this guy is very funny <iframe width="560" height="315" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/kJR0DYs70f8" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
I've said it before, but raising the minimum wage is the absolutely worst move when it comes to government initiatives to fight poverty. Food stamps, unemployment insurance, welfare, and other subsidies of those nature are largely paid for by the rich through a progressive system of taxation, and thus you're taking from the rich to give to the poor. Minimum wage does not do this. In fact, you are generally taking from the middle classes and giving to the poor, because it's the middle classes who are much likely to go to institutions which pay their workers minimum wage.
States that have higher minimum wages also have stronger small business growth. It's pretty well correlated that a raise in the minimum wage INCREASES growth amongst small businesses. To understand why this is - small businesses usually page much higher than the minimum wage as they need a bit more talented group of people working for them. You can't have a scrub managing your small store - one error by that person has huge negative impact on your biz. The companies that pay out minimum wage are vastly large mega-corporations. When you raise the minimum wage, all of a sudden it gives small businesses a boost since their wages stay the same (already higher) and make them more competitive.
And does not your point inherently concede that raising the minimum wage ends up raising prices, like those opposing it have argued? Which is the inherent problem of minimum wage, because now it means that prices have been raised, meaning the purchasing power of the middle class has now decreased.
hell no.. I made $3.35 an hour in college.. min wage is already too high. Get out and get a real job if McD's doesn't pay enough. Too much bloat and waste to throw more money at it. Welfare doesn't need any more waste. Hell they already get free cell phones and steak / lobster dinners on my dime. Higher minimum wage removes any incentives to better themselves by looking for higher paying jobs. Personally I think it should be lowered.
Not based on anything factual that I have seen. This is a "common sense" argument that just isn't supported by the facts. http://truth-out.org/news/item/14050-minimum-wage-hikes-do-not-cause-inflation
Another problem is the minimum wage creates a surplus of labor (unemployment). What this means is your employer has less incentive to care how they treat you as a minimum wage employee, because there are a dozen people willing to take your place if you complain or quit. Alternatively, if you were only getting paid $1/hr, there might be a dozen other employers willing to hire you and your coworkers away for $1.10 or better conditions. So your employer has an incentive to please you. In other words, the tradeoff for getting overpaid because of an artificial wage floor is an employer that need not worry about keeping you.
I don't have any research to show. But I own and manage a few coffee shops in downtown Houston. We pay our employees anywhere from $8.00-$15.00. But if the minimum wage was raised to say $9-$10, I know we would have to increase prices on all our products.
http://www.forbes.com/sites/janetno...-ignores-tax-credits-food-stamps-and-reality/ "and, oh yeah, working two jobs and paying just $20 a month for health insurance" that's basically what McDonalds is suggesting (but they want you to work at slave rates for them at the same time).
or accept lower return on investment One thing the bootstappy capitalist on here are overestimating is the abilities of the general public. Go out and and about, to Walmart and look around and tell me what percentage of the general population is capable of higher skilled jobs. But, barring ubiquitous birth control, they are still going to be out there and multiplying. If that percentage of low skill capable people earns wages below the poverty line, they are going to burden your social system, that you end up having to pay for anyway. If you pay them a livable wage and require them to have health insurance, you can take a big step toward clearing your social burden and give them more esteem and self reliance. And frankly the level of jobs between menial and skilled is rapidly going away anyway. That level is being replaced with automation. 1.good nutrition 2.good education 3.sex education 4.birth control 5. livable minimum wage or you are going to have a huge underclass dependent on welfare and subsequently, social unrest
Actually it would stimulate the local economy. The increase in prices is off-set by the increase in labor. Big corps employ less people than small businesses. So dollar per dollar you spend on a small biz, it employs more people if you spend it at a local small biz. To understand this - small biz reinvest their income into building their biz, where big corp take that money and spread it across shareholders often in foreign countries. There are other forces in place as well. But there's a lot more complexity to what's going on here that basic economics. Remember that micro economies are not closed systems.
in a perfect world of $5/hr, you wouldn't have enough money to live, but at least you'd be able to complain, because sure, at $5/hr, what doesn't become profitable? supposing involuntary unemployment doesn't exist (which um, it does, unless you want to disprove the Great Depression).
PICK ONE: 1. Raise the Minimum Wage or 2. Raise Taxes on the Rich Which would you choose? Rocket River
This was discussed in the article. Small businesses, as a rule, already pay above minimum wage so that they can attract workers that are more trustworthy than your average minimum wage worker. I have no doubt that you might have to raise prices if the minimum wage were lifted substantially, but the organizations which are affected most are very large employers who actually use minimum wage labor. The study showed that a ten percent increase in the minimum wage would result in price increases of about 0.1%, or ten cents higher for a hundred dollar item. In other words, the facts don't support the detractors' claims.
A much better system would be to peg the workers pay as a percentage of the highest paid employee (the CEO) with profit sharing equally distributed according to the same numbers. No profit that year, no profit sharing.
Producers are going to want to at the very least maintain their profit margin, if they can't offset the cost of increasing wage prices of minimum wage workers then they will just pass that cost off onto the consumers.
Are you referring to fellow Americans or third world countries that have a drastically lower cost of living?
