Eliminating minimum wage would help the very poor!

[FrancisMarion]

In my point of view there is a bigger issue that it is directly pertinent to this thread:

It seems that a large portion of the population does not understand the direct relationship between business success and the consequential potential of increased pay and advancement due to that success. The ones that constantly perceive their employers as adversaries are the ones that are likely to NOT see raises and advancement. If you understand that doing a good job creates profits for the company which affords the company the capital to pay you more, you get it.

Individuals work ethics and abilities should drive wages.

On a different thought: I wonder what % of min wage earners would see decreases in pay if there was no min wage. If it was a high percentage, what would happen to prices for goods and services. If prices for goods is set by supply and demand and the concept of price elasticity is true, would not prices have to decrease if a large portion of the economy saw there earnings decrease?

[nobody's_hero]

You want to know why this is the case? Because some jobs quite simply aren't worth the current minimum wage, so why would an employer add more jobs when the minimum wage is paying the employee more than the production of that employee is bringing in? The idea of business is to make a profit. In some industries, paying an employee the current minimum wage doesn't put companies in a good position to even break even just like any regulations cause unemployment to skyrocket.

And why are employers themselves finding it harder to make a profit?

Inflation.

Just as employees are finding it harder to and harder to stretch a dollar, so too are their employers. Soon the only companies that will be in business are the ones who are massive enough to survive the fallout, but even they are affected by the declining purchasing power of the dollar, just not enough to utterly ruin them . . . yet.

End the Fed and the minimum wage will sort itself out.

[RabbitMan]

The worst states are in this order:
Santa Fe, NM $10.29
San Fran, CA $10.24
1. WA $9.04 (increases yearly)
2. OR $8.80 (increases yearly)
3. VT $8.46 (increases yearly)
4. CT $8.25 now, $9 in July 2012, $9.75 in 2013
IL/DC/NV $8.25
7. CA/MA $8
8. AK $7.75
9. OH $7.70 (increased yearly)
10. FL $7.67
11. AZ $7.65 (increases yearly)
MT $7.65
13. CO $7.64 (increases yearly)
and so on

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_U.S._minimum_wages

As a citizen of Washington Sate, I want to point out something about our minimum wage law, because the quote is misleading. It says our Minimum Wage increases yearly. Do you know why? Washington State actually had a minimum wage at the Federal level until 2000. That year a law went into effect tying the minimum wage to inflation. Our minimum wage is merely inflation adjusted. Technically nothing has changed and the State has been responsible by trying to adhere to the entire point of a minimum wage. It's just everyone else in the country who is getting screwed.

[nobody's_hero]

On a different thought: I wonder what % of min wage earners would see decreases in pay if there was no min wage. If it was a high percentage, what would happen to prices for goods and services. If prices for goods is set by supply and demand and the concept of price elasticity is true, would not prices have to decrease if a large portion of the economy saw there earnings decrease?

If minimum wage is abolished and employers hire more workers, and yet those employers still have to endure the pain of inflation (just like everyone else) when managing their business, I don't see how it would make things any better. If that employer goes out of business due to centrally-managed inflationary pressure, then the workers will have no jobs anyway, regardless of whether the minimum wage is $0.50/hr or $50.00/hr.

The problem is not that there is deflationary pressure and therefore there's not 'physically enough money to pay everyone $7.25/hr' (which would quickly happen if there was a decrease in the money supply, which, I'm not aware of ever happening since the Fed was established), the problem is that all that money rests in the hands of those who received it first (bailout recipients), and they've printed waaaay too much money. So the dollar's value is dropping, not increasing. If the value were increasing and you gave someone a pay cut, they'd be breaking even (though most people would think they're getting a bad deal, just looking at the numbers rather than the value). The dollar is dropping in value and repealing the minimum wage would be like kicking people when they're down.

Just as an experiment, if you don't have a minimum wage job, try living for a year on what the minimum wage is. Take whatever extra money remains in your paycheck and put it in a safe spot, but don't use it! A year from now, find out whether that money you put away (which represents what your employer kept, for the purpose of this experiment), is worth more or less than it was when you started this experiment. My bet is that the money will be worth a bit less—which means that if your employer keeps whatever excess he/she didn't pay you with (so to hire more workers, perhaps), then he/she will not be able to buy as much with it a year from now, either.

Monetary inflation hurts everyone. Minimum wage hurts employers.

Which one would you go after most-intensely if you were looking to fix the problem at its roots, so that everyone might benefit?

[Keith and stuff]

As a citizen of Washington Sate, I want to point out something about our minimum wage law, because the quote is misleading. It says our Minimum Wage increases yearly. Do you know why? Washington State actually had a minimum wage at the Federal level until 2000. That year a law went into effect tying the minimum wage to inflation. Our minimum wage is merely inflation adjusted. Technically nothing has changed and the State has been responsible by trying to adhere to the entire point of a minimum wage. It's just everyone else in the country who is getting screwed.

The higher the state minimum wage is, the more the people of that state are getting screwed. A minimum wage that increases yearly is especially an insidious law. You are looking at it the 100% wrong way. Of course, perhaps you are just joking, perhaps that's why you smiled In that case, I agree with you

Don't worry. Yes, WA is the worst state in this regard. Don't worry though, in 2013, there is a good chance CT will be the worst state.

[LibertyEagle]

Ok, your so wrong... do you live in a dream world?

I watched as my ex boss fired and replaced 15 people on my crew with $5/hour illegal immigrant laborers.
He gave everyone a choice, paycut or pink slip...

If they banned minimum wage tomorrow, your boss would walk into the office and tell everyone that they are taking pay cuts or layoffs as the work force is now to be replaced with $5/hr workers...

If we let employers pay $5/hr then every full time employee would be eligible for food stamps and welfare!
That would get us right back on track... :/

Also, what incentive would there to be to get off unemployment if your making $250/week minimum on that, and jobs would be paying $200 a week for 40 hours before taxes, so after taxes you take home only $156 a week...

They entire system of welfare, food stamps, and unemployment would have to be banned long before we can eliminate a minimum wage.

Even if all that was banned, the employers would still fire you to replace you with the cheapest body would do the work at the lowest price.
Lower labor costs mean more profits. Companies exist to make profit. YOU being a good employee is NOT worth the extra money to keep you.

Au contraire. In most cases, better employees mean higher quality work and thus more profits. It is competition for the best workers in the marketplace that determines wages. It is not the government.

[The Free Hornet]

The purpose of the minimum wage being enacted was not to help people get ahead, it was to allow them, at best, to break-even.

Do you have a citation for this? I posted a link alleging a racist origin (e.g., white workers didn't like minorities working for less pay). Here are more regarding union and racist backing for the minimum wage.

Union Members, Not Minimum-Wage Earners, Benefit When the Minimum Wage Rises

Why Racists and Unions Support Minimum Wages

End the fed. Stop printing money and let the market decide what the minimum wage should be, without some guy at the Federal Reserve constantly tinkering with the money supply. Employers and employees can't make good estimates of what an honest wage should be, if someone in power keeps clouding their vision.

You know how you let the market determine the minimum wage? You end the minimum wage! This obsession with the Fed is over the top. Ending the Fed does not end the minimum wage laws even if you think that the Fed is a motivation for the laws. It is a seperate issue. The minimum wage is a progressive canard not unique to the United States or the Fed.

Monetary inflation hurts everyone. Minimum wage hurts employers.

Which one would you go after most-intensely if you were looking to fix the problem at its roots, so that everyone might benefit?

I would stick to the issue at hand, the minimum wage. The Fed is the root of many problems but the roots of the minimum wage are racism and rent seeking. It is like professional licensing but leveled at a different income level. By way of example, just because the military wastes hundreds of billions of dollars, doesn't mean I am going to not focus on PBS/NPR wasting hundreds of millions of dollars. PBS/NPR doesn't deserve a pass until every other larger budget issue is addressed. I would argue that if you can't or won't address the PBS-sized budget issues, you will be toothless in the face of the military-industrial complex. One may be more the root of the problem, but both must be addressed and I wouldn't quibble about the order.

Monetary inflation hurts everyone. Minimum wage hurts employers.

Minimum wage hurts employees too especially the ones who can't work at full capacity because there is less demand for their work or they are being dragged down by less productive coworkers.

From one of my links above:

Low-Income Families Lose

Unfortunately, the opposite is true for unskilled non-union workers who earn the minimum wage. The researchers found that raising the minimum wage actually reduces these workers' earned income. Wages go up, but only for those workers who keep their jobs. In response to the higher minimum wage, employers reduce both the number of minimum-wage workers they hire and the hours of the minimum-wage workers they do employ. The lost hours and jobs mean that, after the minimum wage rises, the average minimum-wage worker earns less.[9] Union members who earn more than the minimum wage benefit at the expense of minimum-wage workers.

http://www.heritage.org/research/rep...mum-wage-rises

An employer at least has options to adapt and the business experience to adjust prices, management style, import, relocate, build a robot, etc. The typical unskilled, unexperienced worker is less able to adjust in a world where "nobody's hiring". Wendy's can raise the price of a burger to compensate. Unemployed Ernie cannot lower his price, cannot add to his job references without a job, cannot gain more employed experience, and cannot climb a ladder with the initial rungs cut off.

It's a human rights issue and textbook economy mismanagement.

[Traditional Conservative]

It seems strange to read two threads where a large number of members here are arguing in favor of FDA regulations and increasing the minimum wage. Doesn't everyone realize that Ron is opposed to the minimum wage and the FDA? I'm not even a libertarian, but I'm still more libertarian than most of the people who post on this forum.

[rockerrockstar]

The truth is that minimum wage has not been keeping up with inflation. I feel sorry for the minimum wage workers. I don't know how they can afford to drive to work. They must live right next to work because paying for gas at these high prices would not be economical to drive to work. Probably ride the bus otherwise.

Facts

$10.39
How much the federal minimum wage would be if it had kept up with inflation over the past 40 years. Instead, it’s $7.25. Learn More

$15,080
The annual income for a full-time employee working the entire year at the federal minimum wage.

0
The number of states where a minimum wage worker can afford a two-bedroom apartment working a 40-hour week. Learn More

3
The number of times Congress passed legislation to increase the minimum wage in the last 30 years.

19
The number of states (including the District of Columbia) which have raised their minimum wage above the federal level of $7.25.

10
The number of states that annually increase their state minimum to keep up with the rising cost of living.

67
The percentage of Americans that support gradually raising the minimum wage from $7.25 an hour to at least $10.00 an hour, according to an October 2010 poll.

62
The percentage of self-identified Tea Partiers that support raising the minimum wage to $10 in Maryland, according to a December 2010 poll.

76
The percentage of Missouri voters that voted to increase and index the Misourri minimum wage in the 2006 ballot initiative.

$2.13
The federal minimum wage for tipped employees, such as waiters and waitresses, nail salon workers, or parking attendants.

http://www.raisetheminimumwage.com/facts/

Minimum Wage what it buys you 1950s to now. Here is another interesting site see link below.

http://www.thefiscaltimes.com/Media/...w.aspx?index=7

Those that complain about limitless unemployment don't know what they are talking about. The 99 weeks never is really 99 weeks. Matter of fact they recently changed the number of weeks. The the truth is you only qualify for a sum of money for each tier. Your state must have high enough unemployment rate. You only qualify for a certain sum of money for each tier and once it is gone it is over no matter if you have weeks left to collect or not. Then you go to the next tier if you qualify for it. Anyways, I have found that amount of time unemployment last is about half the amount that the weeks they say you can get. Just saying quit saying bad things about unemployed people. You may need the help when you get laid off from the bad decisions of politicians and business in the future.

I can understand people being upset that people that are unemployed and made close to minimum wage will not take a minimum wage job do to unemployment. They don't have incentive to. But consider that there are many unemployed people that are educated and are used to making a good living. Why should you force higher earners to not have unemployment? We need it to give us a chance to find another good job. You will destroy the tax base if you destroy the earnings of all the high earners by forcing them to take minimum wage jobs. By giving them a chance to find a good fit and reasonable job that is similar or near their standard of living it will help the tax base.

I think instead of getting upset about unemployment benefits and trying to cut them we should be instead raising revenue for them. Obviously the premiums for the unemployment benefits were not high enough to cover the expenses caused by this down turn. Maybe both the companies and employees should contribute more to the system. This would help get the system ready in case of more down turns in the economy. Anyways, I also think that their should be an option for people to purchase more unemployment benefits if we want to protect our incomes more.

Anyways, nothing is easy but it is worth thinking about. Put your self in the shoes of an unemployed person that probably ran out of their savings and needs the funds to eat and buy gas. They want work but want something decent to provide a reasonable living near what they are used to. I don't think that is too crazy. Unless their entire industry is gone and has moved to another country.

One thing that would have helped me is if my state had an alternative base period calculation. They did not count my last quarter of earnings. So I could not get benefits for three months so they would count that quarter later. Anyways, waiting three months drained all my savings. If they had the alternative method of calculating the base period I would have qualified. I earned enough money just did not have enough quarters of earnings to begin with. If they had that alternative base period law I would have been fine and not wasted so much money. I probably could have found a job faster because I could have used those funds to move to another state to get work.

[Traditional Conservative]

The truth is that minimum wage has not been keeping up with inflation. I feel sorry for the minimum wage workers. I don't know how they can afford to drive to work. They must live right next to work because paying for gas at these high prices would not be economical to drive to work. Probably ride the bus otherwise.

Most of the people who make minimum wage are either part time workers or high school students just trying to make a little extra money. Very few adults actually work full time at minimum wage jobs.

Also, why exactly do you support Ron Paul if you support massive government regulations like the minimum wage? Do you realize that Ron Paul wants to abolish the minimum wage?