Please justify this $15/hr minimum wage thing

56h wrote:

to think that any idiot of the street is entitled to $15.00/hr for sweeping an aisle or cashing out someone at a movie theater, LOL

more like $5.00, give them motivation to earn real skills.

Extremely wrong thinking.

First of all, SOMEONE needs to do those things you mentioned. Second of all, not everyone is capable of doing much more than those things you mentioned, and finally, burglaries go down when people make money. $5 an hour? So, you want to LOWER the minimum wage? BS, brother.

Congratulations wrote:

That long winded diatribe just might be the best example of arrogant, jealous thinking I have ever seen.

From what I understand, you think I am jealous of the executives making big bucks and want them to give up some of their wealth. Yes, I would like to have a high salary some day, but not at the exploits of people not paid a living wage.

Now, the money I am referring to has ZERO value to the ultra rich. They literally can not spend their money. What is the point of getting 8 million pairs of running shoes a year? Even if you changed your shoes after every run, and ran you ran doubles every day for 100 years you would still have 7,927,000 pairs of shoes left, AFTER ONE YEAR. What I am suggesting is we take 5 million of these shoes, give them to low income runners who can't always afford good quality shoes and help the sport grow. The reason they can't afford shoes is because either themselves or their parents live paycheck to paycheck, working 50+ hour weeks, making minimum wage (which is too low) and taking no time off, just to pay the bills and put food on the table. This was not the case way back when, when flipping burgers for 20 hours a week could put a serious dent in your college tuition. Companies are naturally greedy in our capitalistic system (as they should be, not blaming them for paying a low wage), so the government has to step in and take money away from the executives whose salaries are hyper inflated. In theory, the minimum wage fix would only work if the cut costs to pay lower level workers came directly from inflated executive salaries.

What I would propose is each quarter, the government will decide, based on geographical cost of living (San Fran is more expensive to live in than rural Pennsylvania) and other economic indicators, what the living hourly wage is, whether it's $15 or $10 or $20. Then, with the new tax revenue from the progressive tax, that money subsidizes wages lower than the living standard, up to the living wage. If there is a deficit, the tax is increased, if there is a surplus, the tax is lowered, all on a quarterly basis.

To help explain the shoe example and why it is OK and not "jealous" or "greedy" to tax some earnings beyond the max that people can spend at a very high percentage, the law of diminishing returns can help. At some point the value of the next shoe is so low that it effectively reaches zero. The runner has no use for them, and they may actually produce a negative value because the runner has to pay to keep them somewhere. These people have accumulated so much wealth, that the money is literally worthless to them because they do not even have enough time in the day to think of ways to spend the money. Yes the money still technically has value, but $10 to an ultra rich person is PERSONALLY worth a tiny fraction of what it is PERSONALLY worth to a poor person. Another way to think of it: a poor person and a rich person both have $10, let's say they can feed themselves and their spouse. They both buy the same meal for the same exact price, but the poor couple is more satisfied because they got a meal, and they don't always get a meal, the rich couple is indifferent because they don't have to worry about having enough money to eat. Therefore, by the transitive property, the $10 is the same exact thing as a meal, and the poor couple was more satisfied by the meal and therefore more satisfied by the $10 than the rich couple was. That is why money is worth less to the ultra rich.

Increased Consumer Spending= Increased economic growth no matter what way you try to spin it. And that consumer spending just isn't happening.

Bruh wrote:

Increased Consumer Spending= Increased economic growth no matter what way you try to spin it.

WRONG! Come on, not even Krugman goes this far. If this were true, Zimbabwe's plan to print money and consume its way to prosperity would have worked.

Economic growth is a function by innovation and entrepreneurial activity, which is driven by consumer savings. Empirically, a country's economic growth rate is proportional to its savings rate. The WORST thing that could happen to the economy is if wealthy people decided to spend all their money on consumption.

Consumer spending is what primarily drives an economy. Ours has been sluggish for ages because there are too many people who can't afford to buy a lot of the goods and services we produce. A significantly higher minimum wage will address that and most of the minimum wage workers getting food stamps, Medicaid, subsidized housing, etc. won't qualify and will cost taxpayers less.

adsfajvggsdf wrote:

It used to be the case that a working class family could make a living and have a good life by working low-wage jobs. That is no longer the case.

True. The reason is large-scale immigration. Hillary wants more of it.

bella kayy wrote:

Not every janitor or fast food server is going to climb the promotion ladder. Most won't, because they aren't equipped with the skills to do so. We need to build a society in which the least intelligent, least talented, least skilled worker is still paid a living wage and is treated with dignity, because that is what "created equal" is all about.

There is no such thing as "society," there are only individuals. The least capable depend on the more capable to create the tools that make work easier and allow them to be more productive. The absolute last thing the unskilled need are arrogant liberal "elites" ruling over them, commandeering their autonomy and destroying their lives by creating impossible barriers to employment such as wage controls. The poor need their own freedom, not a minimum wage to flourish.

Not having free college is such a barrier. But i understand that rich families with lazy and not so intelligent kids would oppose that. More competition would crush the slackers

HardLoper wrote:

Bruh wrote:

Increased Consumer Spending= Increased economic growth no matter what way you try to spin it.

WRONG! Come on, not even Krugman goes this far. If this were true, Zimbabwe's plan to print money and consume its way to prosperity would have worked.

Economic growth is a function by innovation and entrepreneurial activity, which is driven by consumer savings. Empirically, a country's economic growth rate is proportional to its savings rate. The WORST thing that could happen to the economy is if wealthy people decided to spend all their money on consumption.

GDP= Consumption+investment+gov't spending+Net trade

This is literally the first thing I learned in economics 101, if everything else in the equation stays the same, and consumption increases, GDP goes up.

As for your points:

1. "Economic growth is a function by innovation and entrepreneurial activity, which is driven by consumer savings"

Completely wrong, especially the last part, yes economic growth is spurred by entrepreneurial activity and innovation. Both of these ideas do not involve saving, they involve spending. To start a business, you need to buy things and spend money to start your business and stay in business. Innovation and entrepreneurship go hand in hand, and innovators also must spend money to create and produce their product to be widespread.

2. "Empirically, a country's economic growth rate is proportional to its savings rate"

Show me a credible economist who actually believes this.

3. Zimbabwe printed money to pay its debts. Even so, I am not suggesting we print more money, I am suggesting we take the wealth that alread exists and spread it more evenly and fairly over the population.

4. "The WORST thing that could happen to the economy is if wealthy people decided to spend all their money on consumption"

And if they saved their money, instead of spending it (like they do now) there will be a massive wealth gap (like there is now) because there isn't enough profit being generated for businesses to give raises to employees at the bottom.

Bruh wrote:

HardLoper wrote:

WRONG! Come on, not even Krugman goes this far. If this were true, Zimbabwe's plan to print money and consume its way to prosperity would have worked.

Economic growth is a function by innovation and entrepreneurial activity, which is driven by consumer savings. Empirically, a country's economic growth rate is proportional to its savings rate. The WORST thing that could happen to the economy is if wealthy people decided to spend all their money on consumption.

GDP= Consumption+investment+gov't spending+Net trade

This is literally the first thing I learned in economics 101, if everything else in the equation stays the same, and consumption increases, GDP goes up.

NOMINAL GDP yes, not real GDP. In your example, what would happen to the price of shoes if rich people decided to spend all their money on them? Maybe this isn't covered until Econ 102.

I will read the rest later

The problem is the ultra rich if their wealth is expanding are using their money for capital growth in the stock markets or buying high end sports teams or art. So while they could never eat 500 million dollars they certainly could spend it on a corporation or a sports team.

You still have done nothing to disprove the fact that you think rich people don't deserve the money they have and others (probably the govt) should have the right to decide how it's used. Open an economics textbook one time and you'll realize that certain jobs pay low wages because almost anyone can do them with minimal training. It's called supply and demand. Rather than artificially raise the wages of these jobs that should mostly be performed by teens/college kids and semi-retirees, how about we focus on building the skills necessary to support our evolving economy. Fields like healthcare and IT are in dire need of qualified workers, but instead of focusing on good parenting, education, and training for these jobs you'd rather we pay some guy $15 to work at McDonalds in a job that will soon be done by a machine. Your solution simply addresses a symptom and does nothing to solve the underlying problem.

Also, to the guy reminiscing about the life his parents had, how many cell phones, TVs, and cars did their families own? How often did they take vacations? The world sure as hell isnt perfect now, but you're kidding yourself if you think the standard of living hasn't increased DRAMATICALLY in this country. Give me a break.

HRE wrote:

Consumer spending is what primarily drives an economy. Ours has been sluggish for ages because there are too many people who can't afford to buy a lot of the goods and services we produce. A significantly higher minimum wage will address that and most of the minimum wage workers getting food stamps, Medicaid, subsidized housing, etc. won't qualify and will cost taxpayers less.

Just like the other guy, your idea of handouts does nothing to address the real problem, which is a lack of education and skills in a large portion of our workforce. Like many, your heart is in the right place, but instead of helping them improve you suggest we accept this condition. Oh, and even if a $15 minimum wage did decrease govt handouts and lessen the "cost on taxpayers", who exactly would be paying the increased prices businesses would need to absorb the increased costs? Economic events don't occur in a vacuum.

Bruh, your name is the first thing that comes to mind each time you post. Savings = investment is not a novel concept. Maybe that\'s covered in Sophomore year.

A wage of any size is not a handout. I'm not discussing handouts at all. Where did you get the idea I was?

Look, you're always going to have incompetent people and if you have massive numbers of them making only subsistence wages they're going to be a drag on the economy. Businesses can take care of themselves. Many would be more profitable if more people could afford what they're selling and they did fine decades ago when the minimum wage was higher in real terms.

?

Why don't you register your well-known handle?

The problem in this country is many people are born into extremely poor circumstances and their parents can't afford to send them to college. If we were to have a transfer of wealth from the ultra rich, there would be more people that could go to college, and more skilled workers. I am clearly not for just raising the minimum wage as the main solution. I am for taking money that has a minuscule or zero value to ultra rich people. It won't effect their lives one bit. The reason they are so rich is because they pay people wages that are too low (current minimum wage). I think minimum wage should vary from area to area based on cost of living and inflation and be whatever someone needs to live without having to work crazy hours or 3 jobs.

I am all for spending on good schools, counseling, infrastructure, etc. Our problem of wealth inequality does not have a 1-stop solution. What I am saying is that just increasing the minimum wage is not enough. What I am proposing doesn't cost the government a dime, and doesn't increase the deficit. The money comes from the ultra rich that exploit the low minimum wage.

Supply and demand is extremely inelastic when talking about jobs, people have to work to support themselves, it's not like all the people can just stop working and demand businesses pay them more. Much different than if Pepsi started making crappy soda, there are other alternatives. There are no alternatives to working other than starving. Striking is also easier said than done.

Ricky Martin wrote:

Bruh, your name is the first thing that comes to mind each time you post. Savings = investment is not a novel concept. Maybe that's covered in Sophomore year.

My point is that investment is a much less efficient way of driving the economy. I never said investment does nothing, but not every dime of those investments will get spent. Whereas if a starving poor person were given money, they would spend every last cent of it. It doesn't matter where the money is pumped into the economy, as long as enough money is being spent, we will thrive. If investment was the most efficient way of stimulating the economy, then I would be all for it, but it simply isn't.

Another point about investing in infrastructure, education etc. is that our politicians don't seem to care enough. They just want to get re-elected every few years, because if they aren't, they are out of a job. And since they know that they couldn't live on the minimum wage that their political system has produced, they will do almost anything to get re-elected.