The problem is in the term “reasonable wage.”
Is the same wage in every corner of the country “reasonable?” How do you determine what wage is “reasonable?” What if I want to work for less than that “reasonable wage” as an alternative to not working at all?
It’s whatever Congress says it is. That was easy. If you don’t like what they come up with, vote for somebody else.
ETA, the employer has no right to PAY you less, so what you want doesn’t matter.
That would be mighty noble of you to embrace the spirit of volunteerism.
Or, you might be leading the way down the path back to workers in substandard conditions being paid peanuts.
Sometimes we do need regulation, especially when dealing with companies whose sole reason for existence is to produce the largest possible profit with no responsibility whatsoever. I mean, that’s OK. That is what a company is supposed to do. These companies are needed. So are regulations like minimum wage.
Companies unfettered by any regulation would be like a car with an excellent engine and no brakes. It’s not the engines fault when you crash. It would be the fault of the moron who removed the brakes.
Yes, both of those things are accurate descriptions – especially the “if you don’t like it, vote for somebody else…” line. That’s what McCain is – the somebody else.
But when he indicates that he’s the candidate for those that don’t like it, he’s reviled as touting a view that no one could possibly legitimately hold. It’s that I object to. I have no problem losing on the minimum wage issue; I have a problem being told that there’s no reasonable argument to the contrary.
Exactly.
When was the last time the grocery story had a kid bagging your groceries for you, and carried it out to your car? That was the staple job for high schoolers when I was growing up. The local grocery store finally gave up and stopped doing it after a couple of minimum wage hikes. It kinda made sense at $4.25, but not $6.15. So an employment opportunity went away.
I think there’s an argument that a MW can cause problems for some employers, but I think the problems caused by emiminating it would be much worse and more widespread.
More importantly, as far as politics goes, it’s an extremely unpopular position. WQhether McCain is right, wrong or indifferent in his philospphy towards labor, he doesn’t do himself any favors by telling workesr they’re on their own right now.
That’s a very reasonable position to take.
SmartAleq went a bit further, however.
Ok, if you can come up with an anecdotal cite from personal experience, I can come up with one of my own. As recently as two years ago, I worked at a grocery store in Washington State, which has the highest minumum wage of all states (currently at $8.07, I think it was about 7.90 when I worked there). Yet the store could still afford to have workers do the job you just described.
I would like to point out that you offer no documentation of this assertion whatsoever. You offered two anecdotal instances (you and your father) of people who at one time worked for minimum wage and assumedly at that time did not support a minimum wage law. I can counter your anecdotes with two of my own, as I and my SO have both worked for minimum wage and we do support it and have supported every raise put forth by the federal government. I see no cite to show any current proof of any minimum wage worker (grossing $13,624 per year, assuming full time hours) who would have no trepidation whatsoever at the prospect of being reduced to, say, the Kansas minimum wage of $2.65/hour (grossing $5,512 per year, assuming full time hours.) As a matter of fact if you were to produce such a paragon I would find it… remarkable, to say the least.
As a resident of Oregon I’ve heard these Chicken Little pronouncements that higher minimum wages will cause rampant unemployment many, many times. Indeed, since I live right across the Columbia River from Washington, which has the highest state minimum wage in the country I hear it twice over. Nevertheless, somehow we manage to only come in tied at 33rd for overall unemployment rates. Looking at the state minimum wage map and the rankings for unemployment I see no clear correlation that higher minimum wages translate to higher unemployment.
I submit that better paid employees are more efficient at supporting the economy at the base level, where it most needs to be supported. I submit that paying the lowest echelon of workers a higher aggregate wage is better for the economy than paying the same amount of money to the top one percent of the workers, as the larger number of workers spending more money per capita supports the economy in a more healthy way than a richer top echelon does–lower echelon workers buy food and gas and housing, whereas rich people getting richer tends only to support the stock market and the makers of luxury goods.
As for insisting that minimum wage laws encourage hiring illegal aliens, I submit that that is a red herring. Undocumented workers can only be hidden in a small subset of jobs, which are already well represented with illegals. A robust guest worker policy would take care of the issue quite handily, it seems to me–this would remove the “ha ha, I can pay you dick because you can’t complain” loophole.
Then again, since John McCain thinks that Americans won’t pick lettuce for fifty bucks an hour, I can’t in any sort of conscience recommend the guy as knowing much at all about how the economy works or what a fair wage is.
How does your anecdote “counter” mine? I don’t dispute that many otjers, likely even MOST, minimum wage workers support an increase. Many other people, certainly including other minimum wage workers, do not. Your anecdote doesn’t refute my claim.
Ukrops, a local grocery store chain here in central VA, has baggers up the wazoo. They practically yank the groceries out of your arms and force you to follow them to your car. And all of them are high school students.
Of course, Ukrops is hella expensive. But they’ve managed to stay in business (while staying on closed on Sundays!)
But your post reminds me of the stern lecturing about the free market we libruals often get from Walmartians. We aren’t supposed to weep when the local hardware store closes because it’s all about competition, survival of the fittest, and all that jazz. But when they take this argument down to the level of the individual worker, it doesn’t work. Not when the base-level worker doesn’t and can never have as much power as the CEO. Will products become cheaper if all the grocery store CEOs in America said, “Fuck minimum wage laws. We’re paying our cashiers $3 an hour and that’s that!” What magical law of nature would automatically transfer the savings to the consumers rather than perpetuate a greater accumulation of wealth at the other end? We’re supposed to have faith that this would happen, but basic human behavior doesn’t indicate it would be likely. Not all on its own.
A person would have to be heartless to be both anti-union and anti-regulation. Sadly, this seems to be the economic philosophy of many conservatives. Even more tragic is how un-laissez-faire they are when it comes to bedrooms, wombs, and science books. No gay couple ever caused massive unemployment, widespread foreclosures, and demoralized communities. But you better believe GOD HATES THEM ANYWAY!
Before minimum wage regulation, was there a greater or less divide between rich and poor? This isn’t a rhetorical question. I’m honestly curious.
Word. The biggest enemy of small business is big business.
You have offered no support for your claim at all. Do try to keep up. I was specifically targeting John McCain for his smarmy crocodile tears over the plight of the “hard working Americans” and pointing out that it’s disingenous for him to wax all rhapsodic over those people (especially since he only adopted that line of rhetoric to deflect criticism of his “fundamentals of the economy are sound” line spoken on a morning when several huge economic disasters occurred) when he has a longstanding record of ignoring their needs–except for when those needs come up in an election year, when he finds it politically expedient to pay lip service to them. You’re the one who wanted to take a big old side track into your own opinion of the minimum wage law and who supports it. You offered two anecdotal instances of people who at one time worked for minimum wage who did not support it. I merely pointed out that your anecdotes mean absolutely nothing, and to highlight the meaninglessness of it I gave you two equally worthless anecdotes. I still have yet to see any documentation to support your claim that “many” minimum wage workers do not support minimum wage legislation. If you have any such documentation, please by all means produce it. If you don’t have any to produce, feel free to drop this entire line of discussion as it constitutes a highjack of the thread, adds nothing to the general discussion and continuing to harp on it doesn’t reflect well on you.
John McCain has never given a flying fuck about the American worker. Neither has his good buddy, George W. Bush. Working-class people who vote for these candidates are fools.
These are certainly sound ideas, and well worth considering on that side of the minimum wage arguement. However what it sounds like you are repeatedly asserting (and correct me if I’m wrong), is that no reasonable person could possibly not support a minimum wage and/or an increase in the minimum wage. At least, this discussion started out by your vilifying McCain as not being a true friend of the working class, and you specifically listed the reason as being because he does not support the idea of a minimum wage. Surely you know that there are many reputable economists who don’t support a minimum wage because of its unintended consequences and because they believe its effects do more harm than good for the average worker. You may not agree that this is in fact the case, but if you are not seeing the broader points of Bricker’s anecdotes then I’ll see if I can clarify: if someone does not support the idea of a federally mandated minimum wage, that does not make them evil, elitist, out-of-touch with the working man, a running imperialist dog, or so hopelessly vapid that all he wants to do is stay home and roll around naked in his vast piles of thousand-dollar bills that he amassed from the toil of serfs working under him.
I’ve got a great idea: why not make the minimum wage $25/hour? What could possibly be the downside? Joe Lunchbucket gets a great raise, a higher standard of living, and those big corporations have to cut into their obscene profits. And those little inefficient places that can’t properly manage their overhead will burden our economy no more. Win-win!
At no point have I said that “no reasonable person could possibly not support a minimum wage and/or an increase in the minimum wage.” What I said, twice now in fact, is that when John McCain, specifically, prattles on about “hard working Americans” being the “fundamentals of the economy,” I find it disingenous considering that he has done little to support those hard working Americans in ANY way, even one so basic as to support raising the federal minimum wage. In fact, I (as a resident of Oregon) find the federal minimum wage ludicrously low but realize that if one averages cost of living across the entire United States it’s probably JUST enough to keep a single fulltime worker from starving to death and/or living in a refrigerator box on a street corner.
A federal minimum wage of $25/hour is definitely too high and I would not support such a large increase. In some areas, in some circumstances, it’s impossible to get anyone to work for the federal minimum wage, as my mother discovered some fifteen years ago in the San Francisco Bay Area when she had to offer at least $15/hour to get anyone to even submit a resume and this was for a job that required only a valid driver’s license, a high school diploma and no felony record. In return the employee would be taught a valuable set of skills that would be marketable pretty much anywhere. On the other hand, when I worked for a hazardous waste disposal company they found it less expensive to import workers from Mississippi and Louisiana and pay per diem on top of hourly wage because those boys would shovel asbestos without masks for ten bucks an hour. No jobs where they came from, y’see. Smart California boys were holding out for $15/hour and full Tyvek bunny suits on account of they knew how nasty asbestos is.
Now, just because those Louisiana boys were WILLING to put their lives and lungs on the line for ten bucks an hour, would it be okay to ALLOW them to shovel asbestos without masks? OSHA didn’t think so and hence the dumb boys from the swamps were protected in spite of themselves. This is what the federal government does and what it should do–provide minimum standards for employment and job safety and other regulatory checks and balances on corporations, which have a historically, shall we say “spotty” record regarding such things. (As a good example, ever heard of a “company town” with a “company store?”) States can then refine the basic laws to suit the conditions specific to their own unique circumstances. It would be nice if all corporations would pay all their workers a decent living wage and give them safe working conditions even though the workers might be desperate enough to take less than minimum or work in hazardous conditions–but just in case some corporations are tempted to step over that ethical line in order to improve shareholder dividends I’m very glad there are minimum standards that must be upheld regardless of the local conditions.
It would also be nice if I crapped solid gold nuggets every morning, but I’m not holding my breath for that to happen.
Aw man, I was reading this thread just to enjoy the Obama praise, but then people had to go and ruin it for me.
A little background info:
About 5 years ago my company shut down the tech support call center that I worked for so that they could outsource the jobs to India. The reason was that they could pay the Indians 1/50th (at that time) of what they had to pay Americans.
Since then I completed my Business degree. I now work as a contract employee, working on computers, without any healthcare benefits. I recently took on a 2nd job delivering pizza. Very recently, the minimum wage went up, which gets me a few more dollars per week.
I am very much opposed to the MW increase. It gives more incentive to companies to outsource jobs. 1/50 just became more like 1/60. While my current 2 jobs can’t be outsourced, the people who need computer service, and the people who want pizza delivered, do have jobs that can be outsourced.
Minimum wage jobs are for highschool students and idiots. If you are trying to support oa family of 4 on a minimum wage job, then you have made some serious mistakes in your life. I’m sorry if this offends you.
I’m not saying that there should be NO minimum wage. But it shouldn’t be tied to what somebody needs to feed a family.
So, FWIW, I’m a (part time) MW worker that does not support MW legislation. And I’m pro-Obama.
And that becomes the fundamental problem. Because there are people who have had serious problems in their lives, and who are trying to support themselves and families on minimum wage.
Protectionism is not the answer, but at least we can stop rewarding the companies who outsource jobs, and we can start prosecuting those companies who hire illegal aliens. Of course, that will mean that prices will increase, because salaries will have to increase. Which will mean that the same amount of money will, for many things, buy less.
Globalization, while in the long run a terrific thing, in the short term sucks.
See below…
Are there any non-white males who agree with Bricker? How about any females? Is there anyone here currently making the minimum wage who agrees with Bricker. I don’t want to turn this into a poll thread, so please keep it in the context of the OP.
I haven’t noticed a change in this courtesy in Nashville. I even had a waitress walk me to the car with take out food last week.