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Higher Minimum Wage Coming Soon

You mean that same free-market that had no problem with child labor?

Before the free-market, children worked on farms didn't they? And then after a few years child labor became less and less prevalent as prosperity increased. Children no longer had to work so they stopped working.

The same free-market that decided blacks couldn't work "intellgient" jobs?

Compared to before when they had no jobs. And now blacks are employed in a variety of jobs.

The same free-market that if didn't have to would pay slave wages? Yeah, that free-market.

That's an irrational assumption based on nothing.

Your hatred of the free-market stems from comparing what we had when we were close to a free-market system to what we have now. It is not a fair comparison. For a valid comparison, you need to look at what capitalism changed once it was instituted. Before capitalism, you could go generations without any economic growth. Once we got capitalism, we expected growth every year.

Your thinking is the fallacy of irrational comparison. You don't take into account the many variables that have changed. You cherry pick one variable and say that one variable caused the change. It's the method of "correlation does not prove causation."
 
Well tell me, if someone said "Hey, I have this really nice car here, I'll sell it to you for 50 cents", you wouldn't buy it? If you wouldn't buy it, why not? Do you presume yourself to be in a better position than the owner to make a decision as to what's in his/her best interest? And if you would buy it, wouldn't that be exploitative?

And tell me, what should kids starving in Ethiopia do? Just starve quietly because the moral complexity of using something a starving kid made makes you feel icky? I remember when I was in Nicaragua the subsistence farmers were all jealous of the sweatshop workers because relatively 75 cents an hour was more than the farmers made. Can it really be considered moral for rich people to constrain what poor people do to make themselves a living just so the rich people can feel good about themselves?

The problem is that people need food, shelter and other necissities to survive. To get those necissities they need money to get money they need a job. So therefor many people really don't have a choice either starve and live on the street or get a job that you barely survive on and have to work very long hours. Of course it will always be company that will take the advantage of that fact. It can be really bad for the economy ecpecially in poor countries. That the workingforce will not be educated or traiend because it's no need to train the work force or get machine because you get people to work dirt cheap.

That efficiency is a important part that if the company can choose from many desperate people, they could just focus on low wages to increase profit. Instead by paying higher wage and compensate for that by giving training, buy machine and other things to make production more efficient and get a higher output by working hour.

Childlabor is bad because it's create more childlabor. That if children is competing with adults, you get simplier and more dangereus job with less pay, making it harder for the famillies to survive without puting their children to work. It makes it harder for the country to gain a long term growth in their economy, because to a sustaniable growth you need an educated workforce, and it's very hard to get it then children work instead of going to school.
 
What's wrong with taking advantage of that? Supply and demand determine the market value of anything. If there isn't a lot of demand for your labor, the only possible way you can get work is to charge less for your labor because if you charge the same rate for your labor as someone who's labor generates higher demand, they're always going to hire the other person.

And so you have these people, who you admit desperately need wages, and you're saying that, for their own good, you're making it illegal for them to do absolutely the only thing they can do to get work because the terms of their agreements make you feel icky. How populist. :doh

But I'm glad you've figured out one aspect of how supply and demand works (that if there is a larger supply of unskilled laborers the price for unskilled labor is driven down), but you ignored all the other things that can also impact unskilled labor wages (if supply goes down, wages go up, if demand for unskilled labor goes up, wages go up, and if demand for unskilled labor goes down, wages go down). I understand why you failed to mention these, as they all demonstrate why a minimum wage is absolutely preposterous.
You admitted that higher labor costs leads to the creation of economic incentives to develop new ways of minimizing labor consumption. Now you pointed out that they will invest more into training so they can get more out of each labor hour consumed, but, for obvious reasons, you left off why they'd do this, which is to facilitate the consumption of fewer labor hours (i.e. firing the people who now can't get jobs because you just made it illegal to market their only marketable trait), and, also for obvious reasons, you left off the primary thing they will invest in as a product of this incentive, which is automation. It's economics 101, if you want to discourage the consumption of something, you increase its cost. We want to use less oil, so people suggest a gas tax, which would incentivize technological developments to facilitate the consumption of the now more expensive gas. So you increase the cost of labor, what do you think happens? Technological development that enables machines to do the work that people once did. And I'm sure the people who lose their jobs to machines and now can't find new jobs because you made it illegal to market their only marketable trait are going to be VERY grateful to you for your efforts.

The problem is that you set to strict limits to what countries and people can do. That it's not just that people and countries can do product A. In reality you can have a country doing product A, B, C and D and the country have a fairly unskilled labor. Their are a decreased global demand for product A or an increase global supply of product A. The easy solution then is the company making product A is demand more hours and less salaries for workers to compete. But is that always the right solution. That yes you will still be able to sell product A. But people making product A will have a very tough time ecomical, also it will be easy for the companies making product B, C and D to demand lower wages for their workers, because it's increase demand of desperate people that can work cheap, because the people making product A can hardly been able to survive. Instead the solution maybe is that you instead increase the skill or machinery so you make higher quality product of product A. That yes that maybe mean that people will lose the job. But their the goverment can step in help get people to get an education and training so they can start making product E, that is the new product of the future.

And then on child labor, answer my initial question. Should the starving Ethiopian kids just starve quietly? Is that what you want? Because they're starving, and the only way to mitigate that is to exchange something for food, and all these kids have is cheap labor. So they should not exchange the only thing they have to exchange for the food that they desperately need because it offends your sensibilities? "Oh my god, I'm so hungry I'm digesting my own gum meat, but I guess it's only fair that I keep starving if doing what I have to do to get food offends your sensibilities." I'm all about aid to help these kids, but how well has that worked out? Did I miss some news story? Is hunger no longer a problem in the developing world? Have things somehow gotten so good that we can now afford to start limiting access to food based on what does and does not offend our sensibilities?

First of all their you have the big problem trusting the market. Because if the customer in west have the choice of choosing between product A that cost 15 dollar and product B that cost 16 dollar without knowing how the product is made he will choose the product for 15 dollar, even if it for him it would not be that much of a big deal to pay one dollar more. But for the etophian farmer the extra one dollar could mean that his children could go to school and therefor have more choice then to be poor farmers like the parent. That maybe they could better job and help to make Etophia a richer country. Why doesn't it happen with the free market? First of the difference in power the negotiating that the consumer in west can easily choose tea if coffe get expensive. But the Etophian farmer have only choose to make coffe because he never went to any real school and make so little so he have no money to try other products. Also you have the lack of information that with all the product the western consumer buy it is very hard to know of the condition the products are produce.

Then back to you original question that yes the answer is not to ban all child labor overnight and have it over night, because it will lead to starving children. One problem is how the global market because if country A ban child labor the product they sell to the western consumer would cost 15 dollar instead of 14 dollar, so people will choose product from country B that have less efficient production but because of child labor the cost of the product is 14,5 dollar. The reason the consumer make this choice is many case because of lack of information. That in todays market driven world the consumer is bombarded with advertisment to potray how good all the products all the companies sells. But gets really objective information how the product is really made. It can also be extremly hard for the consumer to get the information. That yes they can maybe find out how the mobilephone is produced in china if they really try, but their are practicly impossible to find out how the minerals to the mobilephone is mined. So the answer is a increase transparancy and trust that as a consumer you can get a better understand how the products you buy is produced and pay a little more for that, like for example through the FLO initiative. But also that you push for global initiative, that should child labor really be allowed to be a competition tool on the global market? It is also about efficient aid program, that for famillies not been depend on dirt cheap jobs and child labor and countries to developed you need education. That just having public funded school that can offer the children one decent meal a day can go a long way. That poverty can stop development.
 
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