Minimum wage/Livable Wage

That is a good map, but there are 4 weeks in a month on average to make enough money to pay for rent. Then again, you have to buy food and other things too.

And even though I live in one of the cheap states, I still think rents are more of the problem compared to minimum wage. It is also the fact that you never get to stop paying rent, and the guy who is making passive income off of you and others is doing well in this economy which is what I think needs to change.

But, with the amount of people there are, the desire for new houses, bad inexpensive house designs, and a bunch of other factors, cheap houses that have great neighborhoods are a hard thing to come by.

 

Jesse Ventura, as only he could, speaks out on the minimum wage:

 

It still doesn't help those who want to retire and have very little saved... I worry about inflation reducing the purchasing power of money and then people will need to work for more years to make sure they have enough saved.

And I think it will help accelerate the push to automate a lot of jobs, or it will just reduce the number of people doing the basic jobs. I worry that there won't be the next 'bubble' like there has been with dot.coms, housing, and health care to absorb those people back into the workforce. And periods of unemployment can wreck havoc on your savings/retirement accounts if you don't plan for those long periods without a steady paycheck.

And it isn't just the rich vs poor anymore, it is the coasts vs the middle and North & West vs the South when it comes to wages and wooing companies to move to where they get the best tax breaks. If I do the same job in San Francisco or Miami, I would need to get paid twice as much to live a similar lifestyle. But, the city is more interesting. The dating options are better (but with more competition from other guys). However home prices are way too high. But the car prices are exactly the same as here. Same with anything you buy over the Internet.

This is a much more complicated issue than they are trying to make it seem.

 

The presidents latest speech was about raising the minimum wage and one of his points was about how a Republican said it would only help young people.
He said that wasn't such a bad thing considering that it would give them a chance to save for college but the fact is most of the people on minimum wage anymore aren't kids.
It was a good speech if anyone gets a chance to see it.

 

I was invited, but I didn't go.

As it turned out, the meeting that conflicted with the speech was canceled, but by then it was too late.

 

I would have so blown off that meeting.
Getting to see the POTUS in full speech mode would be worth the consequences.

 

BTDT.

 

Every time the minimum wage is raised you hear two good arguments against it.

• Companies cut hours worked across their workforce to ensure they aren't spending more money on labor. Basically the same number of people work fewer hours at higher wages.
• It limits the potential opportunities of some worker demographics (first-time workers, handicapped workers, etc).
• Ultimately the money has to come from somewhere. If you arbitrarily set the minimum wage at 100,000\yr you would simply make certain types of businesses less feasible or alter the cost\benefit of replacing humans with automation such that the jobs disappear completely.

I guess I have to come out on the anti-regulation side. The answer that works for me is that if you give people basic freedoms like "at will employment", they will perpetually seek out what is in their own best interest. Since a living wage is in everyone's best interest, they would work towards that. Likewise, it forces companies to pay a fair market wage to retain good people - since those people can walk away at any time for more money.

If you're happy working for $7.00\hr, then so be it. If not, then it is wholly within your power to seek other opportunities more closely aligned with your market value. If working for $7.00\hr is so unreasonable, why do so many people do it? Since the definition of a living wage varies between people, states and situations, it's not possible (note I didn't say difficult, I said impossible) to regulate. I know people who wouldn't work for $20\hr or even $100\hr, but they don't expect the federal government to raise the minimum wage to their definition of fair market value.

By giving people freedom to choose who they work for, you create a competitive market that matches buyers and sellers of labor at competitive rates. This is the best possible system because its a system of freedom and not of restriction.

You're also free to start your own business and earn as much as you want to.

 

I could try to argue your points @Lendari but Senator Warren and Robert Reich do a much better job than I ever could.

 

Well if the government tells you how much you are allowed to make or tells companies how much they have to pay you, that doesn't sound much like freedom to me. Freedom doesn't just mean social freedom. The economic freedoms (like the right to own property or start a business) is an equally important component of a free society.

Instead of having the freedom to seek out the "right fit" for your own unique situation, instead you want the government to regulate everyone with some "one size fits all" legislation.

The reality is that has lots of unintended consequences that I outlined above and results in less overall freedom than the market based solution.

Why $10.10\hr... why not $11.00\hr or $20.00\hr or $7.00\hr. The fallacy is that there is a "one size fits all" number that a lawmaker can arrive at that will work universally. The world is not that simple, and making laws that assume it is that simple will have unintended consequences.

 

That's the old "Wages Fund" fallacy, which has been thoroughly debunked. Economics 101.

The demand for low-wage workers is economically inelastic, which means the amount of labor demanded is not changed much by an increase or decrease in the cost.

In other words, the effect of changes in the minimum wage is primarily to change the amount of money received by the lowest stratum of paid workers.

And it does. Right now, taxpayers pay to support minimum wage workers through SNAP and other programs. Wouldn't it be better if they earned enough to support themselves without help?

And then we have the Impossible Hypothetical! Another softball.

If you drink too much water, you will die of water intoxication. By your logic, no one should drink any water.

The minimum wage is not "fair market value," it is a regulated wage. It is regulated for sound policy reasons.

That's wonderful, but very few people are cut out to be entrepreneurs. Moreover, there are millions of people who need to work to support themselves, and there are not millions of available market niches for businesses.

 

And having a minimum wage completely destroys those freedoms. Is that your argument?

Ah, so starvation wages should be perfectly legal, if you find workers with no other choices?

Absolute freedom for entrepreneurs means slavery for everybody else.

 

I don't understand how you equate a fair market wage for a common skill set to equate to forced labor. All employment in the US is at will.

Every American citizen has the right to own and operate their own business. Individual freedom is the great equalizer.

I'm not trying to marginalize the plight of the under-employed. If you are working a 7.25\hr job and you have (lets say in theory) a skill base that should be valued at 20.00\hr I don't see how raising the minimum wage solves your problem.

It might eliminate some symptoms, but it's not getting at the root cause.

The current system of "at will employment" means you can go seek the right wage. There is nothing stopping you from doing that because you are a free person operating in a free market.

Increasing the minimum wage solves none of those issues except in a superficial way that has other unintended consequences.