Biden signs EO to raise minimum wage to $15

I agree with this logic and would state that any minimum wage is anti-free market.

You are not entitled to a wage that can support a family of 4. Develop a skill to get the wage you want. The reality is some people only bring the value of a wage to support themselves and it is not the government's responsibility to tell the market you must pay a person this much.

The reality is when the government tells a business to pay more than the market dictates for a job that job goes away. It gets outsourced overseas, it gets automated out, or it just goes away altogether. Businesses have no interest in hiring at a loss. Creating jobs is not their purpose, making money is and jobs are just an outcome of that purpose. Some workers are more valuable to them than others. A business whose purpose is socialistic ideals will soon be broke. The reality is a business only offers the salary and incentives to employees it needs to be competitive in hiring the talent it needs to operate and make money.

PTF wrote:

why wrote:

what if they just decreased income tax instead of increasing minimum wage? Then companies wouldn't have to raise prices to make up for losses due to increased employee costs.

That makes way too much sense.

Or how about reducing the amount businesses have to carry in things like payroll tax, workers comp, insurance. A $15 an hour worker costs a business more like $22 an hour. Eliminate a lot of the regulations and taxes and more money could go to employees. Also, eliminate the 16% ish paid for social security and minimum wage. If those programs were eliminated people would be more responsible and save. That extra income would be very helpful to people.

In fact, let's get the government completely out of the market and have them operate a military, maintain the courts and run the post office like the constitution says, and do basically nothing else. That worked great until Woody Wilson and FDR effed it up and we've been on a steady downward spiral since.

Practically none. I've had to pay poorly educated individuals ridiculously high wages on federal projects (upwards of $100 an hour for individuals with a high school education and some online trade classes on some jobs in the bay area). Meanwhile, the engineer who is managing the project and actually has a degree and understands every facet of the project gets paid $50 an hour because he is not on site, and therefor not covered by the Davis Bacon wage scales which are set by trade unions. If you've ever wondered why your taxes are so high and why it costs the government 50% more to build a building than a private individual, take a look at Davis-Bacon Wage scales.

As usual, the situation is considerably more nuanced than many posters on this thread seem to think.

Which is to say: Contrary to the thread's (purposely?) misleading title, President Biden did NOT sign an executive order "to raise minimum wage to $15." Google is your friend.

https://www.marketplace.org/2021/01/22/biden-takes-a-step-toward-15-federal-minimum-wage/

We might see the LRC VIP ranks double or triple now, huzzah!

Here is the CBO analysis that says wages would be boosted for 17 million, but 1.3 million would be out of work. Doesn't really look at how the inflation would effect an individuals purchasing power (everything would be more expensive, so even if their wages are higher, if everything else goes up in price, their new found income may not allow them to buy anything more than they already are).

https://www.cbo.gov/system/files/2019-07/CBO-55410-MinimumWage2019.pdf

As pointed out elsewhere, the exec order applies to federal workers.

Some jobs are not worth $15, as in the hour of labor provided does not return $15 plus overhead (insurance, SS/DI/Med) plus return on capital (gotta pay the mortgage/lease) . In a service business where the customer can easily walk or decide to do without, that is not something the owner, worker, or government can impose.

Suppose minimum wage was raised to $15 nationally.

Jobs that need doing that pay less will get done under the table. This converts the workers to peonage and the employers to criminals. Employees, not being in any legal status, will obey. Employers will be inspected according to the whim of local politicians and (3... 2... 1...) obey.

Maybe US citizens will refuse to work illegally. Great, we have a ready supply of illegal migrants who can now bid for the next tier of jobs. Since they have no legal status, they will be nice and obedient.

Oh, and this already happens to a degree.

I conduct a race and I need some course marshals. I do get some volunteers, but I need more. So I find a local school group. Bring out a dozen kids for a couple of hours, give the team a couple hundred bucks. Works out to around $5 per hour, quite a bit less than my state's minimum wage. Everybody is happy and consents to the arrangement. It would be different if we did it for 2000 hours a year instead of two sessions of 3 hours each.

I don't know what the big deal is. Where I live in bfe, we can't get people to show up for less than $16.

Minimum wage last 40 years:

(Equivalent in 2020 dollars)

1980 - $3.10 ($10.39)

1981 - $3.35 ($9.98)

1990 - $3.80 ($7.74)

1991 - $4.25 ($8.16)

1996 - $4.75 ($7.95)

1997 - $5.15 ($8.34)

2007 - $5.85 ($7.45)

2008 - $6.55 ($8.01)

2009 - $7.25 ($8.86)

I doubt anyone would argue that the minimum wage needs to be increased and I doubt many would say $10.00 is too much. However, $15 will cause a lot of layoffs. Instead of everyone making $15/hour, we will end up with some people making $15 and some collecting unemployment after getting their job cut.

This could decimate our military recruiting. Many people join the military to get out of a minimum wage job. Right now, the yearly salary of an E-1 is $21,420, plus $4,472.52 for food and somewhere between $11,232 (Fort Benning, GA) and $16,524 (Fort Carson, CO) for housing. This makes for total pay of between $37,124 and $42,416 per year. 40 hours per week for a year is 2080 hours, making the pay per hour between $17.85 and $20.39.

This is, of course, assuming only working 40 hours per week. It is very rare to work less than 45 hours per week and often can be much longer. You don't "clock out" at 5 like many jobs; you work until the required tasks for the day are done. If that means 6:00PM, 7:00PM, 10:00PM or later, so be it. Overtime pay? Hell no. What about going to the field for 10 days? That alone is 240 hours of work in only 10 days. Go to NTC or JRTC for a month? Try 30 days of straight work without a break. Don't even get me started on a yearlong deployment. When you take the total number of hours a Soldier actually works, the hourly rate for an E-1 is certainly less than $15. So why should someone quit their $15/hour job working the fryer at a fast food restaurant to sign up for a job in the military where the pay is lower, the hours are completely inconsistent and unpredictable, you live where the military sends you, deployments are an eventual certainty if you remain in long enough (goodbye family for nine months), and if a war kicks off you could end up killed or permanently disabled. I would hate to be a Recruiter if a $15 minimum goes nationwide.

PaperAthletes wrote:

No one deserves anything. Life’s not fair. Tough sh*t. If you want to get a better paying job you can go to community college, work hard, go to a university and get a better job. Someone who works at McDonald’s microwaving a garbage burger doesn’t deserve $15 an hour for that.

X10000

Your statistics on military pay are misleading.

If unmarried and no dependents that E1 doesn't get housing pay or sustenance (food) pay because they are living in the barracks and eating at the DFAC.

Also......by the time a Soldier gets to their first unit they will be an E2 or E3.

At 24mo they'll get promoted to E4 or 18mo if they get granted a waiver (usually saved for your best soldiers and not always available).

The military will be fine. If it is determined that min wage is cutting into recruiting they will just boost military pay across the board.

Alan

Primo Numero Uno wrote:

Creating jobs is not their purpose, making money is and jobs are just an outcome of that purpose. Some workers are more valuable to them than others. A business whose purpose is socialistic ideals will soon be broke. The reality is a business only offers the salary and incentives to employees it needs to be competitive in hiring the talent it needs to operate and make money.

First of all, wrong. A business' "purpose" is to do whatever it's in business to do, and to do it well - make luxury things, make cheap things, provide cheap services, provide high end services, etc. You usually need employees to do that. Sometimes you need highly skilled employees, and sometimes you need low skilled employees. The profits (the "making money part") you make are a result of how well you've balanced things like labor and product/service.

Now to the whole discussion, a blanket $15 minimum wage will probably put a lot of small businesses out of the picture. What will remain will be large Wal-mart type companies. A much better solution in my opinion would be to mandate a cost of living adjusted minimum wage at the state or even the county level. Determine at the federal level what "livable" means, and then leave it to the states to compute all the variables relevant to their area. Make them do it every year or two, idk.

You’re not expected to live off an entry level job. You’re expected to improve, become valuable, learn, get promoted and get paid more. Low pay is an incentive to do better.

If you can’t do that then you are a drain on society. You deserve to starve to death and make room for people who can actually contribute to the advancement of our country.

If Biden is making all these laws via executive order then what is the purpose of Congress? Is King Biden showing us that Congress is redundant?

How do I work this? wrote:

You’re not expected to live off an entry level job. You’re expected to improve, become valuable, learn, get promoted and get paid more. Low pay is an incentive to do better.

If you can’t do that then you are a drain on society. You deserve to starve to death and make room for people who can actually contribute to the advancement of our country.

If Biden is making all these laws via executive order then what is the purpose of Congress? Is King Biden showing us that Congress is redundant?

As opposed to King Trump? King Obama? King Bush? King Clinton?

If you don't like EO's then petition Congress to get rid of them.

Also the posters here are having a knee-jerk reaction without reading the actual article.....

....no wages have actually increased yet....and the wage increase is for FEDERAL WORKERS.

And as far as the comment about people aren't meant to live on minimum wage or people should get better skills & education.....I'm all for that...but there are countless examples of single income families with multiple children not making enough money who YOU the taxpayer now pay for their student lunches, sec 8 housing, WIC, and countless other government programs.

Get rid of the govenment programs? Ok so you want to increase homelessness, drug use, selling of drugs, prostitution, etc. People gotta make money somehow to pay the bills. If you mandate a living wage then you reduce the use of government programs that YOU the taxpayer pay for.

Alan

The first job in hs argument is such bs when you realize millions of people are working those jobs. And aren't "first job in hs anyways". It's a cop out to pay people garbage.

Look it up. Number of people paid minimum wage or right above it. And the demographics. It's deplorable.

And no one should be paid so little when ceos have more money than they could ever possibly spend. Why? So it can just sit in their bank accounts doing nothing?

Runningart2004 wrote:

Your statistics on military pay are misleading.

If unmarried and no dependents that E1 doesn't get housing pay or sustenance (food) pay because they are living in the barracks and eating at the DFAC.

Also......by the time a Soldier gets to their first unit they will be an E2 or E3.

At 24mo they'll get promoted to E4 or 18mo if they get granted a waiver (usually saved for your best soldiers and not always available).

The military will be fine. If it is determined that min wage is cutting into recruiting they will just boost military pay across the board.

Alan

Depends upon where a person is stationed and what branch he is in, there are quite a few E-1s who do not live in barracks. Even if he does, all that means is that his pay his significantly LOWER since the money for food and housing disappears - so the total pay is only $21,420. Whether or not he hits E-2 prior to a first duty station depends upon the length of AIT or OSUT and many will not promote. Either way, E-2 is not much either. Young people looking for a better life by leaving a minimum wage job and joining the military rarely look two years in the future to what the pay WILL be; they look at what the pay is NOW.

And the thought that a Democratic House, Democratic Senate, and a Democratic President will "boost military pay" if numbers are not good is almost laughable. Historically the largest raises occur when Republicans are in charge. I have been in since the Bush years and by far the lowest raises were throughout the Obama years. Under Bush it was generally 3-4% per year and under Obama it was almost always 1.x%. Trump bumped it up to around 3% again.

I noticed you didn’t mention his invasion of Syria on first day in office. Probably not showing you that on CNN. American Democrats love War.

You're right. E2 or E3 isn't much better. In fact pay, unless you have dependents, isn't that much.

That being said.....the VAST majority of privates w/o dependents live in the barracks. I would put the % well over 95%.

I joined at 32, married, w/a kid. Best professional decision I've ever made. Have a BS in Exercise Science. Could have went Officer. Enlisted instead. Easily make over twice as much as I did working in my degree field.

That being said.....

$15 an hour min wage is prob a good 20 years ago. I think the next bump will be to $10 ish.

The military will be fine. It always has. It always will be.

Alan

Runningart2004 wrote:

I joined at 32, married, w/a kid. Best professional decision I've ever made. Have a BS in Exercise Science. Could have [gone] Officer. Enlisted instead. Easily make over twice as much as I did working in my degree field.

Alan, I haven't been following you that closely--are you E7 now?