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smooth · 06-22-2004, 08:01 PM

I see some interesting ideas from a number of people here. My responses are:

1) The minimum wage will primarily affect service oriented jobs. Most of these can't be exported overseas, unless you are going to eat your burger or make your motel bed in India.

2) If the price of a burger or motel room increases to compensate for the wage increase, so be it. The workers aren't buying the burger or staying in the room. This inflation scare tactic will only affect the people buying the product, not the producers or suppliers--just as it should.

3) I have worked for small businesses before. I haven't ever worked for minimum wage at any place other than a large corporation (fast food and retail clothes). I doubt minimum wage will force out wage earners in mom and pop shops, unless we're talking about the 5 and dime (which are already headed out of existence for more reasons than the wages their workers are making).

4) The standard of living has been decreasing in a similar trend to the dollar's value falling. All these programs that people complain about as giving to the poor (actually, the worker bees in our economy, but shelve that small detail for a minute) kicked off one of the largest periods of prosperity for our country. The minimum wage, GI bills, and various other "handouts" for the baby boomers created a huge middle class and spawned our technological growth, rise of corporations (and those "nasty" CEO's), and huge production rates right up until a few decades ago when those programs began to be phased out.

Many people argue now, leftists and rightists both, that the New Deal programs saved capitalism. People back then thought it was going to rain fury on the wealth of the elites, too. It wasn't until decades later that the genius of the effects were recognized. If not for those various give-away programs, our economy would have completely imploded and we'd probably look like Sweden, New Zealand, or something *right-wingers shudder*

06-22-2004, 08:01 PM	#40 (permalink)
smooth Junkie Location: Right here	I see some interesting ideas from a number of people here. My responses are: 1) The minimum wage will primarily affect service oriented jobs. Most of these can't be exported overseas, unless you are going to eat your burger or make your motel bed in India. 2) If the price of a burger or motel room increases to compensate for the wage increase, so be it. The workers aren't buying the burger or staying in the room. This inflation scare tactic will only affect the people buying the product, not the producers or suppliers--just as it should. 3) I have worked for small businesses before. I haven't ever worked for minimum wage at any place other than a large corporation (fast food and retail clothes). I doubt minimum wage will force out wage earners in mom and pop shops, unless we're talking about the 5 and dime (which are already headed out of existence for more reasons than the wages their workers are making). 4) The standard of living has been decreasing in a similar trend to the dollar's value falling. All these programs that people complain about as giving to the poor (actually, the worker bees in our economy, but shelve that small detail for a minute) kicked off one of the largest periods of prosperity for our country. The minimum wage, GI bills, and various other "handouts" for the baby boomers created a huge middle class and spawned our technological growth, rise of corporations (and those "nasty" CEO's), and huge production rates right up until a few decades ago when those programs began to be phased out. Many people argue now, leftists and rightists both, that the New Deal programs saved capitalism. People back then thought it was going to rain fury on the wealth of the elites, too. It wasn't until decades later that the genius of the effects were recognized. If not for those various give-away programs, our economy would have completely imploded and we'd probably look like Sweden, New Zealand, or something right-wingers shudder __________________ "The theory of a free press is that truth will emerge from free discussion, not that it will be presented perfectly and instantly in any one account." -- Walter Lippmann "You measure democracy by the freedom it gives its dissidents, not the freedom it gives its assimilated conformists." -- Abbie Hoffman