Jump to content

Minimum Wage


Captain Worley

Recommended Posts


  • Replies 78
  • Created
  • Last Reply
The argument that people are "willing" to work for this so why shouldn't they ignores that fact that they are likely only willing because they have no choice. Don't work at all (then be labeled lazy and living off the government by conservatives) or work for what is the bottom end wage (then be used to point out how willing you are to work for nothing). I'm sure all of us are glad WE don't have to make that "choice".
Link to comment
Share on other sites

so how do you feel about minimum wage?

while i can agree with everything you've said, you didn't really make any comment on what it has to do with minimum wage. i've been there working those crappy jobs, living at home (my mother just barely making ends meet with my step-father who was sick with cancer), and i have to say... i didn't have to work minimum wage jobs. i did unskilled labor in a warehouse loading trucks, unloading trucks, filling boxes, stacking pallets, etc... all with a 4 year degree. i did this for nearly 2 years. i got paid under the table, making $7/hr. i worked with people who had it much worse than me, a 45 year old schizophrenic who managed to live on his own and temp workers from a drug/alcohol rehab program. the temp workers had all sorts of stories, but most of them realized that it was their own doing that put them where they were and they were doing their best to pull themselves up, but getting a GED, learning a trade, etc. the rehab program was paid $10/hr for their work, but the workers only saw half of that because it was consider part of the program (it was also based on born again christianity, and they were also taught to preach it... lucky for me, only a couple of them actually tried to preach it to me).

the american dream has changed. it's not what it used to be. part of that dream now is going to college and too many high schools are concentrating too much on that and the students just aren't capable of handling that. they are, however, perfectly capable of working with their hands. i think more inner city and low income high schools need to concentrate on teaching students a trade rather than college prep. if there's some students who really want to work to go to college, let them, but with less than 50% of the students actually going, why are they forced to take college prep type classes? even if they can get into college, can they afford it without taking out ridiculous loans? i'm in the middle class, living pretty comfortably, but i'm in a ton of debt because i went to college, and i went to a state school (in the state i lived in no less). if these students learned a trade, they could be making decent wages (well above minimum wage) right out of high school rather than working in a grocery store, a warehouse, or "digging ditches". there is currently a shortage of skilled laborers, which is part of the reason they make so much, and why a lot of them are quite corrupt in their business practices. it's these types of jobs that many of the lower income people can be going into and making a fair amount of money and living comfortably rather than working 2-3 low paying jobs.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

(And in re-reading, proofing and editing my own post here, I will note my own sanctimoniousness: my crankiness comes from having done what I considered to be the right things, getting into what I'd consider to be a safely middle-class professional environment, only to get thrown back down a notch. One never expects this to happen, though it's becoming more common, and when it does happen, you have absolutely no role models - you are winging it. And being poor [comparatively at least], maintaining ones' dignity and perseverence, and not being destroyed financially or psychologically, by that condition, is a great, unheralded art form.)
Link to comment
Share on other sites

i think more inner city and low income high schools need to concentrate on teaching students a trade rather than college prep. if there's some students who really want to work to go to college, let them, but with less than 50% of the students actually going, why are they forced to take college prep type classes? even if they can get into college, can they afford it without taking out ridiculous loans?...there is currently a shortage of skilled laborers, which is part of the reason they make so much, and why a lot of them are quite corrupt in their business practices. it's these types of jobs that many of the lower income people can be going into and making a fair amount of money and living comfortably rather than working 2-3 low paying jobs.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

I agree with you, college is certainly being oversold. The trades should be presented as an acceptable alternative for the less academically inclined.

I must add that I don't believe college graduates should expect to receive much interest outside of academia with degrees like Art history, Women's studies, or other cultural studies programs. They are fine if you plan on entering law school, or academia, but otherwise you're pouring your money down the drain.

Also, the number and percentage of the population making high incomes is at the highest level of all time - and increasing at a good clip. There is still an exceptional amount of money to be made for those who are smart, have a plan, and are willing to work for it.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I must add that I don't believe college graduates should expect to receive much interest outside of academia with degrees like Art history, Women's studies, or other cultural studies programs. They are fine if you plan on entering law school, or academia, but otherwise you're pouring your money down the drain.
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Gosh after reading some of these ultra capitalist posts it makes me wonder do the hardline capitalists want the US to be like Mexico?????

A squalid place where no one makes a decent wage, except the very wealthy. Mass poverty at every turn. People begging in public being the norm......

OK I know this will create a firestorm, but if it were up to me the minimum wage would be $10 an hour FOR ANY JOB. Not just for jobs with a certain number of employees, or one that does interstate commerce. Paying people less than that is a disgrace. The USA isn't some third world nation after all.

On a sidenote I have to say that if I were a business owner, I certainly wouldn't want to hire ANYONE at the minimum wage as it currently stands. I've always believed in the old addage--you get what you pay for. If you want quality employees, how can you possibly achieve it by paying human beings $5.15 an hour!!!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Gosh after reading some of these ultra capitalist posts it makes me wonder do the hardline capitalists want the US to be like Mexico?????

A squalid place where no one makes a decent wage, except the very wealthy. Mass poverty at every turn. People begging in public being the norm......

OK I know this will create a firestorm, but if it were up to me the minimum wage would be $10 an hour FOR ANY JOB. Not just for jobs with a certain number of employees, or one that does interstate commerce. Paying people less than that is a disgrace. The USA isn't some third world nation after all.

On a sidenote I have to say that if I were a business owner, I certainly wouldn't want to hire ANYONE at the minimum wage as it currently stands. I've always believed in the old addage--you get what you pay for. If you want quality employees, how can you possibly achieve it by paying human beings $5.15 an hour!!!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Bravo - a great point; I've wondered the same thing, and I sometimes fear that the answer is yes.

Howevre I can understand at least a piece of the opposing point - that a business cna (or should) choose to pay staff higher wages but that it shouldn't be mandated. Here in Chapel Hill, I can think of a pair of customer service oriented businesses that have the policy of starting people at $10 an hour - they have opted to do this, and there are visible benefits that explain why they have made this choice - they have very little turnover, their employees are loyal and willing to work hard, their customers know they can count on the staff. Both are well-regarded for quality of service, and the benfits - if you, as an employer manage things well - are definitely the kind of thing that you can grow a very prosperous business out of.

I know the inner workings of another local company that pays minimum, does little promoting within the ranks, and battles revolving-door turnover, along with other problems. You do indeed get what you pay for.

Mexico is an excellent reference point - it's among the 10 or 20 largest economies in the world, larger than several in Europe, and has an abundance of resources and people willing to work, and yet in many ways it's a basket case - the money goes straight to the top, doesn't trickle down, and what you have is basically a very poor country with far fewer excuses for that poverty than most other poor countries. The kind of imperial sensibility that exists in Mexico's upper classes has definitely taken root here, and I wonder where we're going to end up.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

All this economic blue-skying is great, but where does that leave the small businessman?

Gusterfell said: Didn't the business owner's choices put him in a position where his business couldn't survive?

No, the businessman was OK until the minumum wage was increased.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"Those that will fail had business plans that, through some flaw, didn't allow them to keep up with the competition."

But these businesses are being affacted by the GOVERNMENT not competition

"Businesses constantly have to adapt to change or die. A minimum wage increase is no exception."

So you're cool with government dabbling running out the small guy? If it was compettition, yep, too bad, soo sad.

I'm not talking, Walmart, or other big corporations. I've already said that if they put in a clause where businesses with less than 25 employees were exempt, I could get behind raising the minimum wage. However, it would hurt a lot of smaller businesses. It is a problem that needs to be addressed, but I really doubt it will be. The consequences of rainging minimum wage, I think, will be far more destructive than constructive.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

All this economic blue-skying is great, but where does that leave the small businessman?

Gusterfell said: Didn't the business owner's choices put him in a position where his business couldn't survive?

No, the businessman was OK until the minumum wage was increased.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

This is the untold truth to plenty of young Americans. Basically you MUST prepare for college, that is the ONLY way to realize the American Dream. Sure, many professions require a college degree, but are those jobs chosen for the wrong reasons? I think we are all told that college is the only route that should be considered and basically anyone that can't cut college is a loser. That might be a harsh word, but that is what our society implies. Funny thing is, if you really look at it jobs from college don't necessarily get you paid better than you would be if you didn't go. I have friends with college degrees that work in the medical field (not physicians), bankers, teachers, etc. They all make FAR below the friends I have that own landscape companies, are electricians, own auto businesses, are framers/construction, etc. I know an electrician that makes $125,000/year and has only been in business for 5 years. Try that at an average corporate job. When I had a landscape company in the early 90's I was bringing in $75,000/year. I even have a friend that has wanted to quit waiting tables at a restaurant downtown but can't justify leaving the $50,000+ mostly non-taxed income for a "good" regular job that pays the same but takes out taxes.

I think the college route is certainly important, but a lot of people leave college and discover a very tight job market for the flood of college degree applicants that want what is available. The law of supply-and-demand makes those jobs often lower paying than jobs where finding an employee is difficult because no one whats to do that kind of job.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

"But these businesses are being affacted by the GOVERNMENT not competition"

Which should be considered. Governments both left and right have been doing this since at least the New Deal.

"So you're cool with government dabbling running out the small guy? If it was compettition, yep, too bad, soo sad."

No, but this has generally not been the case on a vast scale with previous minimum wage hikes, and if the businessman deserves consideration (they've gotten quite a bit of it for the last 20-25 years), so do his employees (who have gotten very little).

"The consequences of rainging minimum wage, I think, will be far more destructive than constructive."

I can't agree. I wouldn't want to overstate the impact of a minimum wage hike - we're still going to have a lot of poor people in this country, and that ain't going to change, unfortunately. But the most extreme variants of free market theory, even when set forth in the most pragmatic language, fail to take human nature into consideration, and this is a quality that can't be reduced to a mathematical input in an economic equation. And such theories also exist in a strange moral vacuum - it's less bad for society to victimize some people, over some others.

The reality of such thinking is dangerous in its' potential for divisiveness - we don't live in some banana republic.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...

Important Information

By using this site you agree to our Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. We have placed cookies on your device to help make this website better. You can adjust your cookie settings, otherwise we'll assume you're okay to continue.