UE benefits, food stamps, etc already have time limits to them. Besides, there's a negative association taking those minimum wage jobs that takes away your future earnings power. If you're an engineer, you're probably more employable as an engineer if you've been out of work looking for a year, then if you've been working at McDonalds for the last year.
Why should the livfestyle of an engineer be subsidized while the McJob workers need not apply for unemployment benefits?
The people who work at Walmart don't have a lot of career options. I can either ignore their plight or vote for a government that is responsive to their needs.
Weekly: 12 credit hours, 20 hours studying, 40 hours working. UH is about 6 grand a year in state. Work 48 weeks with 4 weeks of vacation. Earn a little over $11k. Leaves about $5k for living. $416 a month for living expenses. Seems unfeasible without serious government assistance. Better idea: drop minimum wage to $2 an hour and make it up with 30% tips. Edit: it is feasible at a school like BYU or UF, though. Their tuition is a little of 3k.
The engineer who works at McDonalds would probably still get food stamps and other benefits since they probably are older and have a larger household. And it would mean someone else is NOT working at McDonalds and thus is still collecting UE benefits. There are more people than jobs. Someone is going to end up getting the UE benefits, etc.
anyone who can go through four years of engineering not only has keen problem-solving and mathematical skills---they also have the incredible ability to be able to withdraw, for years at a time, from any woman of any kind. people like that need to be protected and nourished for the good of mankind.
A rise in the minimum wage will be inflationary as it always is. That, coupled with rising fuel prices, is not what we need right now. Inflation on top of inflation? No thanks.
^The empirical evidence on that is mixed. It's kind of a chicken and egg situation---in times of high inflation there will naturally be pressure to raise the minimum wage. Whether or not minimum wage increases are exogenous or endogenous to changes in inflation is hard to isolate. which is a nice rejoinder--- Minimum Wage in U.S. Fails to Beat Inflation: Chart of the Day this isn't even factoring in debt deleveraging, which is creating extreme deflationary pressure, and the argument that more inflation is healthier for an indebted American consumer, such that even if your argument were true, it fails on the implicit premise that inflation would be harmful.
Go ahead and raise it if need be, but try to do it based on a 12-hour workday instead of 8. If you're making that little it might make sense to put in a longer day, at multiple jobs if need be.
Well if The Market requires them to live in cardboard boxes that is just the way it is. Quit you pity party., you snivelilng liberal. God created man and nature and The Market andd social Darwinism, doncha know. God created the laws of nature and the mathematical laws that underly his creation like gravity and the market are immutable. It is not man's perogative to interfere or to try to improve on market outcomes as that is hubris and destined fo fail.
Yeah, try actually living on that in San Francisco. Raising minimum wage generally raises wages for low paying jobs. There is a stigma attached to being paid minimum wage, so companies pay a couple of dollars more to attract qualified employees they want representing their business. Oh that job pays $9 or $10 an hour, that's pretty good....$15 an hour? That's amazing. Not so much when the minimum wage is $11 per hour.
Probably true, although most engineers wouldn't be out of work for a significant amount of time. I think the unemployment rate for engineers is about 2%. My son's about to graduate with a computer engineering/computer science degree (double major, Major), so it damn well better be. (and we'll be very happy not to be paying for his education!)
