For large companies I disagree with the fixed minimum wage principle. Instead the minimum wage of an employee should be 1/20 th or more of the maximum employee hourly wage (including bonuses and stock options). This makes it so companies can survive, and cut wages if they need to (but also the CEO would have to take a cut here), if the company can afford to pay the CEO more, they can afford to pay the workers more.
They do something like that in Finland ...or Norway
Stupid Belligerent Drunk wrote:
For large companies I disagree with the fixed minimum wage principle. Instead the minimum wage of an employee should be 1/20 th or more of the maximum employee hourly wage (including bonuses and stock options). This makes it so companies can survive, and cut wages if they need to (but also the CEO would have to take a cut here), if the company can afford to pay the CEO more, they can afford to pay the workers more.
Why? The CEO's value to the company is way more than 20 times the value of the lowest paid employee. Do you really think that any random McDonald's employee's impact on the company's value is equal to 5% of the CEO's impact?
A great CEO can increase revenue by millions of dollars. A great cashier might create a few thousand dollars in efficiency gains and goodwill compared to an average cashier.
I know it all, YOU don't wrote:
Seattle's $15/hr is great if you work in the automation industy or have a Mom and Pop fast food business, a restaurant, for example. The Franchise industry will be taking a huge hit as businesses eliminate unnecessary costs.
OP here. The franchises will have the biggest exposure in the new Seattle. A grand opportunity for distributors has arisen to implement just-in-time distribution technology to sell bulk qualtities to an expected new rash of Mom and Pop retailers and Fast Food Joints.
Are you TRYING for dumbest post of the year here or what? What an incredibly ignorant view of economics you have. Your attempts at causations are hilarious.Yeah, "competition and cost pressures" will simply cut into profits with no implications, huh? No impact on price will result, huh? Care to share some of your figures about "business owners" "taking an enormous share of GDP"? Oh, and yeah the economy will definitely be "stimulated" by the extra money the people who have been fortunately enough to keep their jobs have to spend. The ones that lose their jobs or aren't hired because of forced higher wages won't have a negative impact at all.The rest of your post shows an ignorance of what it takes to successfully run a business that I only experience with the most idealistic of ultra liberals. The number one goal of a business is profits, you f'n idiot! Whether it's a mom and pop or a multinational corporation. Profits and more profits. Not "a minimal, satisfactory amount of profits that the most anti-business segment of the population approves of, and the rest given to people for simply being born." Profits. Profits allow the company to continue to innovate, expand production and sustain future profits. These profits are what keep economy moving. Oh, and of course a portion of these profits result in tax money that pays for schools, teachers, police/firemen, road/park maintenance, etc. And, if times get a little rough or the economy dips and he company has some money banked, maybe they can make it through rather than collapse. You libs want that tax money, don't you?
jjjjjjjjj wrote:
Automation may be continuing but in Seattle $15/hr is just not that much and will insure that working people will not live in deep poverty. Competition and cost pressures will mean that this will likely cut some into business profits, meaning that there will be a far more equitable distribution of income. For far too long, business owners have been taking an enormous share of GDP because workers have lacked collective bargaining power with limited government enforcement of unionizing laws and "free trade" agreements that have allowed capital to flow freely among the rich of all nations while the poor and working class can neither move freely across borders, nor access any of that capital. Meanwhile, productivity increases have continued from decades prior to 1980, yet wages have hardly risen at all. Remember too that this will stimulate the economy in Seattle, because all of the increased wages will be spent, whereas the business profits are often not spent. Apple Computer is the best example, sitting on a pile of well over $100 billion, and rather than investing in America with that or paying their workers, they'd prefer to sit on it or give dividends to their wealthy investors while actively preventing their workers from getting higher paying job offers from their supposed competitors, like Google.
Actually, consumer spending keeps the economy running. It's been in the crapper largely because lots of people don't have much to spend. Higher salaries would change that to some extent. If profits created jobs we'd be swimming in them.
McDonalds was just an example. Try using another one, like Starbucks, and see if your statement still rings true.
jorvack wrote:
Having lived in Seattle for several years there are very few fast food restaurants compared to other cities. I think its funny that everyone is concerned about the success of Mcdonalds. They will be fine. They sell garbage and mark it up 400%
Now they will sell garbage and mark it up 350%
there are 5 Mcdonalds in a city of 650,000
30% of the workers at mcdonalds make over minimum wage. So how many workers are talking about here? 20?
No more squeezing the working poor.
It really is a sad day when I realize that most of my Letsrun peers/friends are upper class, white, conservative, bullshit people. I'm sick of this GOP crap.
Minimum wage of $15/hr is TOO LOW! If we take into account inflation, minimum wage should be $25 or $30/hr.
This is America and by making people try and live on $8/hr...well frankly it's not possible. Not anywhere near possible. That means if they're working full-time they're making around $1300/month. Seriously? Cars, gas, rent, food, retirement, pleasure, etc. Doesn't even come close.
Do any of you recall the ending of the movie Elysium? How well did it turn out for the rich people? Do you think poor people are just going to sit around and let oppression squeeze the life out of them without a revolution?
as a society we should strive to ensure that they have the basics, (although ideally they would have extra money for pleasure) the rest is up to them and their work ethic (As is maintaining the job in the first place).
*they being everyone
Well, if this were a problem facing Seattle residents, then the should increase all wages by a certain percentage. There has to be a a more skilled job than a waiter that was making $15 an hour before this law but this person now makes the same as another just pushing buttons on a screen.
I have never understood the necessity to interfere with the market is such a case. If all minimum wage earners were to quit today, their respective business would reopen in a couple of days with new hires and run as effectively because there is relatively low skill required to work at these places. If all medical doctors quit today, there would be massive amounts of death and agony and it would take along to replace them. On this spectrum, that is how much you are worth to society.
Sad day indeed,but not the way you have it drawn up. Minimum Wage is not a way of keeping people poor, but rather keeping people motivated. If we raise the wage to a ludicrous number like you suggest we will further the decline of American society. A strong number of people will no longer have something to reach for, they will be contempt with their station and we will have far less qualified labor. I own a small business and I pay well above minimum wage (Starting Rookies at $12.50/hr + Full benefits) but that is my choice not a government mandate. I start people that low because I want them to be aggressive on how they work their way up in my company, I want them to not be happy with $40-$50K. The best part of the system I run is it works. My top four employees all made over $100K last year, all four of them started in my warehouse opening boxes and putting parts on the shelf. Through their hard work they made my little company the very best at what we do and they are compensated accordingly. We need to re-embrace the American Dream for future generations, not teach them its ok to just make ends meet.
HRE wrote:
Actually, consumer spending keeps the economy running. It's been in the crapper largely because lots of people don't have much to spend. Higher salaries would change that to some extent. If profits created jobs we'd be swimming in them.
Pure wisdom.
First....there are other forms of franchising other than fast food that pay their employees more than minimum wage...like an H & R block for example.
Second...if all of the fast food chains are forced to close their doors because of the minimum wage (which won't happen), a fast food chain would capitalize on this, enter the market and capture a huge market share and would earn supra normal profits above their minimum wage cost. Others would then enter the market to capture said profits until those profits are competed away. It's better to look at things through a dynamic lense.
I say all this not in favor of the minimum wage hike, but I am confident in saying that there will be businesses, both franchised and not, that will find ways to capitalize on the situation.
Up front.. Do any of you live in the Seattle Metro area?
Don’t get your conservative magic under-roo's in a bunch..
Everyone in their right mind knows that the minimum wage in Mississippi does not need to be the same as Seattle. I understand just as well as anyone that burger flipping should sustain someone for life but you also have to make employment somewhat worth it.
This is what theincreases in min wage has done in Seattle, and it is based upon the cost of living. I refuse to feel sorry for McDonalds or anyone else who has to share a little more of their ridiculous profits with its employees in markets that require increased wages to sustain business.
doesn't make sense wrote:
Why? The CEO's value to the company is way more than 20 times the value of the lowest paid employee. Do you really think that any random McDonald's employee's impact on the company's value is equal to 5% of the CEO's impact?
A great CEO can increase revenue by millions of dollars. A great cashier might create a few thousand dollars in efficiency gains and goodwill compared to an average cashier.
Would you consider that their gains/salary would be a fairer number? Especially when CEO's make 380 times the average worker's salary.[1] I think that is a better representation of employee "worth."
[1]http://money.cnn.com/2012/04/19/news/economy/ceo-pay/
Your compassion for the poor is touching indeed. You are a regular Mother Theresa. You've presented such a succinct, persuasive argument against the minimum wage that perhaps you'd do all of us liberals a favor and let us sit at your knee while you explain how cutting the capital gains tax for billionaires benefits the poor.
America was a much better place back i n the 19th century when there was no minimum wage and factories were free to emloy children to do dangerous work at low pay. I'm with you; let's get rid of the minimum wage and other legislation that protects workers and we can enjoy a prosperous way of life, just like the Chinese.
Sorrytoeatandrun wrote:
Why stop at $15. Why not $50 per hour? Or $100? Dont they care about working people?
I'm sure we'll find out what the impact is over the next year.
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