Abolish minimum wage?

[cgroupman]

Watching Fox news this morning. An old debate point, but being brought up again. They have politico types saying how it helps both employers and employees. One person said that this would act to widen, even further, the gap between haves and have nots. Some validity to both sides, much like the RTW/Union breaking debates IMO.

Any thoughts on this guys and gals?



c

 

[nutmeg]

What do we know for sure in this debate?

There will be an increase in contributions for SS and medicare to the gov't.

By raising the minimun wage the employee will pay more into the system and so will the employer.

So first and foremost this is a postive for the gov't to raise the min wage.

 

[cgroupman]

Quote from nutmeg:

What do we know for sure in this debate?

There will be an increase in contributions for SS and medicare to the gov't.

By raising the minimun wage the employee will pay more into the system and so will the employer.

So first and foremost this is a postive for the gov't to raise the min wage.

Good response, makes sense. I kept watching, it turned to the same ol' same ol' with right and left yelling at each other. I just can't see where one guy kept saying 'raise it to $500/hour if it's such a good thing' - much like the 'lower taxes to zero if if it's such a good thing.'
This instead of a discussion.

Would getting rid of it really help anyone? I hate to say it, but wages below $7 per hour, and the jobs attached are relegated to immigrants much of the time. But, that's another discussion altogether.

I have to ask you, Mr. Nutmeg, answer only if you choose of course. Are you a professional writer? Comedian? Where do you get all those jokes? I've been curious years.


c

 

[nutmeg]

Quote from cgroupman:

Good response, makes sense. I kept watching, it turned to the same Where do you get all those jokes? I've been curious years.


c

Some jokes I swipe from others, some are just derivatives of other jokes, some I make up.

Naww, I'm not a writer. Just goofin around on the net.

 

[Lucrum]

Quote from cgroupman:

Watching Fox news this morning. An old debate point, but being brought up again. They have politico types saying how it helps both employers and employees. One person said that this would act to widen, even further, the gap between haves and have nots. Some validity to both sides, much like the RTW/Union breaking debates IMO.

Any thoughts on this guys and gals?



c

I didn't see the debate. But I'm generally pro free markets. So on the surface at least I wouldn't be opposed to abolishing the min wage. It could always be tried as an experiment and reinstated if it doesn't work out.

 

[cgroupman]

Quote from Lucrum:

I didn't see the debate. But I'm generally pro free markets. So on the surface at least I wouldn't be opposed to abolishing the min wage. It could always be tried as an experiment and reinstated if it doesn't work out.

Fair enough. At $7 per hour, there aren't that many I'm told, but my gut feeling is that are a lot more than let on. Fast foods, general retail and entry levels. I guess tip related jobs too.

$7x40= $280 per week. Minus FICA, Medicare, not sure if income tax applies that low. Rent in most places = $700 or more, pretty sad if you're stuck there alone. Even going to $10 makes it more plausible. Oh well, we'll see if this gets any legs again.


c

 

[nutmeg]

Suppose though you had a small business with 10 employees and none of them made min wage.

Let's say min wage is $7.75 and a few of your employees made $8.50 an hour. What happens when min wage is raised to $8.50 or $10.00?

Before you can make one new hire at the new rate, everybody in the store would probably need a wage adjustment or you'd have a mutiny.

 

[cgroupman]

Quote from nutmeg:

Suppose though you had a small business with 10 employees and none of them made min wage.

Let's say min wage is $7.75 and a few of your employees made $8.50 an hour. What happens when min wage is raised to $8.50 or $10.00?

Before you can make one new hire at the new rate, everybody in the store would probably need a wage adjustment or you'd have a mutiny.

Right, but the discussion was supposed to be, per Fox, on abolishing the min wage. To your point, I guess as with any business I would try to increase my sales prices to compensate. Or, ask the workers to work harder or longer, heaven forbid these days.


c

 

[Max E.]

Raising minimum wage is basicaly an excercise in futility. You could raise the minimum wage to 12 dollars an hour and all that would bring along with it is cost of living increases. The cost of rent would go up right along with it, and the places that pay minimum wage would have to increase the cost of all the goods that they sell right along with it. Either that or they would have to hire less people, or else hire people under the table who are willing to work for less then minimum wage, so it would just serve to kill jobs.

I worked reffing hockey games from the time i was 12 years old, (which paid less then minimum wage) and then i served my time as a McMonkey flipping burgers when i was 16, quite frankly it serves as a good motivator that you dont want to do those jobs for a living. No one goes in to a minimum wage job thinking that is where they want to be for life, its only supposed to serve as a stepping stone, or else get you in the door at a place so that the people who work hard can work their way up.

Plus a large portion of the places who pay minimum wage are places where the person working can also make tips. Take a waitress for example, my buddy who owns some bars said that some of his better looking servers who are good at flirting with the drunks can clear 60k a year, and thats almost all cash money so when you factor out taxes thats like 70k+/year when compared to a taxable income. Raising minimum wage would guarantee that he would either have to charge more for drinks(which would directly cut into their tips), or hire less people, or else go out of business altogether, whereby no one would have a job.

Basically raising minimum wage is nothing more than a circle jerk, the people who actually work at whatever the preset minimum is are always going to be poor, whether the wage is 10$ per hour or 20$ per hour, because of all the unintended consequences that come along with the wage increases. The government is never going to legislate poor people out of poverty, all you have to do is look at what a colossal failure the so called "war on poverty" has been to prove that.