Minimum Wage: Gene Epstein misdirects Tom Woods listeners

[Krugminator2]

the middle class and poor are dying.
.

No they aren't.

No one is poor in the United States except by choice or mental illness. The horn of plenty that relative free enterprise has created in the United States has allowed even the worst off to live quite well.

The Poor in the US Are Richer than the Middle Class in Much of Europe https://mises.org/wire/poor-us-are-richer-middle-class-much-europe

America's Real Poverty Rate Is Around And About Zero

https://www.forbes.com/sites/timwor...ate-is-around-and-about-zero/?sh=37ab58605c6a

 

[merkelstan]

My numbers don't lie. There's a net wealth caused by millions of people working over generations along with the productivity gains through innovation and capital investment. That was pilfered by the hidden tax caused by the federal reserve regime and the fractional reserve banking fraud.

Comparisons to other countries are fair insofar as you can say 'we got screwed less', but the fact is, bottom tier wage earners would be getting $44/hr and not living paycheck to paycheck if the Krugman Klass hadn't defrauded us of the wealth we produced.

ALL THOSE PRINTED TRILLIONS WENT INTO SOMEBODY'S POCKETS, and it wasn't wage-earners. If you haven't been studying how it was done at places like mises.org - well, nobody's stopping you!

 

[Invisible Man]

My numbers don't lie. There's a net wealth caused by millions of people working over generations along with the productivity gains through innovation and capital investment. That was pilfered by the hidden tax caused by the federal reserve regime and the fractional reserve banking fraud.

Comparisons to other countries are fair insofar as you can say 'we got screwed less', but the fact is, bottom tier wage earners would be getting $44/hr and not living paycheck to paycheck if the Krugman Klass hadn't defrauded us of the wealth we produced.

ALL THOSE PRINTED TRILLIONS WENT INTO SOMEBODY'S POCKETS, and it wasn't wage-earners. If you haven't been studying how it was done at places like mises.org - well, nobody's stopping you!

It seems like you're mixing different claims together, some of which are more defensible than others.

But some of what you've said sounded like you were trying to say that the poor are getting poorer (e.g. in the OP when you say that Epstein, "acts as if [his point about the percent of people earning MW] is a drop-dead argument that they are better off").

If you really do mean to say that, and if you think there are articles on mises.org that make the same kind of argument you're making about that, then can you please share them?

Because the things you've been saying in this thread, particularly in the OP, sure don't seem like what I read at mises.org.

 

[Swordsmyth]

Another way inflation is disguised to make the ridiculous claims that everyone is better off is the destruction of quality in everything.

 

[Krugminator2]

Because the things you've been saying in this thread, particularly in the OP, sure don't seem like what I read at mises.org.

I have read the Mises site since the early 2000s. Quite confident they wouldn't agree with the assertions.

Think how crazy these statement are.

"Adjust for M2 Inflation to 2020 and you get a 2020 median income of $456,300, or $231,112 "

That's 83.77% of the USA workforce reporting yearly income at or below true inflation corrected 1979 minimum wage at fulltime work.

The average household (non=t individual) income is $87,864 today. That takes into account billionaires and households have more than one person on average. So obviously his median numbers are not even possible.

And he thinks 84% of people are worse off than a minimum wage worker in 1979. How can someone think that is even remotely possible especially using 1979 as a starting point? A more accurate statement would probably be 98% of workers are better off than a minimum wage worker in 1979.

Inflation is not good but inflation in recent decades has been fairly low. And if a growing money supply is horrible for the median person in his worldview, then is a falling money supply good for the median person? The money supply contracted by a 1/3 between 1930 and 1932. Was the median worker better off because of the Great Depression?

 

[tebowlives]

Another way to look at the same question, instead of using CPI or money supply is to compare how much people today can buy from the amount they earn in a given number of hours of work versus in years past. By that measure, people earn far more per hour today than in previous decades.

Here's a good Reason TV episode about that.

Because technology reduces costs. Except in government run like healthcare.

"How can guys with regular jobs afford this?" They sell drugs on the side and or they are in debt up to their eyeballs.