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 Alex213
Stranger
Registered: 08/22/05
Posts: 1,839
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 Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall 
#6491787 - 01/24/07 07:01 AM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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When I flew to Seattle last week, airport security gave me trouble over the four pound ham I was carrying. Several TSA officials gathered to consider the question of whether ham is a "gel," to which I retorted: If ham is a gel, so am I. I suggested that they biopsy it for hidden box-cutters.
I offered to divide it into 21 three-ounce chunks, each appropriately stowed in a Ziploc baggie. But no deal.
So I broke down and told them I was flying into what I had been warned would be a food-free zone: Washington, with the highest minimum wage in the country ($7.63 an hour), could hardly be expected to have affordable restaurants or a functioning economy of any kind. Notable conservative economists have almost unanimously predicted that an increased minimum wage would result in wild price increases and mass unemployment, and I had a suitcase full of clippings to prove it.
I would be entering a culinary wasteland, facing fast food meals of $20 and up, and if I tried to fall back on soup kitchens, thousands of unemployed restaurant workers would be lined up ahead of me.
So imagine my surprise when I arrived, ham-less, in Seattle to find it fully functional, if not positively bustling. Restaurants were packed, and I could still get a grilled salmon sandwich for $7.95 at a cafeteria-style place overlooking the sound. My hotel was amply staffed with congenial people and - perhaps only because of the un-Seattle-like cold, no beggars approached me on the streets. Nor can you say the dire effects of a higher minimum wage just haven't had time to set in: Washington raised its minimum wage above the federal level of $5.15 an hour about a decade ago.
In fact, according to a January 9th article New York Times, Washington's economy is booming, generating 90,000 new jobs in the last year. Even business groups have stopped griping about the state's minimum wage. The article quotes a pizza store owner in the western part of the state: ''We're paying the highest wage we've ever had to pay, and our business is still up more than 11 percent over last year.''
My next stops were in California, with a minimum wage of $7.50 an hour, slated to go up to $8 next year. Again, no imported ham was required. Sidewalk taquerias flourished, as well, or so I'm told, as those celebrity sushi spots where you can pay $100 for a bite of fresh chum.
Overall, 29 states have raised their minimum wages above $5.15 an hour, and - lo!--the sky has not fallen. Could we have some apologies, please, from the economists who predicted a retail apocalypse?
Not that a $7 or even $8 minimum wage is utopian. My book Nickel and Dimed is often wrongly described as an account of my attempts to live on the minimum wage. Far from it; I averaged $7 an hour, which, according to the federal government, is well above the poverty level for a family of one. But I couldn't get by on that, thanks to the high rents even in trailer parks and residential motels, and I never went near pricey housing markets like San Francisco or Seattle. In the Seattle area, a "living wage" (calculated to reflect local housing and other basic costs) is $11.89 an hour for a single person and $25.35 for a family of three - more than three times the current minimum wage.
There is no moral justification for a minimum wage lower than a living wage. And given the experience of the 29 states that have raised their minimum wages, there isn't even an amoral economic justification either.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/barbara-ehrenreich/minimum-wage-rises-sky-d_b_39255.html
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 wilshire
free radical
 
Registered: 05/11/05
Posts: 2,421
Loc: SE PA
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: Alex213]
#6493189 - 01/24/07 03:57 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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like i've always said - they should just raise it to $50 an hour and be done with poverty for good.
"There is no moral justification for a minimum wage lower than a living wage."
amen to that!
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wilshire
free radical
Registered: 05/11/05
Posts: 2,421
Loc: SE PA
Last seen: 14 years, 2 months
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: wilshire]
#6493202 - 01/24/07 04:04 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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gluke bastid
Stinky Bum
Registered: 12/20/00
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: wilshire]
#6493368 - 01/24/07 05:00 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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So you don't think there should be a minimum wage?
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Society in every form is a blessing,
but government at its best is but a necessary evil
- Thomas Paine
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Flop Johnson
Praise Skatballah
Registered: 09/22/05
Posts: 13,789
Loc: TX
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: wilshire]
#6493375 - 01/24/07 05:03 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
wilshire said:
like i've always said - they should just raise it to $50 an hour and be done with poverty for good.
"There is no moral justification for a minimum wage lower than a living wage."
amen to that!
Or you could just work a crappy job for a crappy wage, instead of getting something you don't deserve/getting something that an employer shouldn't be obligated to give you.
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gluke bastid
Stinky Bum
Registered: 12/20/00
Posts: 3,322
Loc: Charm City
Last seen: 5 years, 6 months
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: wilshire]
#6493382 - 01/24/07 05:04 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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So you don't think there should be a minimum wage?
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Society in every form is a blessing,
but government at its best is but a necessary evil
- Thomas Paine
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DieCommie
Registered: 12/11/03
Posts: 29,258
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: gluke bastid]
#6493469 - 01/24/07 05:42 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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.
Edited by DieCommie (11/13/16 10:17 AM)
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zappaisgod
horrid asshole
Registered: 02/11/04
Posts: 81,741
Loc: Fractallife's gym
Last seen: 7 years, 10 months
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: DieCommie]
#6493582 - 01/24/07 06:30 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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This is very funny. Apparently the person who wrote this thinks that rents and wages are equal in California and Alabama. This is a stupid person. New York equals Mississippi. I could go on but I think the gist is clear. It's pretty clear to Nancy Pelosi, who thinks Samoa shouldn't be included. WHAT KIND OF MORALS IS THAT!!!!!
"There is no moral justification for a minimum wage lower than a living wage. And given the experience of the 29 states that have raised their minimum wages, there isn't even an amoral economic justification either."
There isn't a minimum wage in the country that a single person without children cannot subsist on. What that person can't subsist on is a zero wage, which there will be more of in many of the lower wage states when the employers of minimum wage workers opt out. But never mind that. Just how many people does this idiot think the minimum wage for one person should be able to support? A wife? plus one kid? plus two kids? three? Morality? Fuck that heinous retard, she knows nothing about struggling to pay bills and completely ignores the fact that almost nobody earns minimum wage for long. It's called entry level pay. It's what people are overpaid when they don't know how to do anything. I am not the least bit interested in what this pampered twat did for a school project. If all your ability can earn is minimum wage after you've been working for 6 months you definitely need to live in Arkansas. That's right Hilary, I said Arkansas.
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zappaisgod
horrid asshole
Registered: 02/11/04
Posts: 81,741
Loc: Fractallife's gym
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: zappaisgod]
#6493585 - 01/24/07 06:30 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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I replied to the wrong person by mistake
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Basilides
Servent ofWisdom
Registered: 02/10/06
Posts: 7,059
Loc: Crown and Heart
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: Flop Johnson]
#6494121 - 01/24/07 09:11 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
MoeRon said:
Quote:
wilshire said:
like i've always said - they should just raise it to $50 an hour and be done with poverty for good.
"There is no moral justification for a minimum wage lower than a living wage."
amen to that!
Or you could just work a crappy job for a crappy wage, instead of getting something you don't deserve/getting something that an employer shouldn't be obligated to give you.
I like the idea of a minimum wage because most employers are cheap assholes.
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"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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Alex213
Stranger
Registered: 08/22/05
Posts: 1,839
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: DieCommie]
#6495179 - 01/25/07 07:28 AM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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[quote
I always get disgusted when I deliver a pizza to the govt. projects... They have big TVs, nicer cars than me, satalite dishes, plus they are ordering over priced home delivery fast food. Im not on the dole, but I cant even afford home pizza delivery!
Are you're positive they're buying that on what the government gives them?
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Seuss
Error: divide byzero
Registered: 04/27/01
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: Alex213]
#6495235 - 01/25/07 08:07 AM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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> That's right Hilary, I said Arkansas.
I have no love for Hillary, but, she was born and grew up in Illinois. She didn't move to Arkansas until after hooking up with Bill. She actually served as president of the Wellesley College Chapter of the College Republicans. (Yes, Republicans!)
> I like the idea of a minimum wage because most employers are cheap assholes.
I don't like the idea of a minimum wage because I believe in the concept of supply and demand, even when it comes to employment. (I also dislike inflation, the inevitable result of raising the minimum wage.)
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Just another spore in the wind.
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trippindad82
Trusted Cultivator of Trich
Registered: 01/07/07
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: Seuss]
#6495311 - 01/25/07 08:52 AM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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IMO, the minimum is such bullshit. All that happens with the minimum is it becomes the new standard. That's it. Most places who offer low paying jobs do their best to never allow anyone to get much above the minimum wage. Sure one can say that there are plenty of $10/hr jobs out there, but if everyone working for $6/hr left to $10/hr jobs, there wouldn't be any left. Also, raising the minimum wage doesn't do anything. Slowly but surely, the cost of living just goes up and makes the minimum pointless...again. What I don't agree with, which no on seems to bring up here, is that why is an MBA worth more than a masters in education? An MBA is nothing, yet an MBA will guarantee one at least $100k/yr. But teachers, some of the most highly educated people out there barely make $35k/yr. One can argue that teachers get the whole summer off which is why they are paid so little, but you must realize that teaching is an around the clock job during the non summer months. Maybe if the pay for teachers went up, there would be better teachers in the system, and the idea of "low income/poverty" wouldn't be there anymore. Yeah right....in an economic situation, in order for someone to have everything (which those up at the top want and have) someone has to have little to nothing. Also, for those of you saying that "poverty" doesn't exist here in America. Guess what, it does. The only reason why our homeless and poor eat so well is thanks to the corporate policy. McD's, Burger King, and any other food place out there throws food away. Brand clean uneaten food. Those homeless people know this and hit it up. You don't have this in foreign countries. There is no McD's for that little kid pic'd above to be able to dig through their garbage. And we as a country would rather throw food out and pay farmers not to grow a crop rather than send the excess food to those countries. And when those countries do get food, some company like Haliburton is getting paid to provide it. It's just a fucked up circle that will continue to loop until eternity.
If mankind can't even figure out how to live peacefully, how do you expect us to be able to solve any of those other problems.
Once again, this is also part of the media cover up of what's really going on. Those people who really run our govt don't give a shit about the rest of us. We could starve away and all die, as long as they still have all the power and money. The only time you will ever see those really in charge (the puppeteers behind the scenes) is if their own lives could possibly be affected. Until then, good luck on solving shit like this.
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Trying to explain a journey to someone who has never experienced it is like trying to explain what a zebra looks like to blind person who has never seen a horse.
^^^The above matter may be a complete fantasy that I concocted out of possible boredom.^^^
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pokermush
Waterboardingmyself toprotect America!
Registered: 09/17/06
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: Basilides]
#6495817 - 01/25/07 12:58 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
I like the idea of a minimum wage because most employers didn't become employers by paying more than something is worth.
Fixed your post.
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trippindad82
Trusted Cultivator of Trich
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: pokermush]
#6495833 - 01/25/07 01:02 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
pokermush said:
Quote:
I like the idea of a minimum wage because most employers didn't become employers by paying more than something is worth.
Fixed your post.
The problem is that most minimum wage workers work 100x harder than those who make even twice what they do. PayChex pays it's janitorial staff $6.25/hr to clean up after 1400 immature people who can't even piss in the toilet or throw garbage in the trash can. Yet, the managers who make well over $16/hr (worked into salary) do less work (most of them hand their work off to subordinates) and are obviously getting paid more. So, in your eyes, having a boss who doesn't do shit is more important than having a clean toilet to drop a deuce?
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Trying to explain a journey to someone who has never experienced it is like trying to explain what a zebra looks like to blind person who has never seen a horse.
^^^The above matter may be a complete fantasy that I concocted out of possible boredom.^^^
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Basilides
Servent ofWisdom
Registered: 02/10/06
Posts: 7,059
Loc: Crown and Heart
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: pokermush]
#6495837 - 01/25/07 01:04 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Actually, what work is worth is entirely subjective. Eva think of that?
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"Have you found the beginning, then, that you are looking for the end? You see, the end will be where the beginning is. Congratulations to the one who stands at the beginning: that one will know the end and will not taste death."
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pokermush
Waterboardingmyself toprotect America!
Registered: 09/17/06
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: Basilides]
#6495908 - 01/25/07 01:21 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Who forces those janitors to do the job for $6.25 per hour? Who is to say that a janitor who might be a slow worker, and can only get $6 or so worth of work done in an hour can't have a job?
If the job was worth more, Paychex would have to pay more to fill the position.
And Basilides, work is worth whatever the employer and employee agree it's worth. If the employee takes a job from a "cheap asshole" for too little pay, its his own damn fault and he should quit whining and find another job.
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trippindad82
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: pokermush]
#6495940 - 01/25/07 01:31 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Sometimes, due to language barriers, lack of education, appearance, or whatever else FORCES a person into a crappy paying job. The problem is that a college education is being weighed in as more than it is worth. Another thing, try to tell an employer who is offering you a $6/hr job that you want double that pay or nothing and see how you get laughed at. The issue is that you are required to work in order to survive and are sometimes forced into crappy jobs. Do you think that those migrant workers who pick the fruits and vegetables that you eat for dinner wouldn't want better pay? Of course they would, but due to a faulty impractical system, they will always make that pay. And if they didn't, your head of lettuce would cost $8 instead of $1.50. I know that we need these low paid workers to keep our own costs down, but at the same time, how can doing nothing except watching someone for 8 hours be worth 50+k/yr?
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Trying to explain a journey to someone who has never experienced it is like trying to explain what a zebra looks like to blind person who has never seen a horse.
^^^The above matter may be a complete fantasy that I concocted out of possible boredom.^^^
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pokermush
Waterboardingmyself toprotect America!
Registered: 09/17/06
Posts: 475
Loc: Utah
Last seen: 16 years, 1 day
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: trippindad82]
#6496018 - 01/25/07 02:01 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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If the job isn't worth $6 an hour to you, you won't do it. You're asking for an entire class of people to be paid more than the job is worth. Regardless of the cascading ramifications of that, it is wrong.
If your appearance is so bad that you scare away customers, your work is worth less to the business. If you don't speak the language and can't communicate well with the customers, your work is less valuable to the business.
Who are you to say that a business has to pay somebody else the same as me, when I work twice as hard and produce twice as much as the next guy?
The beauty of America is that anybody can work hard to improve their life. They can improve their appearance, learn a new language, and go to school to learn new skills. America's respect for that fundamental liberty is what has set us apart from the world and made us "the land of opportunity".
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Redstorm
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Re: Minimum wage rises, sky does not fall [Re: trippindad82]
#6496081 - 01/25/07 02:24 PM (17 years, 2 months ago) |
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Quote:
trippindad82 said:
Quote:
pokermush said:
Quote:
I like the idea of a minimum wage because most employers didn't become employers by paying more than something is worth.
Fixed your post.
The problem is that most minimum wage workers work 100x harder than those who make even twice what they do. PayChex pays it's janitorial staff $6.25/hr to clean up after 1400 immature people who can't even piss in the toilet or throw garbage in the trash can. Yet, the managers who make well over $16/hr (worked into salary) do less work (most of them hand their work off to subordinates) and are obviously getting paid more. So, in your eyes, having a boss who doesn't do shit is more important than having a clean toilet to drop a deuce?
A person who forgoes an education did so by his or her own choice. Pretty much anyone who wants to go to college can these days via loans or need-based scholarships.
Why should a janitor receive as much pay as a manager when the manager had to pay tens of thousands of dollars to be qualified for that position and the janitor just had to walk in and fill out an application?
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