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House votes for minimum wage hike


rnc

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I'm in favor of a minimum wage increase in principal, but isn't the reality that this causes more jobs to be filled by those (typically illegal residents) paid "outside" of the tax system and more job loss to cheaper places in the world?
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A question - several states have had minimum wages higher than the national standard for a number of years. What is the job loss situation - in numbers and percentages in those states? This would be the closest thing to an unbiased indicator that we are likely to find - in attempting to do my own research, I find a lot of numbers from both governmental sources, the Economic Policy Institute and think tanks (like the Heritage Foundation and the Hoover Institute), and while they all seem persuasive, they are all very obviously slanted to the right or left, and those biases reflect theories that don't exactly square with the reality that people actually live in.

According to the Fiscal Policy Institute, employment, and actual numbers of small businesses grew faster than the national average in states with higher-than-federal minimum wages. I was unable to find any effects upon poverty rates in those states, and though several studies did mention small business failures (specifically, Waldman's study published in The Journal of Economic Issues in 1998), those mentions of "few if any effects" were not backed up by hard numbers I could locate at this late date.

I support raising the wage, but I'd support tying it to some other things: education, specifically. The manner in which wage laws have been implemented, until now at least, have done nothing to reduce poverty. I support raising the wage, if we also legally make it MUCH more difficult to drop out of high school, for example; or something else - small business owner gets a tax break (perhaps with an expiration date) to offset the hike, and/or the employee gets - instead of a greater lump of cash - an education allottment similar to current tax/benefits withholding. The idea would be to make the minimum wage law what it never really has been (what the left has often claimed [an honest way for unskilled adults to suport themselves or their families, which would include bettering oneself in ways that would allow one to move into a more economically feasable career]), while also reducing the "teenage store clerk" factor, and gradually, seriously trying to promote a drastic reduction in the size of our inter-generational unskilled workforce. I think the left has often been disingenuous and condescending in its' anti-poverty rhetoric (minimum wage discussions included), but I also suspect that the hard right would honestly love to see a race to the bottom, towards some semi-institutionalized caste system in this country, which of course would be the eventual disruption and end of this country, if other countries are any reliable indicator.

Of course, these are all legislative ideas of mine, and we all know how the government can and has mucked things up. But I've seen nothing in free market theory that would make me trust it any more.

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Minimum wage went up from 5.15 to 6.75 when I was working at a store in high school/college in Rhode Island. At first there wasn't really any noticeable difference, but gradually as people would quit (high turnover job, being a retail store of course) they would not hire someone to take their place. When I first started, we would have 6 or 7 people on the night shift. By the time I quit we were down to 3 or 4 if we were lucky. Was this an effect of minimum wage? I have no idea, but they never really cut payroll dollars so it most likely was.

I never noticed any unemployment trends beginning, though I'd have to look at the numbers.

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Yes, eliminate it.

The majority of people on the minimum wage are teenagers living at home, the minimum wage is simply a ploy constructed by the unions as a bargaining stick for higher wages. The primary supporters of the minimum wage are invariably unions.

A person's wages should be between the employer and employee, there is no one-size-fits-all.

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Minnesota's minimum wage increased to $6.15/hr. last summer and unemployment here still remains well below that of the national average.

You're right, other things do need to be addressed: Educational opportunities, training, etc. But please, explain to me how a single mother is going to educate herself when the federal government has been cutting financial aid?

I don't want to hear the "Well, she should have thought of that before getting knocked up".. as a man, I am disgusted by the number of men that go out as young men and get women/girls pregnant and then take off, only to adopt an attitude later in life that "it's their fault, they don't deserve help".

The conservative/Republican solution to society has been devastating. First you teach "abstinence only" education, which doesn't teach young people sexual responsibility, so they are more likely to go and get pregnant. Then you cut their welfare and financial aid so they can't afford daycare or to go to school and end up having to pawn the children off on grandparents/etc. while they go to work at low-paying jobs where movement upward is unlikely because of elevated sick days, etc. because not only do you have to care for yourself, but also for your child. The Republican solution to that seems to be to stand around and point fingers and chastize the person for their situation that I'm sure they're already well aware of: "Individual responsibility.. maybe you should have kept your legs closed... judge judge judge.. complain complain complain.. no real solutions, I"m just angry at the world and I'm going to make everyone miserable with me"

Maybe you're right on one thign: If we actually gave people the tools to help themselves like free college education or at least affordable with good medical coverage we wouldn't need a minimum wage. Or as our entire society moved forward would wages simply adjust so that even though the dumbest workers were smarter, they still get minimum wage?

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Its fine and good to talk about education and training, but someone that depends on a minimum wage job to simply pay their bills likely will have little time to go to school or to a training program. And those programs have been slashed and cut recently so where do these minimum wage earners turn? Do they quit working for a while to get this training. If so, how do they pay rent? How do they eat?

The theories are all fine and dandy, but the reality for many people is much much more difficult.

What about those that live in areas with no other job options? No robust economy like many of our regions have?

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Simple fact: The minimum wage has been increased many times over the years. Adjusted for inflation, many of those increases were much more drastic than the current proposal. None of these increases have ever caused the economy to implode, nor to cause mass business failures. Like I said last time we debated this, if a business plan can't survive paying wages that keep up with inflation, the business plan is flawed and should be allowed to fail.

^DwntownGeo, very, very few minimum wage workers live the lifestyle you're describing. The lack of savings in american households is as much the result of outsourcing of well-paying jobs as it is people's own irresponsibility.

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