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Seattle mayor unveils plan for $15 minimum wage

Glen Contrarian said:
And when - when! - Seattle's economy continues to grow after the $15/hour MW is in effect, what will the conservatives say then?
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We will still continue to state that until you can show a direct connection between the growing economy and raising the MW, it's still a bad idea. "Correlation does not equal causation." Show us the mechanism for how increasing a cost with no benefit extended to the profitability of a company can be good for the economy.
 
ttwtt78640 said:
I applaud your use of a concrete example to make your point. So let us compare the cost of living differences of the US and Australia to see if your theory holds up, after all, cost of living is the measure most important to the working poor.

Cost Of Living Comparison Between Australia And United States

EDIT: To be fair, I must also address your contention that Australia's higher minimum wage would, in fact, reduce their need for "wefare" spending to levels below that of the US. It seems, that too, is not so.

How fair is Australia
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good point - I like that site!

Now, for the flip side of the argument, the poverty rate in Australia is lower than it is here. Not by much, but then, their people mostly don't have to worry about affording health care.

But there's something else to think about, too - just because a place has a high cost of living doesn't mean it's a bad place to live. Here's the ranking of nations by cost of living...and almost all of the ones with the highest cost of living are first-world nations with the highest standards of living (Venezuela's gotta be a statistical outlier), whereas the ones with the lowest cost of living are without exception third-world nations.

In other words, "nanny-statism" obviously generally enables nations to be more stable and to have a higher standard of living for their population. There is one and only one downside that I see to the high-tax, high-regulation, strong-social-safety-net governmental systems of first-world democracies: consumption. It's been said that in order for everyone to live a first-world lifestyle, we'd need three Earths. So what can be done, what the end result may be, I simply don't know. But I do know that life is healthier, safer, and in many ways better in first-world socialized democracies than in any other country you care to name.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
good point - I like that site!

Now, for the flip side of the argument, the poverty rate in Australia is lower than it is here. Not by much, but then, their people mostly don't have to worry about affording health care.

But there's something else to think about, too - just because a place has a high cost of living doesn't mean it's a bad place to live. Here's the ranking of nations by cost of living...and almost all of the ones with the highest cost of living are first-world nations with the highest standards of living (Venezuela's gotta be a statistical outlier), whereas the ones with the lowest cost of living are without exception third-world nations.

In other words, "nanny-statism" obviously generally enables nations to be more stable and to have a higher standard of living for their population. There is one and only one downside that I see to the high-tax, high-regulation, strong-social-safety-net governmental systems of first-world democracies: consumption. It's been said that in order for everyone to live a first-world lifestyle, we'd need three Earths. So what can be done, what the end result may be, I simply don't know. But I do know that life is healthier, safer, and in many ways better in first-world socialized democracies than in any other country you care to name.
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I am not sure that I understand what poverty rates are based on, much less how, with no standard to compare nations, it matters. The bottom line is that those considered poor before getting "safety net" assistance are no longer poor after getting it in either the US or Australia (or any "rich" nations). If Australia spends more of its GDP on its poor, than the US does, then the percentage in poverty matters little if they still require more aid to lift them out of it.
 
apdst said:
Oh no! You claim 15 is going to be good for the economy, then 50 will be even better.
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Less regulation is good for the economy, then no regulation will be even better. DEATH TO AMERICA. ANARCHY!

Lower taxes are good for the economy, so maybe we should have 0% taxes for all! Run an all-volunteer government. I'm sure the highways will be fine and our troops will have... You know, bullets and things.
 
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the REST of the first world is feeding upon the US, and have been doing so since at LEAST ww2, most of them since ww1. They get away with not having to spend much of anything for military defense, for instance, because WE pick up the tab for that.
 
ginwood said:
the REST of the first world is feeding upon the US, and have been doing so since at LEAST ww2, most of them since ww1. They get away with not having to spend much of anything for military defense, for instance, because WE pick up the tab for that.
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So how much military spending should we cut?
 
Glen Contrarian said:
What you're not getting is that YOU PAY ANYWAY. If you don't pay enough for the workers to feed, shelter, and clothe themselves and their families, then you will pay the additional taxes necessary for them to do so. Here's a Harvard study that might be of interest to you. It found that Costco's employee costs are actually cheaper than Sam's Club even though Costco pays its employees on average $5/hr MORE than Sam's Club does.

Try reading that reference...and think about what would happen if businesses paid enough that they didn't have such a high turnover rate....
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costco also doesn't have half the stores or half the employee or half the overhead as sam's club either. costco also has a higher price point and caters to a different crowd of people. even though they are both warehouse stores they do not contain the same products. i get so tired of this false impression that gets spouted.

lets up costco store numbers by a few hundred hire about 500 more employee's and see if their management doesn't make changes to pay scale.


That's the big bugaboo among conservatives - and it's flat wrong. Why? $15/hr is still not a lot of money - it's enough to get by on (if one is careful) without depending on taxpayer assistance. The people will STILL be looking for the cheapest bargains they can get...which will keep the market prices from skyrocketing like conservatives think they will.
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if you can't live on 15 dollars an hour then you need some much needed financial counsiling. i lived perfectly fine on 12 dollars an hour. no tax payer assistance required.

you also failed to address the point. the computer tech that makes 15 an hour isn't going to work for the same wage as a bag boy or a burger flipper or a cashier. he is going to want more money since his job is significantly higher. everybody above that person is going to want the same thing. more money for doing a much harder job.

that means price increases and or people let go to compensate the distortion in the salary market.

You're going to automate McDonald's, Burger King, and Wal-Mart? Good luck with that!
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They make automated food ordering systems now and walmart already has automated checkout systems. so yes they are having good luck with that.
i don't need bag boys the cashers can bag the groceries if needed.

for mcdonalds i just need 1 person in the drive through and 1 person to get food to people and a few people to cook. if you go into mcdonalds now you see 3 people taking orders at least another 2 or 3 people getting food then the cooks. i can easily downgrade 3 or 4 people.
 
If minimum wage goes up by say, $5/hour, isn't it only fair that every worker's wage is raised by the same amount?
 
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I like raising minimum wage to living wage as long as you eliminate corporate tax, eliminate businesses having health care costs by going to single payer for catastrophic and cash/charity for the minor stuff, and eliminate state income tax. If job creators are overloaded they will close up, raise prices so living wage is meaningless as living standards are just adjusted, or move the jobs to a more business friendly country.
 
ludin said:
costco also doesn't have half the stores or half the employee or half the overhead as sam's club either. costco also has a higher price point and caters to a different crowd of people. even though they are both warehouse stores they do not contain the same products. i get so tired of this false impression that gets spouted.
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You really didn't READ the article, did you? The measurement is cost per employee, and the number of employees does not matter - the jobs they are doing is comparable. Remember, the big difference between the two sets of employees is that Sam's Club is having to spend much, much more in retraining costs because they have such a high turnover. Also:

Sam's West, Inc. (doing business as Sam's Club) is an American chain of membership-only retail warehouse clubs owned and operated by Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., founded in 1983 and named after Walmart founder Sam Walton. As of 2012 Sam's Club chain serves 47 million U.S. and Puerto Rican members and is the 8th largest U.S. retailer.[2] As of January 31, 2008, Sam's Club ranks second in sales volume among warehouse clubs with 57 billion in sales behind Costco, despite the fact that Sam's has more retail locations.

lets up costco store numbers by a few hundred hire about 500 more employee's and see if their management doesn't make changes to pay scale.
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Really? As of July 2012, Costco is the second largest retailer in the United States, the seventh largest retailer in the world and the largest membership warehouse club chain in the United States

Furthermore, Costco already has 174,000 employees, so I really don't think 500 more employees isn't going to make that much of a difference.

if you can't live on 15 dollars an hour then you need some much needed financial counsiling. i lived perfectly fine on 12 dollars an hour. no tax payer assistance required.
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Were you raising a family on that $12/hr? What you are able to do for yourself is one thing - what you have to be able to do for a family is a whole different ball of wax. And where you live makes a big difference, too. For instance, one can live in the MS Delta where I grew up on $10/hr if one is careful...but $10/hr isn't even close to what's needed to live in NY or SF.

you also failed to address the point. the computer tech that makes 15 an hour isn't going to work for the same wage as a bag boy or a burger flipper or a cashier. he is going to want more money since his job is significantly higher. everybody above that person is going to want the same thing. more money for doing a much harder job.

that means price increases and or people let go to compensate the distortion in the salary market.
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They make automated food ordering systems now and walmart already has automated checkout systems. so yes they are having good luck with that.
i don't need bag boys the cashers can bag the groceries if needed.

for mcdonalds i just need 1 person in the drive through and 1 person to get food to people and a few people to cook. if you go into mcdonalds now you see 3 people taking orders at least another 2 or 3 people getting food then the cooks. i can easily downgrade 3 or 4 people.[/QUOTE]

If a computer tech is only getting $15/hr, he needs to find a new employer. I worked as one for $17/hr...but that was ten years ago. And you are NOT going to be able to somehow automate McDonald's or Burger King, much less Wal-Mart. If you think you can, you seriously need a urinalysis test. Sure, they'll have tech assist, but not true automation. People won't go to what would essentially be a drive-through vending machine.
 
ttwtt78640 said:
I am not sure that I understand what poverty rates are based on, much less how, with no standard to compare nations, it matters. The bottom line is that those considered poor before getting "safety net" assistance are no longer poor after getting it in either the US or Australia (or any "rich" nations). If Australia spends more of its GDP on its poor, than the US does, then the percentage in poverty matters little if they still require more aid to lift them out of it.
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Is it "more aid required to lift them out of it", or is it "they're willing to do what it takes to lift more people out of poverty"?

Anyway, my overarching point - as it has been for years now - is that if strong social safety nets were really so bad economically, then why are the nations with the strongest social safety nets the ones that are generally the most stable, with the highest standards of living, and the healthiest economically?

I say that the social safety net, instead of being a drag on the economy, is an essential part of growing the economy. Instead of having a vast income inequality with the poorest of the poor being lucky to get $2/day as in so many third-world nations, our 'poor' are still generally well off when compared to what's found in third-world nations. What's more, they spend pretty much every penny they get, which boosts the local economy, which boosts the nation's economy as a whole. In other words, yes, conservatives are right that taxes are wealth redistribution, but it's that wealth redistribution that makes the economy healthier as a whole...and the proof lay in all the first-world socialized democracies on the planet.

And if we have a significantly higher minimum wage, that takes some of the pressure off the taxpayer - and the tax revenue can go to pay for other improvements or, maybe, just maybe, the debt.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
And you are NOT going to be able to somehow automate McDonald's or Burger King, much less Wal-Mart. If you think you can, you seriously need a urinalysis test. Sure, they'll have tech assist, but not true automation. People won't go to what would essentially be a drive-through vending machine.
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You absolutely can easily automate parts of fast food places like McDonalds or Burger King. The order taking part is already automated at some places around where I live, and it works great. I'm sure that automation of the food cooking part is very near.
 
While you are applying money to the minimum wage that people aren't qualified to earn don't forget to double or triple social security so the poor elderly can afford the mcnuggets!
 
IDK but I'd be curious to see how your fixed income seniors respond? Will they get some kind of city addition to their social security so they can afford to buy things in town? When you find them deciding on cat food instead of meds and dying without a penny to their name let me know.

Glen Contrarian said:
And when - when! - Seattle's economy continues to grow after the $15/hour MW is in effect, what will the conservatives say then?
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CalGun said:
IDK but I'd be curious to see how your fixed income seniors respond? Will they get some kind of city addition to their social security so they can afford to buy things in town? When you find them deciding on cat food instead of meds and dying without a penny to their name let me know.
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I agree, but if I died without a penny to my name I'd be happy. What a waste otherwise, IMO. :p
 
Glen Contrarian said:
Is it "more aid required to lift them out of it", or is it "they're willing to do what it takes to lift more people out of poverty"?

Anyway, my overarching point - as it has been for years now - is that if strong social safety nets were really so bad economically, then why are the nations with the strongest social safety nets the ones that are generally the most stable, with the highest standards of living, and the healthiest economically?

I say that the social safety net, instead of being a drag on the economy, is an essential part of growing the economy. Instead of having a vast income inequality with the poorest of the poor being lucky to get $2/day as in so many third-world nations, our 'poor' are still generally well off when compared to what's found in third-world nations. What's more, they spend pretty much every penny they get, which boosts the local economy, which boosts the nation's economy as a whole. In other words, yes, conservatives are right that taxes are wealth redistribution, but it's that wealth redistribution that makes the economy healthier as a whole...and the proof lay in all the first-world socialized democracies on the planet.

And if we have a significantly higher minimum wage, that takes some of the pressure off the taxpayer - and the tax revenue can go to pay for other improvements or, maybe, just maybe, the debt.
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Now you are simply ignoring the facts - the US, with its lower MW, spends LESS than Australia, with its higher MW, on "safety net" programs. There is no tax revenue increase on an earned income of $20K vs. safety net payments of $20K (except for SS/Medicare).
 
Glen Contrarian said:
You really didn't READ the article, did you? The measurement is cost per employee, and the number of employees does not matter - the jobs they are doing is comparable. Remember, the big difference between the two sets of employees is that Sam's Club is having to spend much, much more in retraining costs because they have such a high turnover. Also:
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Why read something that compares apples to oranges. Actually the number of employee's do matter along with price point and other factors that you ignore because it counters your argument.
Sam's West, Inc. (doing business as Sam's Club) is an American chain of membership-only retail warehouse clubs owned and operated by Wal-Mart Stores, Inc., founded in 1983 and named after Walmart founder Sam Walton. As of 2012 Sam's Club chain serves 47 million U.S. and Puerto Rican members and is the 8th largest U.S. retailer.[2] As of January 31, 2008, Sam's Club ranks second in sales volume among warehouse clubs with 57 billion in sales behind Costco, despite the fact that Sam's has more retail locations.
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Thank you for supporting my argument.

Were you raising a family on that $12/hr? What you are able to do for yourself is one thing - what you have to be able to do for a family is a whole different ball of wax. And where you live makes a big difference, too. For instance, one can live in the MS Delta where I grew up on $10/hr if one is careful...but $10/hr isn't even close to what's needed to live in NY or SF.
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Moving the goal posts that is not what you said. you said making 15 was a low wage and you can barely get by. you neither mentioned anything about family or anything else. don't change the argument because it gets countered.

12 dollars is a livable wages. 15 is a livable wage. heck when i moved i was making 10 an hour and was still able to get by.

If a computer tech is only getting $15/hr, he needs to find a new employer. I worked as one for $17/hr...but that was ten years ago. And you are NOT going to be able to somehow automate McDonald's or Burger King, much less Wal-Mart. If you think you can, you seriously need a urinalysis test. Sure, they'll have tech assist, but not true automation. People won't go to what would essentially be a drive-through vending machine.
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UMM 15 avg starting wage for a entry level computer tech. computer programmers or admins will make more but for your average computer tech 12-15 is average.

you want to know how many stores use automated food ordering machines now? quite a few. they are easy simple and work well.
so yes they can easily automate mcdonalds or burger king.

they are already automating walmart. they are already have self check out. 1 person can cover 4 or 5 stations compared to having 4 cashiers.
 
faithful_servant said:
We will still continue to state that until you can show a direct connection between the growing economy and raising the MW, it's still a bad idea. "Correlation does not equal causation." Show us the mechanism for how increasing a cost with no benefit extended to the profitability of a company can be good for the economy.
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Easy! Here. That's a link to a Harvard study showing that because Costco pays its employees a living wage, they have a lot lower turnover and spend so much less on hiring and retraining that they actually spend less per employee than Sam's Club, even though Sam's Club pays their employees an average of $5 LESS per hour than Costco does.
 
CalGun said:
While you are applying money to the minimum wage that people aren't qualified to earn don't forget to double or triple social security so the poor elderly can afford the mcnuggets!
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actually it is more than that. most union labor has their salaries and pay tied to minimum wage. so when minimum wage goes up they have a me to clause.
almost all union labor will get a huge pay increase as well.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
And when - when! - Seattle's economy continues to grow after the $15/hour MW is in effect, what will the conservatives say then?
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What will granny say when her fixed SS check does not cover the bills anymore? What will the retired military vet do when their fixed income fails to get that generous raise? Do these morons in Seattle not see that not all city residents work or even intend to?
 
Jack Fabulous said:
"Living wage" and "minimum wage" are two entirely different things. If the "minimum wage" went to $10+/ hour it STILL wouldn't be enough to live on. It would probably be close if you were single and had no dependents but it would be barely scraping by at best.

This issue follows the same philosophy that people use when they call for tax increases on the wealthy. It can be shown over and over again that tax increases will only cover a small fraction of the deficit and it is only through spending cuts and economic growth that we can ever hope to erase it. Even with this knowledge in hand the same "tax the rich" battle cry just keeps on because it is a play on emotion that is easy to sell.

I'm to the point where I say just go ahead and do it. I'll support it. Increase the minimum wage to whatever you want and increase the top tax brackets, too. All I ask is that once these measures are in place and we're still up to our eyeballs in debt and the middle class are still wallowing in mediocrity... have the decency to vote for people who offer REAL solutions to the REAL problem instead of offering feel good token gestures that only serve to play to the masses and maintain the status quo.
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Well, I'm glad you see that "trickle-down" doesn't work. That's why George H.W. Bush referred to it as "voodoo economics". I'm no fan of Al Sharpton by any means, but I have to admit I like his quip: "We got the down, but we never got the trickle."

Keynesian economics works - that's what got us from the 1950's through the 1970's without an exploding federal debt - our worst economics times since the Depression all came AFTER Reaganomics took effect. And if you'll think about it, what got us out of the Depression? Our huge military build-up for WWII, right? All the shipbuilding, all the factories, all that was paid for by the taxpayers...and their taxes stimulated the economy to the point that after WWII, we were the strongest economy the world had ever seen. If the conservatives were right that economic stimulus doesn't work, then our taxpayer-funded buildup to WWII SHOULD have driven us further down into the Depression instead of bringing us out of it.

Taxes can be too high...but they can be too low. The three times since WWI that our taxes were the lowest were in the 1920's, 1981, and in the early 2000's. And what happened following each of those times? Correlation isn't causation...but the pattern is interesting.
 
The Man said:
You absolutely can easily automate parts of fast food places like McDonalds or Burger King. The order taking part is already automated at some places around where I live, and it works great. I'm sure that automation of the food cooking part is very near.
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We'll see, won't we?
 
CalGun said:
IDK but I'd be curious to see how your fixed income seniors respond? Will they get some kind of city addition to their social security so they can afford to buy things in town? When you find them deciding on cat food instead of meds and dying without a penny to their name let me know.
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Gotta be careful with those assumptions, guy - they come back and bite you sometimes, y'know? If you'll recall, seniors have this little thing called "Medicare" - you may have heard of it, you know, at those Tea Party rallies where they carried signs saying, "Keep your government hands off my Medicare!"

And last I recall, conservatives wanted to privatize Social Security! Seeing how well the deregulated private sector did in 2008, that should work out just fine for everyone, huh? Of course, that's unless y'all want to get rid of SS in toto, since that was part of FDR's socialist agenda, y'know....
 
ttwtt78640 said:
Now you are simply ignoring the facts - the US, with its lower MW, spends LESS than Australia, with its higher MW, on "safety net" programs. There is no tax revenue increase on an earned income of $20K vs. safety net payments of $20K (except for SS/Medicare).
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And they can do this because they work their system more efficiently than we do. From your reference:

By contrast, Australia’s flat-rate payments are financed from general taxation revenue, and there are no separate social security contributions; benefits are also income-tested or asset-tested, so payments reduce as other resources increase. The rationale for this approach is that it reduces poverty more efficiently by concentrating the available resources on the poor (“helping those most in need”) and minimises adverse incentives by limiting the overall level of spending and taxes.

...

Our system relies more heavily on income-testing and directs a higher share of benefits to lower-income groups than any other country in the OECD (and probably in the world). The poorest 20 per cent of the population receives nearly 42 per cent of all the money spent on social security; the richest 20 per cent receives only around 3 per cent. As a result, the poorest fifth receives twelve times as much in social benefits as the richest fifth, while in the United States the poorest get about one and a half times as much as the richest.
 
Glen Contrarian said:
And they can do this because they work their system more efficiently than we do. From your reference:

By contrast, Australia’s flat-rate payments are financed from general taxation revenue, and there are no separate social security contributions; benefits are also income-tested or asset-tested, so payments reduce as other resources increase. The rationale for this approach is that it reduces poverty more efficiently by concentrating the available resources on the poor (“helping those most in need”) and minimises adverse incentives by limiting the overall level of spending and taxes.

...

Our system relies more heavily on income-testing and directs a higher share of benefits to lower-income groups than any other country in the OECD (and probably in the world). The poorest 20 per cent of the population receives nearly 42 per cent of all the money spent on social security; the richest 20 per cent receives only around 3 per cent. As a result, the poorest fifth receives twelve times as much in social benefits as the richest fifth, while in the United States the poorest get about one and a half times as much as the richest.
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You are only hurting your case here. You are saying that the more efficient "safety net" system is also the more expensive "safety net" system.

You can't have it both ways because the higher that you drive the cost of living by mandating higher wages then the more you must give to the folks on "safety net" programs to make ends meet. This is why Australia, with a lower percentage of poor people, still has to spend more of its GDP on them.
 
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