Should min wage be removed?

mikhail said:

Like i said i know your point but i dont agree.Or maybe i do agree but in a modern day scale your talking about having no employment for up to what 20-30% of Americans who would want to live in a society like that.By the way im not a complete amateur on economics I just dont believe Keynes can be disregarded and Libertarianism has the answers.

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Persistent unemployment like that is impossible! Did you even read what I posted?

phattonez said:

Persistent unemployment like that is impossible! Did you even read what I posted?

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You gotta understand i dont think it is impossible im asking for evidence like where are these jobs gonna come from? Im disagreeing with the theory.As in i think its outdated by the current and future reality.

mikhail said:

You gotta understand i dont think it is impossible im asking for evidence like where are these jobs gonna come from? Im disagreeing with the theory.As in i think its outdated by the current and future reality.

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Workers produce, and what they produce can be sold (either directly or indirectly), so a new employee brings in a certain amount of money for a company right?

phattonez said:

Workers produce, and what they produce can be sold (either directly or indirectly), so a new employee brings in a certain amount of money for a company right?

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Yes but if you own a business and can cut down on your staff and replace them with a machine you should do so right?

mikhail said:

Yes but if you own a business and can cut down on your staff and replace them with a machine you should do so right?

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Let's not get ahead of ourselves. So employees bring a certain amount of money into the company. So then companies would like to pay a little less than what the worker produces for the company so that they can make a profit, right?

phattonez said:

Let's not get ahead of ourselves. So employees bring a certain amount of money into the company. So then companies would like to pay a little less than what the worker produces for the company so that they can make a profit, right?

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Well of course but i can see your trying to drive me down a path.What ya bringing in next the competing company?

mikhail said:

Well of course but i can see your trying to drive me down a path.What ya bringing in next the competing company?

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Not really. So if the worker cannot find a job, then musn't it mean that he is looking for a wage that is higher or too close to his marginal productivity?

phattonez said:

Not really. So if the worker cannot find a job, then musn't it mean that he is looking for a wage that is higher or too close to his marginal productivity?

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No because in my version of events there arent any jobs.This is all theory America already has a massive unemployment problem and i dont see that changing i keep coming back to the same question where are the jobs gonna come from? Not in theory but in practice right now today.

mikhail said:

No because in my version of events there arent any jobs.This is all theory America already has a massive unemployment problem and i dont see that changing i keep coming back to the same question where are the jobs gonna come from? Not in theory but in practice right now today.

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But we've already decided that companies will higher slightly below marginal productivity. So how could there be such a massive part of the population out of work permanently? Are you going to say that 20% of the population is completely incapable of doing any good for anybody?

phattonez said:

But we've already decided that companies will higher slightly below marginal productivity. So how could there be such a massive part of the population out of work permanently? Are you going to say that 20% of the population is completely incapable of doing any good for anybody?

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No im saying there is a limit to production,also the kind of income inequalities your talking about seem disasterous and also i feel technology(and often the replacement jobs you talk of) will make jobs obsolete at such a rate society will struggle to ajust.

I really need to go to bed now but i would like to take up this debate with you some other time if thats cool with you? nice talking to ya

Two observations to make.

1. In our global, mixed economy, CEOs are captains of a mercenary bureaucracy who half serve the government/general public and half keep it hostage. They don't have any responsibility because they don't face any real consequences. Worse case scenario, they retire early and live "more modestly" but still better off than most millionares, maybe throw in a couple years of white collar prison time in severe cases of wrong conduct. The CEOs have bartered among the executive culture and with the government so that they have enough money and power to have zero responsibility. To be responsible, there has to be a chance of serious loss, like losing your home to a recession or losing your children to Protective Services or going to jail for several decades. Over the course of generations, CEOs have negotiated a series of legal and private privileges that leave them very well provided for regardless of the errors they make.

2. Concepts of value are subjective and therefore arbitrary. Gold is a comparatively useless item, but civilizations have historically found it plausible to base the entirety of their community's economic accomplishments and endeavors on this impractical metal. That undermines any scientific approach to evaluating market worth. Humans have too many magpie-like tendencies to say CEOs deserve their money or that low-level workers deserve this or that as a minimum wage. If there is, or is not, a minimum wage, its existence it as aribtrary as the CEOs' bloated paychecks.

megaprogman said:

If you have to compare apples to oranges to prove you point, than you have none. :shrug:

Also, taking a look at your link (thanks for fixing it), if the minimum wage had gone up at the pace of inflation, it would have been 5.82/hr in 2009, obviously 7.50 is higher. Thus wages are increasing faster than hamburgers, even with a 3 cent difference. Now we are comparing apples to apples

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If that were true then the poor would be able to save and work towards not being poor. This isn't the case when you look at it purely from inflation or the glass price floor. The two combined show that the person making $7.50 is worse off then the person making $3.15.

The_Patriot said:

If that were true then the poor would be able to save and work towards not being poor. This isn't the case when you look at it purely from inflation or the glass price floor. The two combined show that the person making $7.50 is worse off then the person making $3.15.

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Based on what?

You failed to show how inflation factored in since min wage has increased faster.
You failed to show how a burger costs more to a person on min wage since 1988.

What other "evidence" do you have?

megaprogman said:

Based on what?

You failed to show how inflation factored in since min wage has increased faster.
You failed to show how a burger costs more to a person on min wage since 1988.

What other "evidence" do you have?

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I've already presented my evidence and it comes back that minimum wage is detrimental to workers by making them poorer. You've shown data that confirms what I said.

The_Patriot said:

I've already presented my evidence and it comes back that minimum wage is detrimental to workers by making them poorer. You've shown data that confirms what I said.

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Please show me this confirmation.

Korimyr the Rat said:

Yes. Labor is essentially a market good; its price is determined by the same forces of supply and demand that govern every other market good. Government policies, like price controls on other goods, can alter the price of a good but not its value meaning that the minimum wage decreases the demand for labor and thus reduces the amount of labor that businesses choose to purchase. It drives people out of jobs and depresses the wages of jobs that would otherwise be worth more than the minimum wage. If we want to help the working class in this country, we should working on keeping jobs here rather than driving them overseas.

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I will have to concur. I guess you saved me some time, Sir.

No, never.

The minimum wage is needed to create a gap between those on welfare and those who do the jobs the ones on welfare refuse. In my country this gap is very small meaning you might as well stay on welfare and moonlight, you'll work less hrs and still make more money than those on minimum wage.

get rid of welfare and have the govt give that money to businesses to compensate them for increasing minimum wage.

Djoop said:

No, never.

The minimum wage is needed to create a gap between those on welfare and those who do the jobs the ones on welfare refuse. In my country this gap is very small meaning you might as well stay on welfare and moonlight, you'll work less hrs and still make more money than those on minimum wage.

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well if we got rid of welfare for anyone who can work that issue wouldn't surface

TurtleDude said:

well if we got rid of welfare for anyone who can work that issue wouldn't surface

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What about corporate Welfare? I am against that very strongly.

TurtleDude said:

well if we got rid of welfare for anyone who can work that issue wouldn't surface

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I'm not in favour of it but that's true. In the dutch case welfare grows with the economy, which is truly absurd, welfare should be the minimum people need to survive.

mikhail said:

Your listing industries that have no way near enough demand for the amount of people you suggest they can employ.Yes this is the classic arguement it doesent matter about losing the "old jobs" because through education etc are people wont need them.How many people do ya think can work in finance and IT ?

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Don't you mean how many crooks can work in finance?:2razz:
As for IT, the neighbor kid got himself signed up for IT training at one of the local trade schools AFTER local businesses started laying off IT workers. Just a few years before, IT was determined to be worth more money where I work, then they started laying them off. The trick was to boost pay, then demand performance, and get rid of the low performers. So with only the best left in place, and the lesser ones looking for jobs, why would the job market be good for a kid right out of school?

tlmorg02 said:

What about corporate Welfare? I am against that very strongly.

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define that-if it means a city enticing a company to relocate or build a new factory in that city in return for tax breaks that is really a quid pro quo that the city sees as benefiting its citizens and I don't have a problem with that. its like a city without a pro football team telling a football team that it will build the team a state of the art arena if the team locates in the city.

the problem is that corporate welfare can mean far more things than welfare given to the untalented or the unproductive and can have some very positive outcomes for the society.

pbrauer said:

You're saying that employers hire employees the same way housewives shop at the grocery store? That's just silly, they hire employees to get the job done.

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You don't read, and you don't answer questions like the one phattonez asked.

OscarB63 said:

get rid of welfare and have the govt give that money to businesses to compensate them for increasing minimum wage.

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How many of those businesses will just keep the money? They certainly won't increase hiring beyond their needs. so those on welfare get nothing...and some can't live without it. Granted, many are welfare cheats, but not most of them..