On the Minimum Wage
LaLo and others have argued against the minimum wage. They honestly think it would benefit the economy. The argument has raged but no one has examined the numbers rationally. Probably the single largest industry with a a minimum wage work force is restaurants. I worked in management there for a decade, so I know.
Allow me to jump to the conclusion and I will backfill with numbers. If fast food could cut the pay of hourly help in half, the price of a McDonalds Quarter-pounder Combo would go down by 42 cents and the profits of the owner would double.
How do I figure? In almost any restaurant, the budget is divided into thirds. About 33% of gross sales goes to food & paper. About a third goes to non-management pay. The hourly help. The other 33% pays for management, rent, utilities, royalties to the parent corporation, debt service (the mortgage) and hopefully profit. In an ideal world, the owner may have a gross profit of 5 to 7% of gross sales.
Take that 33% that the guy flipping burgers gets. Cut it in half. His (or her) pay goes from $8 something to $4 something per hour. That gives the owner an extra 16.5% in his budget. (Half of 33%) Assume he splits it between cutting menu prices and padding his profit. Take half that 16% - that's 8% you can reduce menu prices. In my area, a Quarter-pounder Combo is $5.25. Reduce the price by 8% - that's where you get 42 cents. BFD.
The other half goes to the bottom line. I am still talking in percents. The gross profit, which is 5 to 7% of gross sales (in a perfect world) would more than double.
Which makes me wonder about those who advocate we abolish the minimum wage. Either they have no mathematical skills, or they are whores for the owners who they are actually representing. Or maybe they just despise poor working folks. But there is no economic justification for what they propose.In a free country the provider of a job and the worker are free to negotiate the wages between themselves. It is nobody else's business. I don't think we have the right to deny a worker access to a job they would otherwise take because we have the opinion the wage is too low even if the worker doesn't. Lower wages lead to lower prices for goods and services and the poor benefit the most from lower prices.
But when the employers hold all the power, it isn't a free country is it?
When there is more than one applicant for a job it ceases to be a deal between the employer and employee and becomes a Dutch auction between the two would be employees.
There is no evidence that lower wages lead to lower prices, prices for most items are decided by what the market will bear rather than wage costs, which anyway are almost marginal in many cases.There is a point at which no one will work for the wage offered. Case in point the illegal immigrants that pick fruits and vegtables by hand supposedly because Americans wont work for the wages offered.
Thus proving the need for a minimum wage.
Oh but that means you might have to pay a real price for your food rather than be subsidized by illegal immigrants!Well if we kept illegal imigrants out than farmers would have to raise their wages to entice Americans to do that work and of course we would all have to pay the price. This could present an opportunity for importers to capture more of the market.
Funny, your government has no problem in surcharging imports.
The employee bids out there services to the best payer if they are smart about it. The employer has to pay more to get better employees. The employer is subject to market forces in hiring and other employers compete for employees. As another contributor said. The fast food employees in his area won't work for minimum wage, so the employer has to pay more. This is how it should work in a free country. Central planning doesn't work.
All cost are passed through to the end customer or the business goes out of business. This is economics 101. I don't see how you can say prices aren't driven by input costs. Competition between vendors push the prices down but inputs act as a floor under the lowest price they can accept. If the price is pushed too low then the business will close and the unfortunate employees also lose their jobs. This is another effect of minimum wage - fewer jobs available.
Capitalism isn't perfect - it is just the most best one known in recorded human history. It also provides the most goods and services for the price for all the people.Fine if there is one employer and one employee, we no longer have full employment,instead we have one employer and many (sometimes hundreds) applicants. The job will go to the lowest qualified applicant.
That's why we have mass unemployment.
I didn't say no jobs are driven by input costs, I said many are market led.
Tell me, how many petrol (gas) companies are there in the US. All selling petrol that has cost them different amounts to produce dependant on locality, quality, labour costs etc. etc..
How much price variation is there? Knock out the small independent producers and there is virtually no difference in pump price in a locality.
Same with a big mac, the main driver in price differences is market led.
We introduced a minimum wage in the UK with many predictions of mass unemployment as a result. The reality was no difference in employment. Every body had to pay it.Every one who bought goods and services had to pay for it. You are right about that. The poor who have to spend all their money on needs had to subsidize labor at above market prices when they buy food housing and other necessities of life. You don't get something for nothing. Input costs are passed through to the prices the end consumer pays. When all prices rise the net effect is the worker is no better off. The government wins though in the U.S. because minimum wage boost forces up other wages as well as prices and people move into higher tax brackets.
There is no evidence that increased demand raises prices and a lot of evidence that increased demand reduces prices.
Therefore if you raise the minimum wage you give people more money to spend on essentials, buy two loaves of bread where they bought one before and the per loaf price drops.
Likewise, bring more people into paying taxes and you reduce the amount everybody pays to produce an equal amount of tax revenue.
We saw that in the early 80s when Thatcher removed several million people from the tax paying pool, for the remainder tax increased from 38% of GDP to 44% of GDP.
When the government holds the power it is much worse than the employer having power. You can choose not to work for specific employers that don't deal fairly. The government however can coerce you with guns and threats of incarceration and financially devastating fines.
Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. - Benjamin FranklinIn theory you can choose not to work for a specific employer, in practice you often can't.
What western government has ever forced anybody to work at gun point?Randel Henry wrote:
When the government holds the power it is much worse than the employer having power. You can choose not to work for specific employers that don't deal fairly. The government however can coerce you with guns and threats of incarceration and financially devastating fines.
Those who would give up Essential Liberty to purchase a little Temporary Safety, deserve neither Liberty nor Safety. - Benjamin Franklin
yes you can, you can leave. and see how you conveniently leave out the true message, they can fine you terribly and incarcerate you like the IRS. when they come to arrest you they do come with guns, this is America in the UK police do not carry guns.YOUR ANSWER
In theory you can choose not to work for a specific employer, in practice you often can't.
What western government has ever forced anybody to work at gun point?
he never said they will force you to work with a gun! you took what you wanted ans switched it.
he said if the government gets involved they can scare with incarceration and heavy fines and when they arrest you they do it with guns. you twisted so it fits your thinking and like that can not happen.So you live in an area where there is only one major employer, what are your chances of surviving without him?
You've really lost me on the rest.lol your funny, he said it is better to not depend on the government as they can force all those actions on you, but you can leave a private company if not being treated right.
and I will add if you are doing your job right Most employees will not let you go! and I do not live in a city with one major employee, I live in NY. if you do then you should leave.But why should anybody leave their roots just for the mighty dollar?
Sure, if you're working for the man and doing a good job he's not going to let you go, but what if he's exploiting you and you want to leave?
Not everybody lives in NY so your point is moot.you have a choice. you are not locked in. If you choose to stay it is your choice, many people leave their roots for better paying jobs to support the family and opportunity for a better life. so are those people stupid for leaving? that is the beauty of freedom. If government gets involved it is not free anymore.
I didn't say "forced to work". But now that you ask - Have you heard of the military draft? Most western countries have had that from time to time as the politicians see fit. What happens when you refuse to go? Men with guns come and take you away.
The force I referred to in this case was force to pay minimum wage. Anything the government requires you by law to do is enforced by government agents (police or otherwise) that have the authority to draw a weapon on you if you resist their attempts to enforce it.
Another case I was thinking of was forced to buy health insurance as is currently being attempted.
I have chosen not to work for thousands of employers. Even just starting out with no training or experience. I chose not to work at McD's or any of that type of place. I found other work that was more tolerable for a similar wage in a mom and pop pharmacy. I don't know of any person that has to work for a specific civilian employer.
42 cents may not be that much to you but that could be enough to fuel an increase in sales. And what of the extra profit of the proprietor? He will likely invest that money creating more jobs elsewhere.
Unlikely that it would have much impact on sales and what makes you think the employer would not decide to have longer holidays because of his increased profit.
John I would have to totally agree with you there. Lowering a meal 42 cents is not that big of a deal. For those who can't afford it to begin with, we will not be able to afford it after wards either. Lower it $2 to $3 then you are talking.
Besides which, who actually believes they would even lower it that much if at all? They get their costs cut, but come up with another expense where they have to use that money instead of giving the end consumer a break.
If lowering costs actually lowered the price of the product, then why haven't prices been reduced when the gas prices were lowered from $4 a gallon? You know trucking companies tacked on the extra cost of buying diesel to the shipper, the shipper tacked on their cost to the receiver, and a chain reaction was created until the end consumer saw a rise in prices at the stores. The prices never went down when those costs went away.
I also believe employers will line their own pockets as well as their investors before thinking about giving a break to the end consumer. The investors are always screaming for more profit.
They want cheap labor, but then don't want pay even social security when their cheap labor is to poor to live.
While I won't dispute your math (the figures sound reasonable to me) I would dispute your conclusion.
"If fast food could cut the pay of hourly help in half, the price of a McDonalds Quarter-pounder Combo would go down by 42 cents and the profits of the owner would double". That's a very big IF in my opinion. Few fast food joints pay minimum wage (I doubt there are any in my area) because people won't work at that and they can't work at half that. The inevitable costs associated with a job virtually prevent it (gas, clothing (uniforms, extra shoes, etc.), childcare and others). Even when nearly all fast food workers are teens looking for a few hours a week to buy luxuries you still couldn't get workers for half of minimum wage.
If you could, however, your assumption that management would somehow automatically keep half as profit doesn't fit will with the concept of competition. More likely they would be able to keep 10% of the extra with 90% going to lower prices. Lower prices could induce more total fast food sales (distributed about as they are now) resulting in slightly more profits, perhaps more work hours possible and possibly increased wages.
I don't project that any of these things would happen, merely point out the drawing conclusions from the type of facts you offer is much more difficult in a free enterprise system than simply declaring that this or that would happen. Personally I don't think that eliminating the minimum wage would result in hardly any results at all, but it could go either way. Particularly for those few people that actually feed themselves on it.OK. Let's say the owner will cut the Combo menu price by 75 cents instead of the 42 cents I proposed. Will that induce you to eat lunch twice a day?
My point stands. Decimating the pay of the worker will do damn little to stimulate the economy. IMO, based on working for the owners, they WILL want at least half the benefit of a wage cut.
This model is to illustrate a point. Distributing income from the worker to the owner has no significant benefit in economic terms for the consumer or the economy. It will have serious economic repercussions in the economy as the very bottom earners will sink so far below substance levels that changes in their spending habits would adversely affect housing, groceries, utilities, which they would not be able to afford without massive old-soviet-style overcrowding. Multiple families per apartment and vacancies as a result.They may want half the benefit of lower wages but they won't get it.
Distributing income from the worker to the owner leaves the same amount of money in circulation in any case; as you say there is no significant benefit in economic terms, although the owner may buy more luxuries while the worker is stuck either way buying nothing but necessities.
You continue to write as though anyone can survive on minimum wage; it is not possible for any but single people living in shacks with (many) room mates to do so. The only places where you will find minimum wage being paid are locations where cost of living is low enough to permit a person to scrape by on it. Even then cutting it in half can only result in no workers as no can live in this country on $4/hour.You manage to hit directly a point worthy of a blog.
People making $8 per hour spend 100% of what they earn. People who earn over a million annually may spend less than half of that. The rest has no stimulative effect. Tax relief for the middle class will often be spent - increased consumption drives hiring. Increased savings creates zero jobs.Nonsense! How many people do you know got rich by putting their excess money in their mattress? Rich invest their money. They put it to work to make more money creating jobs in the process!
Nonsense! The rich invest their money. They put it to work in China and India and don't create any jobs at home.
Increase pay and you increase the money spent in the domestic economy creating local jobs and promoting local business.Even investing in foreign countries creates jobs at home.
As many jobs as money spent in the local community!
I very much doubt it.US companies creating jobs in foreign countries took away most of the good manufacturing jobs from us leaving hundreds of thousands unemployed who now have to work two to three jobs just to make what they use to make. Those who can't are now living in their cars, on the streets, or in tent cities that have popped up in various areas especially over in California.
You are also forgetting the lesson of the great depression. The law of supply and demand kick in between employees and employers. Without minimum wage, the fight to the bottom will commence as it did in the depression. If there is a large employee base and small employer base, the employer will pay the least amount possible to the person who is able to perform the job.
Back in the depression era, people were fighting over jobs with low pay and long hours. Employers were only paying $.25 an hour, or a set rate for the day. There was no such thing as overtime pay. If lucky a person brought home $10 a week. If you didn't go to work, or couldn't perform you were fired, and the next person took your place. They only bought necessities, lived in crammed houses, and relied on family and friends to get by.
That is how many of our labor laws got enacted from child labor laws, minimum wage, to over time pay.
Don't forget the lessons in history, and don't forget big business is out for itself, and doesn't care about the little guy.
You got that right! And 100% of $8.00 an hr is not enough. That doesn't even HALF cover it! Just the basics, mind you...nothing extra.
That is why people work 2 and 3 jobs.
Gee-did'ya ever wonder if maybe the Cost Of Living might go down?
NAH--can't have that!
High cost/Low wages= what?
Misery, sickness and despair.
In the "richest country in the world"....it's unconscionable.
Serving God, or Mammon? You be the judge.
You compLETEly ignored these facts:
1) children aren't allowed to work in our society until age 16 (or so), and are forced to go to school instead. While school is USUALLY the better of the two options, lord knows a lot of poor families could really use the income.
2) Sure, restaurants could pay less, but who would work at a crappy job like McD's for $3/hour? And before you say "well, what if they don't have an option?!", let me remind you that, even if they did NOT have an option (which is highly laughable), then $3/hour is much better than 0.
3) If you don't pay people money, then they won't want to work. Pay people a few extra bucks and get dedicated workers, or pay them less and watch them call in sick every other day.
4) You forgot competition: if profits "double", then ... well, I just might start up my own Restaurant!! As profits increase, so too goes competition. I'm already thinking about quitting my work towards a teacher (lousy pay, early hours, bratty kids, no respect from parents or students), and if I could make more money opening a restaurant (My family members are fantastic cooks), I would. But I doubt the profits are there because competition is ravenous.
So, sure, you "did the math", but how do you calculate "when profits increase, competition will alter the profits to an unpredictable quantity".
Sorry, but you can't. Keynes tried and has been proven wrong decade after decade.1. In the McDonald's example, there's also a rather major unintended consequence to cutting the cost of a Quarter Pounder Combo. We'd be going in the wrong direction in terms of incenting people to eat healthy! If I am a $3 an hour worker am I going to go for the discounted QPC or the chicken salad at twice the price???
Anyway, I digress....
There is a lot of that prostitution going around lately. A whole bunch of stupid Americans are mouthing off against the healthcare bill. Do they have any idea who has planted the talking points and sound bites they're spewing? Obamacare, government controlled health care, death panels -- could it be... the INSURANCE COMPANIES they're actually representing when they rant???So, anyone opposed to the 'We'll figure out what's in it after we pass it behind locked doors' health care law is "stupid"? Is that it?
We'll save your 'Big Brother Will Tell You What To Eat' bit for later.No, the people who are stupid are not going to read the healthcare bill anyway. They don't have any interest in what's really in it. They get all their information from Tea Party rallies and Fox News. No thinking required. Open your mouth and say "ahhhh." Now swallow everything we tell you.
The thing is this. If you have health insurance now, and you're happy with it, you can keep exactly what you have.
So why should you care a whit whether other Americans are now being afforded the "privilege" of having what you so enjoy.
Why is that so threatening to you?
The vehement reaction against this healthcare bill is completely irrational. Irrationality bothers me."No, the people who are stupid are not going to read the healthcare bill anyway. They don't have any interest in what's really in it"
You mean like the members of Congress who voted for it? Yeah, they were pretty stupid, huh?"The thing is this. If you have health insurance now, and you're happy with it, you can keep exactly what you have."
If that company stays in business, if the premiums don't grow beyond your ability to pay them, and if your employer finds it mysteriously necessary to drop you into the public swimming pool...You've just made my point for me.
There is way too much tenuousness in the current system.
Having access to decent health care should not be dependent on employer largesse. In fact, it should not be a financial burden on employers or employees.
When Costa Rica has a better health care system than America, it does suggest room for improvement.
And no, I do not think the members of our Congress are stupid."I do not think the members of our Congress are stupid."
According to your previous statement, they must be."Having access to decent health care should not be dependent on employer largesse"
It should be dependent on government largesse?
My employer is still in business, but insurance premiums went up 40% per year for two years. They increased our portion to 30% from 20% and picked up the rest of the increase but last year the best they could find was still an increase of 80% over the prior year.
We no longer have health insurance.
And nothing Obamacare can do will make it affordable for me to purchase any unless uncle sam pays for it. After taking a 22% pay cut on my job and a 100% cut on my wife's (laid off permanently) there isn't anything left for health care.
MM, I find the concept behind your post extremely offensive. Not that you posted it, and certainly not you, but the concept that big daddy in DC needs to care for me.
I am absolutely sick to death of govt idiots "incenting" me. Wear your seat belt. Wear you bicycle helmet and rollerskate kneepads. Eat this. Don't eat that. Use birth control. Practice safe sex. Watch your blood pressure and cholesterol count. Exercise daily.
If I'm stupid enough to stuff my bloated face with a QPC every day, let me! It'll improve the gene pool. On the other hand if I want one once in a while let me do that and don't try to influence my decision by means of "incentives" to live the way big daddy in DC thinks I should. The very concept that there is somehow a "wrong" direction here is itself what is wrong and is producing a nation of sheeple, unable to think or reason for themselves.
Sorry for the rant - that one pushed a button big enough for 10 people.insurance companies WROTE the bill. They LOVE the bill
ObamaCare makes it illegal to NOT buy their products.
What a hell of a subsidy!! I wish someone would make it illegal to not give me money!
Another thing that bothers me is trolls who post on the Hub Pages with no profile, no avatar, no hubs.
It is very difficult to take such anonymous "contributors" seriously.Let me quote MM on this one: "No, the people who are stupid are not going to read the healthcare bill anyway." It was the very politicians voting for the bill that were too "stupid" to read it. And these are the same stupid people we want in charge of our health care? I don't think so! Look at how they have managed the budget for an example of how health care would be run.
Health care is far too important to be turned over to the federal government.But because it is important, too important, to be turned over to the Federal Government we turn it over to who has screwed it up? the insurance industry... are you kidding me? I work for them - have most of my adult life. If you think you are getting a braintrust of fiscal whizkids in the insurance industry, think again.
We put national defense, nuclear energy, and intelligence gathering in the hands of the Federal Government but not ensuring universal healthcare access. How many examples of real "death panels" would you like to read? Send me your email....lollDTR you work for the insurance companies and you do not have good Health-care? that is sad. I would have thought that would be your best benefit for working in that field.
I work for insurance companies, but as an independent contractor - part of the outsourcing in the industry lolll. I am the cheaper alternative to full-time employees in other words. But insurance companies, oddly enough, are not known for having the best health insurance benefits.
Look up the term "marginal utility" and how it relates to "for-profit" healthcare insurance. Then tell us all how private health care insurance companies have your best interest, your health, in mind...
It is a false dichotomy to say one must like the insurance company if they don't like the take over of the health care system by the federal government. I am not keen on many of the practices of health insurance companies.
I want the right to opt out or to choose a different health care provider if I so choose. It is my health and my right. (Remember the calls to get the government to let women decide what to do with their bodies. Men should have the right as well.)
If you want to change the argument to what is wrong with the insurance companies I will be glad to join you in that.
The main problem we have currently is that the health care insurance should not be tied to employment. (Another problem caused originally by government medaling with the market in the area of wage controls.) This reduces choice. The best way to reduce insurance company malfeasance is to allow people to vote with their feet. The insurance company has no power if the customers can leave.We agree - I want the option as well. I would, personally, love to "opt-in" to a government program and would gladly, willingly pay for it via payroll deduction/tax. Raise my taxes 5-7%. I would still be a deal compared to $10,000 a year premiums for a family of 5 with a $2500 deductible. And like you, I don't want my coverage "tied" to where I work.
I want insurance that isn't dependent on employment, employer, etc.
If you want to keep private healthcare insurance, by all means - do so. Even if we had a "public option," insurance companies would not "go under." They would simply modify their product to meet the new market demand. The wealthy, and if recent statistics are accurate that is one number whose ranks haven't been affected by the recession, will always buy private coverage and God bless - more power to them. It's the middle class who are squeezed into deciding how to make ends meet when healthcare premiums rise annually two or three times more than the inflation rate - usually much more.
The idea of mandatory coverage, and yes - it may not be Constitutional, is to broaden the pool of risk for private insurers. You have the 18-35 year old crowd who don't, at least traditionally, purchase healthcare insurance - for whatever reason. This demographic is traditionally very healthy and would help to float the higer risk insureds. I mean it seriously is very basic insurance principle. People can spin it into a "Federal takeover of healthcare" but it is one of the few ways, universal participation, wherein you will actually see a drop in healthcare costs. It gets accused of socialism, but it's really just basic business - if you think about it.
And you have a country where 50% of healhcare is paid for by approximately 10 large insurance carriers. And that is damn close to being a monopoly.
No, it should depend on the goal of healthcare NOT be "to make the biggest profit possible".
....no matter if someone DIES.
We have to get the vultures out of it.
The health and well-being of the citizens of this country needs to be the goal, not the profits of all the industries surrounding it..and they are legion!!
It's HARDLY "largesse" if you have a child dying of cancer.Here's the answer: Single-Payer!!
Cali is doing like Vermont. Common sense,baby.
http://www.dailykos.com/story/2011/04/0 … u-Can-HelpIm all for states implementing such a plan. The measurement for success will be are people moving out of the state or into it.
The feds however have no business taking over the health care business.... or the 50% of it they don't already control.Obama has already said he is not into controlling everything and everybody.
All he said is States must meet the Federal requirement to cover everybody...how they do it is up to them.
That is an excellent way to go IMO.
That way--no one has an "out"...
Gotta work together for the good of all.Obama is a liar. Anyway he's just telling the states they must gave health care and it must meet his requirements. That's not giving the states or the people a choice just the illusion of such...
"Obama is a liar"....just remember that when you cry when people say things about Bachmann and Palin.
And how's this for a choice that youR side has offered us so far:
Have money or die.
Lady Love, you are right - the Feds are involved in 50% of the nation's healthcare. Why don't you ask those veterans and active duty service people to give up their Tri-Care of VA Healthcare Coverage.
I have mentioned that to more than a few - when confronted by the Conservative and Tea Party rhetoric in these groups. I usually get a moment of silence; no one wants to give up a good thing, a great thing. I have rarely heard anyone bitch about health care in the service and even few bitch about the service they receive at the VA.
All we want, all the libs ever wanted, was a public option. The right to choose whether we wanted to stay with for-profit healthcare insurance or not-for-profit healthcare coverage.
"To place the compensation of Ford’s two top executives in perspective, their combined payout of $152 million is equivalent to the annual wages of 5,241 hourly workers earning the coming industry benchmark of $14 an hour—i.e., the wage bill for a large auto plant.
These facts expose the fraud of the claims that “there is no money” for jobs, decent wages and vital social needs such as education, health care and housing. The Ford announcement came as the Obama administration and congressional Democrats were offering to cut a record $33 billion from social programs in the current year’s federal budget and as the Republicans were preparing to unveil a plan to slash trillions of dollars, gutting Medicaid and privatizing Medicare, beginning in fiscal year 2012."
***
There is plenty of $$ in this country...it has all flown to the tippy-top!
We don't buy your BS: cut cut cut cut cut.
All you really mean is more more more more more...for those who already have more money than 150 million of the rest of us.
To paraphrase John Lennon: "The scam is over" (the dream is over)The idea of being "forced" to buy health insurance...
I look to the laws requiring auto insurance...
Now, I know an immediate response points to 1) How driving is not a requirement, and 2) the risk of harm to self and other individuals is very great..
I agree that living is not a choice, at least not in the way driving is...
Yet, the human body is something that is at grave risk, and when it gets harmed it can cost far more than car repairs... And when the problems come, unlike the car, a person cannot simply put off "repairs" until better economic times...
Just like the driver with no auto insurance...when the "accident" comes...it is "the people" who get stuck with the bill when there is no coverage...either family, friends, banks, or government has to step in...or the person gets thrown by the wayside..
A person choosing not to have health insurance is going to go crawling somewhere when they hit a health related snag....it is nearly inevitable..
Perhaps there are those who will crawl into the grave or struggle with a dibilitating problem without much fuss or drive to seek help....but I haven't ever seen that happen in real life...
With this said, it was my understanding that the health care plan would have involved a government sponsored set of alternatives which were, at least in theory, designed to lower the price of health insurance through market competition...
Since the current health care system is basically a cartel, and they can set prices, why not have an outside horse that can potentially bite away at that block of power and control?
I know that the "option" portion didn't make the cut...which would alter the intention of the bill overall...but have I misunderstood the concept behind this legislation?
I want to place this idea next to the main point about minimum wage..
While I admit that I did not read through the whole thread, I liked the original poster's mentioning of the fast-food chain restaurant...
Some points were made to contest its validity, and I wanted to write in answer to them...
Removing the minimum wage would not benefit the youth of this nation... From McDonalds to Taco Bell, the people working behind the counter, and most definitely in the back are overwhelmingly adults who are immigrants. I can't vouch for their immigration status, but I do know that one particular chain restaurant here in L.A. hires nearly exclusively undocumented women...
They make 8 dollars an hour...the minimum wage...
But the integrity of the management is seen through other ways...
When the workers run overtime, those extra hours are removed from the books... By hiring the undocumented, there is no legal recourse... While there are laws in California that extend the labor protections to the undocumented, arrest, imprisonment, separation from family, and the risk of leaving children destitute without parents or income is too great...
But I am working independently on an investigation of this restaurant chain now...
My point is this...removing minimum wage would be a grave mistake..
Many companies are barely running legally as it is..To think there are plenty of Americans who would work there if the management didn't want to undercut the employees and government. I'm assuming they don't pay into workers comp and stuff like that with undocumented workers. I wonder how much they are saving there as well.
There goes the excuse the illegals are doing the jobs Americans won't.
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Is the Call for Raising the Minimum Wage a Detriment?
by rhamson 8 years ago
Two trains of thought are being bantered back and forth. Does a raising of the minimum wage create job loss and lower profits and more unemployment or does it increase disposable income thereby jump starting the economy and increasing hiring?
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Does the United States need a maximum wage as well as a minimum wage?
by Ralph Deeds 11 years ago
Does the United States need a maximum wage as well as a minimum wage?In response to a huge increase in inequality of income and wealth a movement has begun in support of establishing a maximum wage. CEOs would be limited to a specified multiple of the company's worker pay. Barclay's bank CEO...
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The Minimum Wage
by Shawn McIntyre 10 years ago
Always a hot button issue, let's see what HubPages has to say:Should the Minimum Wage be:A) Raised. B) LoweredC) Done away with immediately D) Phased out over the next 10 years.E) None of the above.