Sorry for the triple post. The same source from the post above shows that you’re probably right about GMOs.
Just because I posed the questions doesn’t mean I’m positive I’d get them all right. Sometimes the scientific consensus changes. On the minimum wage question though, I’d note that I phrased the question very simply. As an economic principle, raising the price of anything reduces demand for it.
And I’d argue that while knowing current events is important, so is knowing about important, relevant issues where things don’t change much. It doesn’t help to know all the details of the minimum wage debate if one doesn’t remember their high school level economics. And I’d argue that anyone who doesn’t know things like what the three branches of government are and what’s in the 1st amendment should probably save democracy by educating themselves or staying home.
Actually as a matter of economic principles, not necessarily. It depends on the elasticity (or inelasticity) of demand for the good or service. And for some goods and services (generally status items) there is even a paradoxical reverse curve in which demand increases as price goes up (up to a point).
Economists are aware the demand has varying levels of elasticity/inelasticity and therefore debate what the degree of elasticity is at the low end of the wage/job structure. IF employers are using lower wage employees to the degree they need to use them then the demand is very inelastic at least at the low end of the curve and no jobs would be lost with a modest raise in minimum wage.
Economists would then also consider the secondary effects of raised minimum wage … Would it cause a “trickle up”? That is would lower wage employees now with more money actually consume more and stimulate more hiring? The actual answer would likely be different for different markets at different points in time.
The straightforward most simple answer is that most economists would not endorse the unqualified statement that “raising minimum wage causes job loss.” Most GOP voters and politicians however would believe that they would.
Sometimes someone thinking they know something that they don’t really understand is worse than someone knowing that they don’t know it.
I really shouldn’t use a phrase like “trickle up” without referencing more about it.
Demand for cheap labor is not inelastic though. Cheap labor is the most vulnerable type of labor to automation or other efficiencies.
Minimum wage laws have positive effects, but job growth for unskilled labor is not one of them.
Well the impact of automation on employment was the subject of another thread …
In point of fact however many of the country’s current lowest wage (unskilled) jobs are not as subject to automation or outsourcing out of country. They are harder and more expensive to automate, home health aides, janitorial, working at the counter dealing with customers and with whatever odds and ends need being done be it at a fast food place or Target … it’s the middle to lower middle that is most being hollowed out by automation.
A modest increase in minimum wage does not make automating the jobs that have not been already automated attractive enough. And what could be exported has been. The lowest level is pretty inelastic to a moderate increase.
I am not convinced that modestly increased minimum wage would increase job growth, but it is, as a point of fact, not true that “most” economists agree that raising it is necessarily a job killer. The actual evidence seems to be that such modest raises have no real impact on employment rates. The evidence is referenced above. The Dept of Labor concurs: “A review of 64 studies on minimum wage increases found no discernable effect on employment.” The Center for Economic and Policy Research states:
Again, the claim you have made is simply simplistically wrong.
That’s because an economy is a complex thing and things like economic growth can hide the effect of an increase. Unemployment went up during the stimulus, yet the CBO said the stimulus created jobs according to their model. Because the idea that injecting $800 billion into the economy wouldn’t create jobs would be ludicrous.
Another example is the climate. The fact that CO2 stores heat is about as well established in science as anything can get. Yet despite the fact that CO2 in our atmosphere goes up every year, some years are colder than previous years because other factors can overcome the CO2 increase.
The CBO also confirmed that the proposed minimum wage increase would actually cost some jobs on net.
More articles in mainstream press about the nexus between donations to the Clinton Foundation and policymaking, plus this little tidbit:
http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/the-fix/wp/2015/04/23/hillary-clintons-baggage-problem/
It’s interesting that there’s no outrage that she broke her word to President Obama.
Which results in this:
It’s hard to debate when people don’t even agree on basic facts. I hope at this point we can stop debating whether or not Clinton is honest. The evidence shows she’s not and the public is firmly on the side of not. Anyone who attempts to argue that she is is living in a liberal bubble.
“Honest” isn’t a binary thing. Is she more or less honest than most politicians? If you think she’s less, present some evidence – compare her honesty to other politicians.
Or let me do it for you – Hillary is significantly less dishonest than Marco Rubio, Mitt Romney, John McCain, John Boehner, and Mitch McConnell.
Politifact doesn’t measure honesty. Instead, why don’t we compare how Clinton handles her scandals vs. how John McCain handled his one? He handled it by total transparency and full cooperation with the Keating investigation and admitted he’d made a mistake. John Mccain is a heck of a lot more honest than Hillary Clinton.
As for Romney, that’s who she’s rightly being compared to.
It measures accuracy and honesty. It measures “who tells the truth more often, and who tells falsehoods more often”. Hillary tells the truth more and tells a lot fewer falsehoods than all of those Republicans.
According to Politifact, McCain tells the truth a lot less than Hillary, and tells a lot more falsehoods. Whether or not his falsehoods are knowing or not doesn’t matter much to me. I don’t believe you that McCain is more honest.
She tells a lot fewer falsehoods than Romney.
It more accurately measures the quality of a politician’s staff work, and “Pants on fire” ratings often mean just “badly wrong” rather than a lie. Whereas a half truth can deceive a lot more effectively and often can be said with deceptive intention.
A reputation going back 40 years trumps a few years of Politifact ratings. McCain is virtually scandal-free and his one scandal was a model of transparency and repentance. Clinton’s reaction to every scandal is to clam up. She has yet to even attempt to answer questions about the Clinton Foundation and her email press conference was filled with lies.
And it measures honesty. It points out when politicians lie, in addition to when they’re wrong.
I don’t accept your evaluation of McCain’s history and reputation (or Hillary’s) as truth. I trust Politifact a lot more than you.
And Politifact says what about Keating vs. the email and foundation scandals?
On the email scandal, they say this:
And, as is typical:
That’s one thing. Overall, Politifact rates Hillary as significantly honest, trustworthy, and accurate than McCain. I trust their evaluation more than yours.
You mistake their compilation of ratings for an “evaluation”. Politifact makes no such claim that any one politician is more honest than another.
So Hillary Clinton said, “America invented the community college” and got a “true” point. Her honesty and transparency are something to be envied, indeed.
Okay, then I’ll say Politifact’s compilation of data indicates Hillary is a lot more honest, trustworthy, and accurate than McCain.
Transparency is a separate issue, but compared to McCain, Hillary’s honesty absolutely is to be envied, according to the data.
If the data measured statements by their significance, the data would be better, but that’s left up to the reader.
What the difference in statements between McCain and Clinton actually indicates is that McCain is more likely to speak off the cuff. When Clinton speaks off the cuff, she’s actually pretty embarassing. McCain has never said anything as dumb as “landing under sniper fire” or “We were dead broke”.
He said “yes” to VP candidate Palin. That’s way, way dumber than anything Hillary said.