Obama to raise federal minimum wage via executive order

Because labor saving advancements in technology occur in every decade in which minimum wage & other labor protections have existed, and in every decade in which such protections did not exist, many of which were far more meaningful than the ones you are mentioning.


BECAUSE MACHINES!!! is not an answer

BUT THIS TIME IS DIFFERENT is not an answer unless you can explain why (you haven't, and you can't)

 

No - your original statement was in response to my comment:

Given that I mentioned things like child labor and slavery, the 1800's is perfectly relevant. But even if you did just mean to argue post-minimum-wage, machines have been replacing labor since then at incredible rates too, including all the examples I mentioned. Technology wasn't as advanced, but nor was the human productivity it replaced. It's not like technology is some newfangled concept. It's been radically replacing the lowest tier of labor since before the invention of the wheel.

 

What you're not getting is that the ENTIRE PERIOD of time between the beginning of the industrial revolution and this moment (note: this time period covers the introduction of a minimum wage in the U.S) has been characterized by advances in technology that have significantly increased the efficiency of human labor. Therefore, trying to disregard research about the effects of the minimum wage because it did not take place yesterday (or in the future?) is really, really dumb. This point has been made several times, in different ways, in this thread and you still don't seem able to come to grips with it.

 

And how have these technological advances impacted workers? Over the past 50 years, the American economy has transitioned from being manufacturers to service providers. What do you think will happen when service jobs become widely automated?

I've already explained it. You've repeatedly refused to listen.

Businesses will utilize the cheapest source of production regardless if its minimum wage labor or machines. Right now, minimum wage labor is cheaper. However, minimum wage is continually increasing. At some point, machines will be a cheaper alternative (especially given the advancements in technology), and business will then utilize machines.

I'm not against raising the minimum wage. I'm simply aware that with each minimum wage increase, we get that much closer to making machines a viable alternative.

 

Here is a list of minimum wage jobs:

http://www.forbes.com/2010/05/17/worst-paying-jobs-leadership-careers-salaries_slide.html

Just about none of them can be automated.

On this list you could reasonably argue the cashier could be phased out via automation. However it would add more high tech jobs for manufacturing and servicing those machines.

 

Ah so now you're switching back to raise the MW again with your corollary - with the corollary being this unremarkable, totally entirely vague argument that you have repeated about 332 times.

What do you expect for pointing out this half-formed, non-empirical banality? A cookie? Gold star? Pat on the head? Ceramic Dalmatian?

 

When you're faced with an argument that weakens your position, I expect you to either offer a logical counter-argument or consider the argument within the context of your position and change your position accordingly.

I do not expect insults/sarcasm/strawman responses. What percentage of your posts would you estimate fall into that category? Look through this thread. Have I been anything but polite to you?

 

Incorrect. Go back and look.

 

Yes, I have.

How about another hypothetical...

A judge asks us, as lawyers, for evidence or proof of the claim you are making (that raising the minimum wage will negatively impact unemployment numbers). I go out and get several peer reviewed scientific studies, albeit from 1998, and you get nothing.

Who will the judge rule for?

 

No, you haven't. If you provide your boss something irrelevant and I provide him nothing, then neither of us have given him what he wanted and have both failed equally.

It depends. If your peer reviewed scientific studies offer relevant evidence to the situation at hand, then the judge will rule in your favor. However, if your evidence is outdated and irrelevant, then the judge will ignore it.

If the judge is forced to making a ruling at that time, he will rule in favor of the most logically compelling argument.

 

In order for the judge to determine that my evidence is outdated and irrelevant, more timely and/or relevant evidence would have to be provided to convince him that one set of evidence is better than the other. A judge would not listen seriously to you saying "nuh-uhhhh" (the equivalent of your commentary here) when I have provided concrete, empirical evidence that my position is sound.

Please, go find some evidence for your claims, as I have, or STFU.

 

You're citing data that's correlated with technology from 20 years ago and trying to apply its results to today. To give you a sense of how long ago that was, the internet was still a fledgling commercial technology. Technology has come a long way in 20 years. Some minimum-wage jobs in the service industry have already been automated, and we haven't had aggressive increases to the minimum wage like the one Obama is proposing. Those are the reasons why I've been dismissing your data.

Instead of telling me to STFU, why don't you explain why you think your data is still relevant despite the reasons I just listed?

 

Instead of trying to claim that the evidence is irrelevant, why don't you find some data which support your claim? I did and the data clearly show that raising the minimum wage does not impact unemployment in any meaningful ways.

"That peer reviewed scientific study is 20 years old" does not discount the study in any way. There are plenty of studies from 50 years ago which are still applicable and appropriate to use as evidence BECAUSE THE FINDINGS HAVEN'T BEEN REFUTED. You have not refuted the findings of the studies we are discussing, you are just trying to ignore them.

You're welcome to your ignorance, but you're not welcome to pass it off as intelligence. Your ideology has made it where you have the opinion that raising the minimum wage will in some major way impact unemployment, but, as usual, the data and evidence disagree with your opinion.

 

Go to any grocery store and note the self-checkout registers. There's your evidence.

You mean to say:

"I did and the data clearly shows that raising the minimum wage 20 years ago did not impact unemployment in any meaningful way for the time period studied."

Alright, I'm getting tired of going back and forth with you. You're wrong, and I'll explain why.

First of all, you need to understand the purpose of the study. It's purpose was to measure the impact to unemployment for a specific time period when the minimum wage was raised 20 years ago. It concluded that there was no meaningful impact to unemployment in that time period. That's it. It wasn't offering any trend or insight to the future. All it measured was the impact to unemployment when minimum wage was raised 20 years ago. That's as far as it went.

That data is irrefutable b/c its based entirely on historical statistics. There's no opinion at all. All it does is tell us how unemployment changed when minimum wage was raised 20 years ago. Nothing more, nothing less.

However, you're taking the results of this study, which was specific to the economic/technological environment 20 years ago, and assuming that its findings would still hold true in today's environment. Sorry, but you simply can't make that assumption. The world has changed too much in the past 20 years.

Here's an example. If minimum wage were raised to $35/hour tomorrow, do you think there would be any impact to unemployment? Based on your interpretation of the "data", it wouldn't.

Are you starting to see how you've misinterpreted the data?

 

Something people forget when talking about the economy 20 years ago was that there was a whole lot of fraud and cooking the books going on to artificially prop up the economy. Unemployment and inflation numbers during a bubble aren't exactly reliable.

 

Objection, speculation.

 

That isn't evidence, it's an anecdote.

Right next to the self checkout is a person manning that set of lanes along with at least two and sometimes as many as five checkers, some baggers, and various other employees. The data that we have on this topic still tell me that raising the minimum wage doesn't meaningfully impact unemployment rates.

Don't tell me what I mean to say, I am precise with my language.

Of course, and in the absence of contradictory data, I will continue to regard the empirical results as correct.

Of course you are, I would be too after (figuratively) screaming "NU-UHHHH" over and over again.

Yes, and in the absence of contradictory data, I will continue to regard the empirical results as correct.

You certainly haven't even TRIED to refute the data.

Yes, in the absence of data which shows a different trend, data which would be highly sought out by every single conservative/libertarian/corporatist out there, I will continue to believe what the empirical evidence tells me, in spite of your intuition about your perception of how the world has changed over the last 20 years.

Storytime, YAY!

Nice straw man, logical fallacy much?

I am absolutely CERTAIN that such a drastic, large shock to the economy would have a great many negative impacts, but such a change isn't what is under discussion here.

Are you starting to see how completely, utterly silly you look?

ROFL!!!

 

If that was a logical fallacy, it would be reductio ad absurdum, not strawman. The premise was that the minimum wage was raised without any significant effect on unemployment, he then suggested a massive raise and then used the same logic to suggest it still wouldn't result in significant unemployment.

Some would argue that going to that extreme is absurd, some would argue that it disproves the heart of your premise.

 

Actually, your continual use of ridiculous examples is well, ridiculous. Raising the minimum wage 500%, which is what you propose in your example, has a drastically different effect than raising it say 25%. There may be a threshold at which raising the minimum wage impacts unemployment but you haven't shown that level and you've shown no data that demonstrates that level.

There is also nothing specific to the past 20 years that alters the paradigm of continued technological improvement and how it affects jobs so your contention that world has changed so much in the past 20 years is completely irrelevant. In 1990 they would say the same thing, the world has changed so much in the past 20 years and in 1970 they would say the same thing. Technology has always made jobs obsolete, whether in 1810, 1910, or 2010.

And that's why you're wrong.

 

How can you say I'm wrong when you've already acknowledged that I may be right?