Gallup Poll: 76% of Americans would vote to raise minimum wage to $9/hr

[mad cow]

Sheesh,what does that huge post have to do with the subject?Minimum wage laws hinder choice.If somebody does or doesn't want to work for $5,$10,$20 or $$50,000 an hour,that is their choice,not yours.

This is a private contract between two actors,it shouldn't involve you or the government.If you don't like their choices,too bad,deal with it,it doesn't involve you and it is none of your business.
If you think they are worth more than $5.00/hour,hire them.

 

[Bastiat's The Law]

 

[mad cow]

Great vid,+rep.

 

[parocks]

"Prices rise. If the gains of increasing the minimum wage are to be maintained for those people, it must be continuously increased- otherwise price inflation wipes out the gains over time (how quickly depends on how much wages were increased and how fast prices are going up). "

That is exactly what happens. That's how it works. It's time for another minimum wage hike.
first 43 years (1938-1981) - over 1000% increase (.25 - 3.35)
second 32 years (1981-2013) - under 120% increase (3.35 - 7.25)

"Why a select group? Why not increase everybody's wages and make everyone better off? Because prices would rise even faster so nobody would really be better off."

Right. It's in place for the poorest.



" The increase will be paid for someplace."

?

"What about the workers? Their employer has a budget. If he has to raise wages 20% and is in a competitive market, he has a harder time passing along price increases."

You're assuming he's in a competitive market. Think - big grocery store chain. Most of these businesses are oligopolies.

Also, these businesses competing with other similar businesses. The other business also have minimum wage workers. All of the wages will go up at the same time in the same basic way for everybody. Nobody is getting a competitive advantage over anyone here.


"So instead of raising prices he may cut hours by 20%. The worker gets more per hour but fewer hours. Is he on net better off?"

Assuming that they cut hours, even though there were more customers, because a segment of people that didn't have much money to spend on food
now has more money to spend on foodd

He's better off. He has more free time. And don't forget, if there are oligopolies involved, they don't work the same way. They cut hours, cut prices, or stop buying ads on tv. There are a lot of ways for them to deal with min wage hikes, as well as gas prices going up. It seems like they've been able to do it pretty well since 1938.

"Or maybe the employer reduces the number of workers. Some gained wages- some had their wages go to zero. If you are in the zero group, you are not better off."

Yeah, correct. You'll have to find another job. Or be unable to. That's definitely a downside for those people who get fired because the minimum wage goes up. I think there are far fewer of them than you think. One, because the supermarkets are competing with each other, and people gotta eat, you they'd likely just raise prices like they always have. The supermarkets need who they need. The difference between 7.25 and 9 is irrelevant to them, because they know the other supermarkets also have to raise their labor costs. Prices go up. A tiny bit. Prices are always going up. Oh, look, that costs a quarter more. There isn't any shock, it's built in, they just continuously raise prices. In some cases you won't really have any idea what the price is going to be on a 12 pack of Pepsi. You know that it's worth less than they have it on sale for. And sometimes it's a dollar more. They're charging whatever they feel like, whenever they want. It could be Giant, it could be Pepsi.
It's the way it is, and it isn't particularly worrisome. I just wouldn't worry about too much unemployment being created from this in real life.

Certainly, there are scenarios where this could happen, but typically people's examples are theoretical, and not real.

 

[mad cow]

Bottom line Parocks,you are in favor of putting a gun to somebody's head and saying "pay this person what I want you to pay him,even if he is not worth what I insist that you pay him or I will blow your brains out".

Don Corleone would be proud.

 

[parocks]

Bottom line Parocks,you are in favor of putting a gun to somebody's head and saying "pay this person what I want you to pay him,even if he is not worth what I insist that you pay him or I will blow your brains out".

Don Corleone would be proud.

Are you a crazy person?

No one is forcing anyone to do anything with the minimum wage.

You're thinking of Obamacare.

 

[mad cow]

Are you a crazy person?

No one is forcing anyone to do anything with the minimum wage.

You're thinking of Obamacare.

If you are now saying that the wage paid to any employee is completely between him and his employer and can be as low as $0.01/hour,I must apologize,I have totally misunderstood you during this entire thread.

 

[nobody's_hero]

If they raise the minimum wage and retail workers start getting paid $9/hr, I would seriously consider quitting my job I went to college for, to work in retail. Being a nurse is radically more stressful than stocking a warehouse, and with a base rate of $20 an hour as a nurse, I'd have to carefully weigh the pros and cons of quitting to go work in retail. It might be worth it in terms of the stress I deal with. I certainly would not go through 4 years of college only to make a few bucks more than unskilled workers.

Of course, what will most likely happen is that my wages will go up when minimum-wage earners get more money in their pockets. This is what is known as, "moving the goalposts." The poorest people will get a boost in their pay, which will be negated by proportional increases to all other income-brackets.

 

[Keith and stuff]

Supermarkets are oligopolies.

It depends where you live. For example, Keene NH has 6 stores that least have several full length grocery isles (Walmart, Target, Dollar Tree, Price Chopper, and Hannaford's) another 6 local food markets that don't sell gas. Then there are 4 gas stations with markets in them. And less than 1 mile south there is another grocery store (Market Basket) and another gas station with a market. Plus there are farms and even a large co-op that's locally owned. Not to mention the farmer's market. There are 3 drug stores that have isle after isle of food, including frozen and things like eggs and milk. In fact, if you do coupon stacking, drug stores tend to have the best deals on name brand items, as you can often get stuff for free. Then there's the all local store and the old country store. So people in Keene have at least 25 food stores to buy groceries within bike riding distance. There was another local chain grocery store, Shaw's, but it had to close because it wasn't competitive with the near-by much smaller chain, Market Basket, not to mention the Walmart that shared a building with it. And several years back, Kmart closed because it was poorly run. So there is a good flow on companies competing in the Keene market. There are also a dozen bakeries that sell things like cupcakes, cakes, donuts, muffins... in bulk, which compete with grocery stores for those things. Then in you drive 25 minutes in 3 different directions, there are other grocery stores, food markets, gas stations with markets, dollar stores and so on.

New stores are continuously being built (ALDI, Family Dollar, Dollar Tree, Ocean State Job Lot, Walmart, Market Basket, Trader Joe's Whole Foods, Fresh Market, Ali Baba, local co-ops) and various poorly run stores continue to fail in NH (the Costco in Portsmouth, all of the Stop N Shops in NH, some of the Shaw's). The market certainly isn't a oligopoly in NH, but maybe in your community in ME, it is. That might not just be able lack of a free market in ME, considering how few people live in the area and it's in ME, which is on the edge of the US. My guess is, if ME wasn't so anti-business and anti-consumer, you might have a little more competition there, but it's hard to compete when the market is so small and there is NH right next door.

 

[Keith and stuff]

Of course, what will most likely happen is that my wages will go up when minimum-wage earners get more money in their pockets. This is what is known as, "moving the goalposts." The poorest people will get a boost in their pay, which will be negated by proportional increases to all other income-brackets.

If you are in a union, that might be likely. Some unions negotiate contracts so that the folks in them get a minimum of a certain multiple of min. wage. So if the minimum wage goes up, some or many nicely paid union workers get pay increases.

 

[Keith and stuff]

Are you a crazy person?

No one is forcing anyone to do anything with the minimum wage.

You're thinking of Obamacare.

Isn't it called the minimum wage because it's the minimum wage a company has to pay a almost no skilled worker or that company holds/the leaders go to jail/the company can never hire workers or whatever?

 

[parocks]

Isn't it called the minimum wage because it's the minimum wage a company has to pay a almost no skilled worker or that company holds/the leaders go to jail/the company can never hire workers or whatever?

Yet, no one is FORCED to DO anything.

Similar arguments can be made. But there is no FORCING to DO, like there is with Obamacare.

 

[parocks]

It depends where you live. For example, Keene NH has 6 stores that least have several full length grocery isles (Walmart, Target, Dollar Tree, Price Chopper, and Hannaford's) another 6 local food markets that don't sell gas. Then there are 4 gas stations with markets in them. And less than 1 mile south there is another grocery store (Market Basket) and another gas station with a market. Plus there are farms and even a large co-op that's locally owned. Not to mention the farmer's market. There are 3 drug stores that have isle after isle of food, including frozen and things like eggs and milk. In fact, if you do coupon stacking, drug stores tend to have the best deals on name brand items, as you can often get stuff for free. Then there's the all local store and the old country store. So people in Keene have at least 25 food stores to buy groceries within bike riding distance. There was another local chain grocery store, Shaw's, but it had to close because it wasn't competitive with the near-by much smaller chain, Market Basket, not to mention the Walmart that shared a building with it. And several years back, Kmart closed because it was poorly run. So there is a good flow on companies competing in the Keene market. There are also a dozen bakeries that sell things like cupcakes, cakes, donuts, muffins... in bulk, which compete with grocery stores for those things. Then in you drive 25 minutes in 3 different directions, there are other grocery stores, food markets, gas stations with markets, dollar stores and so on.

New stores are continuously being built (ALDI, Family Dollar, Dollar Tree, Ocean State Job Lot, Walmart, Market Basket, Trader Joe's Whole Foods, Fresh Market, Ali Baba, local co-ops) and various poorly run stores continue to fail in NH (the Costco in Portsmouth, all of the Stop N Shops in NH, some of the Shaw's). The market certainly isn't a oligopoly in NH, but maybe in your community in ME, it is. That might not just be able lack of a free market in ME, considering how few people live in the area and it's in ME, which is on the edge of the US. My guess is, if ME wasn't so anti-business and anti-consumer, you might have a little more competition there, but it's hard to compete when the market is so small and there is NH right next door.

Ok. Good analysis of the supermarket situation in Keene, NH. It does not appear that Keene, NH is in anywhere near the same situation as Maine is. I would note that I don't consider gas stations with food or dollar stores to be supermarkets. There is the one dominant supermarket chain. But that doesn't mean there aren't convenience stores. Or local food markets, with a wider selection of food than convenience stores. Or that we don't have Walmarts, or that we don't have independents, or that we don't have Shaws. It's just that Hannaford is the biggest, with enough might to effect the labor market.

 

[parocks]

If they raise the minimum wage and retail workers start getting paid $9/hr, I would seriously consider quitting my job I went to college for, to work in retail. Being a nurse is radically more stressful than stocking a warehouse, and with a base rate of $20 an hour as a nurse, I'd have to carefully weigh the pros and cons of quitting to go work in retail. It might be worth it in terms of the stress I deal with. I certainly would not go through 4 years of college only to make a few bucks more than unskilled workers.

Of course, what will most likely happen is that my wages will go up when minimum-wage earners get more money in their pockets. This is what is known as, "moving the goalposts." The poorest people will get a boost in their pay, which will be negated by proportional increases to all other income-brackets.

Don't warehouse workers get paid more than minimum wage already? I would think that they do, or that they used to do. Forklift operators surely get more than the minimum wage.

I wouldn't say that the gains are negated. It goes in that direction though. Some might get automatic raises, but others would not. I would think it'd be more "stay the same" than "negated", but definitely the min wage workers wouldn't be the only ones seeing a rise in their wages. To the extent that unemployment would be caused by this - more people making, spending more money - would tend to decrease any unemployment effects.

 

[parocks]

If you are now saying that the wage paid to any employee is completely between him and his employer and can be as low as $0.01/hour,I must apologize,I have totally misunderstood you during this entire thread.

Figure out what the word "forced" means.

It's important to know the difference, especially since Obamacare forces you to buy insurance.

And with the minimum wage, no one is forcing anybody to do anything.

 

[mad cow]

Figure out what the word "forced" means.

It's important to know the difference, especially since Obamacare forces you to buy insurance.

And with the minimum wage, no one is forcing anybody to do anything.

So it is a minimum wage suggestion rather than a minimum wage law?
If McDonalds started paying all their minimum wage employees $5.00/hour there would be no repercussions from the government?

 

[parocks]

So it is a minimum wage suggestion rather than a minimum wage law?
If McDonalds started paying all their minimum wage employees $5.00/hour there would be no repercussions from the government?

Remember, "forced".

 

[mad cow]

Remember, "forced".

So McDonalds is not "forced" to pay minimum wage and could start paying all of their minimum wage employees $5.00/hour tomorrow without any legal repercussions from the government?

 

[gwax23]

So McDonalds is not "forced" to pay minimum wage and could start paying all of their minimum wage employees $5.00/hour tomorrow without any legal repercussions from the government?

Dont waste your time on him. Hes a troll.

 

[Keith and stuff]

Figure out what the word "forced" means.

It's important to know the difference, especially since Obamacare forces you to buy insurance.

And with the minimum wage, no one is forcing anybody to do anything.

Obamacare certainly doesn't force me to buy anything. I don't make enough money to qualify for what you are talking about. But then, if I did, NH law says there is no Obamacare mandate. But even if there was, there is a fine if you make a bunch of money and don't get Obama approved health insurance.

The minimum wage requirement is much more about force. If you don't pay it, you will be fined. If you don't pay the fine, you will be jailed or completely closed. If you resist the jail or closure, you will be tased or killed.