Is federal minimum wage $15 good for the middle class or just the lower class?

Neither. It will put MANY people out of work. Do the silly ultra lefties REALLY think businesses are going to say "damn, Mr. rapist President...you got us. I guess we will accept far less money in profits now." Nope. They will simply not hire the people who need those minimum wage jobs the most, forcing those that are already making close to $15 to work harder since they will be short staffed.

Minimum wage was NEVER meant to be a living wage. If you are making minimum wage after a year, you are living your life wrong. And no one else should suffer for your terrible life choices.

It’s not fair that some companies pay minimum wage and then rely on my tax dollars to subsidize their workforce with housing and food benefits.

Didn’t McDonalds get slammed a few years ago when their new employee budgeting advice got out on the social media?

big ring wrote:

Thanks.....

The true meaning of middle class are those in petit bourgeoisie: medical doctors, dentists, morticians, attorneys, accountants, etc. Do you mean assistant managers at 7-11?

Minimum wage is bargaining chip by organized labor. Minimum wage is a labor union creation. Minimum wage was created to force haute bourgeoisie and their plant managers to price out unskilled labor in favor of skilled labor.

Skilled labor do benefit from minimum wage and increases in middle wage. Electrician, plumbers, registered nurses, K-12 fully licensed teachers, police officers benefit from minimum wage and increases in minimum wage.

Minimum wage does not create improvements in technology, but increases in minimum wage make technology alternatives more profitable. Increases in minimum wage did not create automatic teller machines in 1969, but increases in minimum wage made it easier for banks to reduce bank tellers and chose atms. Minimum wage did not create technology for self check out at Home Depot, Target and Walmart, but it is guaranteed we will have fewer cashiers at Home Depot, Target & Walmart with increases in minimum wage.

Overseas alternatives: 3M company at one time many years ago did nearly all manufacturing in MN. 3M chasing cheaper labor costs and lower taxes moved some manufacturing to TX. Texas is now run like an Under Developed Nation. Look what 8 days below 30F did to Texas 10 days ago. If 3M has to chose between an Under Developed Country (TX) and an Under Developed Country, with increase in minimum wage, it is easy for 3M to move manufacturing several hundred miles south to a real Under Developed Nation, Mexico. Why would Toyota, BMW and Mercedes want to build plants in southern U.S. if there were a $15 minimum wage? Why not build manufacturing site in Mexico instead?

There was a time when all or nearly all U.S. corporations had call centers nearly 100% in U.S. Now most large corporations in S & P 500 plus many in S & P 400 have their call centers in India and Philippines. U.S. corporations have established manufacturing sites out of U.S. for a bit over 100 years. Will $15 minimum wage make it more or less likely U.S. corporations will hire foreign workers outside of U.S. borders?

Unemployment data: Washington state politicians love to say their $15 minimum wage is a success. Unemployment data is phony data. A mayor can arrest her or his way to low unemployment numbers. Same for a governor. Reagan increased personnel in U.S. military. Some say it was a bogus way to lower unemployment. Reagan set up plea bargain system for military personnel. Go downtown Seattle. View all the homeless living on the streets. None of homeless are counted as unemployed.

In summary, to answer your question O.P., minimum wage and in this case, $15 minimum wage was never created to help poor. Minimum wage and in this case $15 minimum wage does help skilled labor. Once minimum wage is $15, skilled labor will be at negotiating table demanding significant pay increases.

A poster stated minimum wage increase will be passed on to consumers. Businesses cannot pass on all increases in labor costs, that is why businesses like 3M move from MN to other sites seeking cheap labor.

If U.S. wants to truly help people in the lower 90%, Austrian-style health care for all. If U.S. truly wants to help people in the lower 90%, tuition free education for all, age 3 to age 23, plus military veterans and medical students. If U.S. truly wants to help people in lower 90%, federal government can choose to hire all able body who need work to build high speed hydrail in U.S. Pay all seeking work on hydrail greater than $15 per hour. Ordering all U.S. corporations to pay all their workers more than $15 per hour is not efficient.

There it was - advice from McDonald’s on how to budget with a minimum wage job. First step, get a second minimum wage job.

klawicki wrote:

Neither. It will put MANY people out of work. Do the silly ultra lefties REALLY think businesses are going to say "damn, Mr. rapist President...you got us. I guess we will accept far less money in profits now." Nope. They will simply not hire the people who need those minimum wage jobs the most, forcing those that are already making close to $15 to work harder since they will be short staffed.

Minimum wage was NEVER meant to be a living wage. If you are making minimum wage after a year, you are living your life wrong. And no one else should suffer for your terrible life choices.

you do realize that the main reason companies have to pay $7 an hour to stay in business now is because their competition is allowed to pay $7 as well. Raising the minimum wage across the board is nothing at all like one company trying jump from $7 to $15 right now.

If you can't run a profitable business while paying a livable wage, then you are doing something wrong. No one else should have to suffer for your terrible choices.

It's bad for everyone.

If I am willing to perform a task for $X, and you are willing to pay me $X to perform the task, how are either of us better off if some third party comes along and tells us that we are not allowed to proceed with this transaction?

bad for everyone wrote:

It's bad for everyone.

If I am willing to perform a task for $X, and you are willing to pay me $X to perform the task, how are either of us better off if some third party comes along and tells us that we are not allowed to proceed with this transaction?

The person getting more money for their work will be better off. It's not a difficult equation.

Do you really think we were better off in when we had 12-year-olds 'willing' to work 12 hours a day in horrible conditions?

I mean what was the government thinking, getting in the way of that mutually agreeable transaction????

..and with that....your premise is shattered.

We've had your world ...and it sucked.

Why not make it $50 or $100 an hour, so everyone can be rich? Because your magical thinking doesn't work.

Limousine Libertarian wrote:

Why not make it $50 or $100 an hour, so everyone can be rich? Because your magical thinking doesn't work.

Because that would be far more disruptive to the economy for questionable further benefits. You can't make everyone rich with a minimum wage, most people with even nominal cognitive ability can understand that.

You can improve the lives of the millions of working people forced to try to live off an inadequate wage. Most people with even nominal cognitive ability can understand that as well.

Why not pay people $1 an hour? Life would be so much better!! Your magical hand doesn't work for everything. We can do better.

Z's got it wrote:

Limousine Libertarian wrote:

Why not make it $50 or $100 an hour, so everyone can be rich? Because your magical thinking doesn't work.

Because that would be far more disruptive to the economy for questionable further benefits. You can't make everyone rich with a minimum wage, most people with even nominal cognitive ability can understand that.

Wow, you're almost starting to get it.

Z's got it wrote:

Why not pay people $1 an hour? Life would be so much better!! Your magical hand doesn't work for everything. We can do better.

Because I won't be able to hire anyone for $1. In fact, it's virtually impossible to hire anyone for only the federal minimum wage - it could be abolished and no one would notice.

There is an argument that it will not be good for large swaths of the population. Employers may reduce hours so yes you get $15/hr but I am cutting your hours from 30 to 25 since I was paying you $12/hr before so my cost is the same. (That math might not work out, but you get the idea).

Jobs that can be automated might be. COVID has already gotten more people used to ordering through an app or kiosk. Why pay someone when the customer can do that work?

Technologies that exist but not used might be implemented. For instance, the ability to have a grocery cart scanned using the bar codes exists. So you go shopping put things in your cart and go to check out where you verify what is in your cart and pay and then you tap your credit card and leave. Or you have your credit card stored in an app and just click yes and go.

Prices will have to increase in some areas where staff might not be cut. At high end places that likely will not matter. And the increases might be small where no one trip will stop people but it might cut down on their frequency. McDonald's for instance (most of which are owned locally and not my the corporation--McD's is as much a real estate company as a fast food place) might raise the cost of a burger by 25 cents. Does that mean a customer reduces the trips to McD's by one a year? Is that then done a few million times over?

On the high end side say a nice seafood place, the staff is already probably getting that or or more. What it would do is shut out competition as start ups likely could not start out at that wage. A reason Amazon supports the increase is that it already pays its workers that wage so in effect it would have the government keeping out competitors who would likely start at a lower wage just as it did. (Never underestimate a big company wanting to use government to protect its interests).

Then there is the trickle up effect (I think I am coining that phrase). If you have someone who is maybe an assistant manager now making $15/hr and one day the new person with no experience working the entry level job at McDs (if they even hire that person) is getting that wage you have to increase the manager's wages as well. Oh then probably increase the general manager's wages.

Econtalk podcast did an episode on this a couple of years ago in Seattle when it raised the minimum wage. It was a mixed bag and hard to tell but the increase was far less drastic than this.

Finally, I think that there should be no minimum wage at all. One fear here is that businesses will take advantage of workers, but I am not so sure. I see plenty of evidence of places paying above the local minimum wage to attract workers. Employers often give raises within a few months to productive workers. (The number of people earning the federal minimum wage is pretty low and those earning it 6 months into a job are even lower. I have not done a dive into this at the state level---many states have a min wage > the federal min wage).

Another fear is that workers will undercut one another and take lower pay for a job. Perhaps, at the same time as soon as a better paying job comes along that worker will likely bolt.

Econ 101 wrote:

PA sucks wrote:

It doesn't help sales when you add labor costs to retail items.

I wonder what happens to sales when millions of potential customers suddenly have more disposable income.

What happens to sales when millions of people might have no job at all or hours are cut and they end up with the same take home pay?

You act like business owners are not going to respond.

sounds good liberal wrote:

old news wrote:

Agreed. Businesses aren’t taking losses because payroll went up. They will pass it on to the consumers, which will negatively effect everyone, plus they will look at cutting positions which negatively efffects those minimum wage workers. But it sounds good to liberals and everyone wins and we all have plenty of money. Keep dreaming.

This is proven many times wrong.

Higher minimum wages create more business. Because these people will spend pretty much everything they earn. Which is not true for the upper 10%.

"Proven"? Okay, let's see your citations. I will not accept "projections". Show me a comparison between an area where minimum wage went up in one part and not another, like Seattle a few years ago. Everything I have seen is a mixed bag. Some businesses closed; others cut hours. Hard to know how many jobs were never offered as a business grew.

Many high schoolers do need them.

A lot of workers choose to work part-time. Businesses might prefer part timers because of cost savings (no requirement to provide health insurance for instance).

Limousine Libertarian wrote:

Z's got it wrote:

Because that would be far more disruptive to the economy for questionable further benefits. You can't make everyone rich with a minimum wage, most people with even nominal cognitive ability can understand that.

Wow, you're almost starting to get it.

Do you always work in such oversimplifications?

A rational person: 'It's hot in here let's turn the heat down a few degrees...'

You: 'Why don't you turn it down 200 degrees????? Huh? Huh?'

...and you present that as proof of something lol.

Your simpleton ideas have had their day

Neither. “Unfortunately, the real minimum wage is always zero, regardless of the laws, and that is the wage that many workers receive in the wake of the creation or escalation of a government-mandated minimum wage, because they lose their jobs or fail to find jobs when they enter the labor force." -Thomas Sowell Basic Economics

"Making it illegal to pay less than a given amount does not make a worker’s productivity worth that amount—and, if it is not, that worker is unlikely to be employed.” -Thomas Sowell Basic Economics

The minimum wage only hurts poorer people. For example, if politicians passed a law mandating no car can be sold for less than $10000, who does this hurt more: poor people or rich people? Who is more likely to own a car that is worth less than $10000 that now no one will buy, and is thus unable to get quick cash in a financial emergency? Replace car with labor and replace $10000 with $7.25 and you get the cruelty of minimum wage laws.

Z's got it wrote:

Limousine Libertarian wrote:

Wow, you're almost starting to get it.

Do you always work in such oversimplifications?

A rational person: 'It's hot in here let's turn the heat down a few degrees...'

You: 'Why don't you turn it down 200 degrees????? Huh? Huh?'

...and you present that as proof of something lol.

Your simpleton ideas have had their day

Rofl, you accuse people of wanting child labor and $1 wages and then cry MUH STRAWMAN when you run out of arguments. Nice try!