs max, and I’m sure it is much lower in the supply chain, where mass quantities of products are moved. So you have to move down the supply chain to do this measurement. McDonalds no doubt has higher labor costs than most. The TV Department of Best Buys has lower costs. In any case, an increase of x% in pay is going to result in an increase of << x% in product cost, so the laborer wins.
Labor costs in fast food goes from about 25 to 30 percent of gross. At least it did about 30 years ago when I was involved. I am sure McDucks is a little lower.