NJ referendum on raising minimum wage. Opinions?

[Andara Bledin]

Your idea is referred to as a Mincome, and is also an idea that the Swiss (I believe) are floating right now.

[Signmaker]

Congrats. Instead of the corporations whose bosses make millions annually taking a cut of a few hundred grand to ensure their work force isn't starving, the cost has now been shifted to everybody else.

Yeah. That's a whole lot better.

Wait...do you think the high end is going to take a cut if minimum wage goes up? They're going to throw their hands in the air, and curse their horrid misfortune in losing millions, possibly cursing those meddling kids?

Yeah. They're not. They're going to increase prices as neccisary to absorb the initial loss. This will be fine, as the increased wage will give a breif lift in the disposable income, before things settle back down to being exactly the way they were before.

Actually, I lie, sorry. The people working for more than minimum wage (yanno, the ones that wont see an increase) will now be working for essentially less, since the divide between them and the minimum wage/poverty line just got narrower.

The position of the poor will not change.
The position of the "evil corporate overlord" will not change.
The position of everyone who works in between those two extremes will get worse.

You want to help the working poor? Instead of giving them more money, let's talk about making their (and everyones) money go further. Lets talk about getting medical costs under control (not just throwing more money at it, like we are now). Lets talk about getting overseas outsourcing under control. Lets talk about reducing corporate tax strangleholds (on corporations, NOT their CEOs, big difference). Lets talk about downsizing and streamlining our goverment at all levels, instead of this enourmous beauorcratic machine that burns $100 bills to hand out pennies.

That would actually fix the problem.

[s_stabeler]

Lets talk about reducing corporate tax strangleholds (on corporations, NOT their CEOs, big difference).

when companies are paying less tax than their frontline staff, percentage-wise ( and in a couple of cases, dollar-wise as well, IIRC)

Lets talk about getting medical costs under control (not just throwing more money at it, like we are now)

that can only really happen under single-payer, not counting the ACA. Try suggesting that, and see how far it gets you.

Lets talk about downsizing and streamlining our goverment at all levels, instead of this enourmous beauorcratic machine that burns $100 bills to hand out pennies.

I'll admit to being skeptical about downsizing government when the first demand of businesses when cutting red tape is on the table is data protection legislation, health and safety laws, environment laws, and worker protection laws being repealed. Should waste be cut? Yes. Should bureaucracy be cut? yes, there probably are too many regulations, and some could probably be streamlined. But it is important to be absolutely certain what you are doing.

[Gravekeeper]

Yeah. They're not. They're going to increase prices as neccisary to absorb the initial loss. This will be fine, as the increased wage will give a breif lift in the disposable income, before things settle back down to being exactly the way they were before.

Windmills do not work that way as I have already demonstrated with various research earlier in this thread. As I indicated before, a price increase is not high on the list of things a business employing minimum wage workers wants to do following an increase in labour costs. The first thing they do is try to improve operating efficiency by a few % points to absorb the cost.

Actually, I lie, sorry. The people working for more than minimum wage (yanno, the ones that wont see an increase) will now be working for essentially less, since the divide between them and the minimum wage/poverty line just got narrower.

That argument is just as stupid now as it was before. Increasing minimum wage does not make everyone else less special. Minimum wage is below where it should be in the US. Any cost increase in product pricing that does somehow occur will occur in the industries utilizing minimum wage workers. Not across the board over the entire economy. But that scenario is unlikely and even if it does occur amounts to mere cents on the goods in question.

Minimum wage up here is $10.25 ( 9.67 US ) an hour. Yet a Big Mac is cheaper here than it is there. ;p

You want to help the working poor? Instead of giving them more money, let's talk about making their (and everyones) money go further. Lets talk about getting medical costs under control (not just throwing more money at it, like we are now). Lets talk about getting overseas outsourcing under control. Lets talk about reducing corporate tax strangleholds (on corporations, NOT their CEOs, big difference). Lets talk about downsizing and streamlining our goverment at all levels, instead of this enourmous beauorcratic machine that burns $100 bills to hand out pennies.

Lets talk about a bureaucratic pipe dream that would never work and even if it did would take years and years to implement instead of one simple fix that you could pass in months? =p

Besides, the US has an effective corporate tax rate of 12.1%. So "corporate tax stranglehold" is complete and total bullshit. They pay less in tax than you do and some of the stuff they do isn't even taxable They also receive tax credits to negate any foreign income tax they might be subject too while operating internationally ut of the US.

Any "Woe is us" yammering from US corporations is complete bullshit.

[Andara Bledin]

Lets talk about a bureaucratic pipe dream that would never work and even if it did would take years and years to implement instead of one simple fix that you could pass in months? =p

It's letting perfect be the enemy of better.

While pretty much everybody agrees that a minimum wage hike is not going to magically fix anything, pretty much every economist worth listening to (including those who've won the Nobel Prize for their work) agree that it needs to be one component of anything done short of setting up a minimum income.

As I said elsewhere, some people seem to think that the only thing to do is shoot for the stars and thumb their noses at the moon on their way by.

[Gravekeeper]

As I said elsewhere, some people seem to think that the only thing to do is shoot for the stars and thumb their noses at the moon on their way by.

That's a good way of putting and that's hitting the nail on the head about what's been bugging me in this thread.

[protege]

I was trying to point out the fact that the time and money we spend on a college diploma doesn't guarantee us great salaries or better salaries than those that don't goto school.

Good point. I have a younger brother who has an MBA. After his graduation, he took the attitude of "I have an MBA, I'm worth a lot." So he was constantly passing up many jobs/interviews, simply because the starting salary wasn't what he thought he was worth. Rather than take the job, stick around and work his way up, he was after the "big money."

He got a bit annoyed at me, simply because I make more than he does...and I don't have an MBA. Of course, I've also been at my job over 15 years (16 years in July ), started at the bottom, and worked my ass off.

[Rapscallion]

The position of the poor will not change.
The position of the "evil corporate overlord" will not change.
The position of everyone who works in between those two extremes will get worse.

Bollocks.

If that's the case, that there will be no change, why is there an ever-increasing gap between the highest and lowest paid? They aren't going back to where they were - they're veering apart at a frightening speed.

Either you've given up on the concept of social justice, whereby paying someone below a subsistence level to avoid the term 'slavery' is acceptable, or you're reciting the will of the corporate overlords, in whose interests you're speaking.

Think of the French Revolution. The difference between then and now is that the nobles have been replaced by those with money, and that's sometimes their only virtuous factor.

It can get to where there's a reasonable ratio between executives and frontline staff. If you don't want it, that's fine, but don't keep others down because of your beliefs.

Rapscallion

[lordlundar]

Umm raps? That's what's Signmaker's saying. The poor will still be poor and the enormously will still be enormously wealthy. The third point is the scale that is changing.

[kamn]

What raps is saying is that right now, when the minimum wage is unaffected (more or less), the wage gap and wealth gap is increasing at an alarming rate. That increasing the minimum wage is going to lessen this gap.
At least, if Im reading this correctly...

[Rapscallion]

I think I'm going to have to go back and reread things, but I got a different version of what Signmaker was saying.

Nudge me?

Rapscallion

[Greenday]

I think I'm going to have to go back and reread things, but I got a different version of what Signmaker was saying.

Nudge me?

Rapscallion

Pretty much how I read it (Poor will stay poor, uber-rich will stay uber-rich).

[Racket_Man]

Good point. I have a younger brother who has an MBA. After his graduation, he took the attitude of "I have an MBA, I'm worth a lot." So he was constantly passing up many jobs/interviews, simply because the starting salary wasn't what he thought he was worth. Rather than take the job, stick around and work his way up, he was after the "big money."

He got a bit annoyed at me, simply because I make more than he does...and I don't have an MBA. Of course, I've also been at my job over 15 years (16 years in July ), started at the bottom, and worked my ass off.

Unfortuneately your brother is suffering from "history recall". By this I mean historically MBA say from the 1960s or 1970s up until the mid 2000s DID indeed command bigger starting salaries right out of college.

Just look at almost any mid to large sized company during that time and you would find the following:

1. a person with a LARGE sense of entitlement because they have an MBA.
2. a person with almost NO experience in a real world business envoironment
3. a person who "thinks" they know what is "best" and what will "work" in a real world business environment without caring how those things effect the employees and customers.

How many times over at CS have we complained about this very thing. Unfortuneately this WAS the accepted way of thinking in the business world for a LONG time.

MBA =/= great ideas - great implementation of said ideas -- what is best for the business --- acceptance of all parties of those ideas.

[Rapscallion]

I reread it - I still get from Signmaker's position that change is impossible.

It's not.

Rapscallion

[Signmaker]

Windmills do not work that way as I have already demonstrated with various research earlier in this thread. As I indicated before, a price increase is not high on the list of things a business employing minimum wage workers wants to do following an increase in labour costs. The first thing they do is try to improve operating efficiency by a few % points to absorb the cost.

Most businesses are already operating at very high levels of efficiency. They are not going to pull additional efficiency out of thin air to cover a double digit percentage increase in payroll. If they were capable of doing that, in the current US economy, they already would have. The additional costs of payroll will have to be absorbed by either reducing payroll costs elsewhere (layoffs, delayed raises, reduced benefits), reducing growth (delaying infrasturcture expansion), or increasing the profit margin on goods/services (higher price for the same thing, cheaper product for same price, reduction in associated services). These are all bad things.

That argument is just as stupid now as it was before. Increasing minimum wage does not make everyone else less special.

Calling something stupid is not really a counterargument. And it's not about being "special", it's about the perentage of deflection from the poverty line. If costs increase, that percentage will go down.

Any cost increase in product pricing that does somehow occur will occur in the industries utilizing minimum wage workers. Not across the board over the entire economy. But that scenario is unlikely and even if it does occur amounts to mere cents on the goods in question.

You make it sound like hardly any industries utilize minimum wage. The reality is that few products exist in the US that are not brought to you by a minimum wage employee somewhere along the line. Raw materials, production, transportation, and retail all have to be considered, and all of them have minimum wage positions.

Minimum wage up here is $10.25 ( 9.67 US ) an hour. Yet a Big Mac is cheaper here than it is there. ;p

And why do you think that is? McDonalds decided to sell it for less, while deciding to pay their people more? Cause they're just so nice and sweet and caring?


I didnt see anyone arguing against my call for less government waste, only challenging it as a refusal to band aid with minimum wage increase. Band aids do have a use. They are temporary treatment, until advanced care can be administered. So I have no problem with a short term artifical increase in the wage, as long as it's backed up with an attack on buerocracy.

But most people see challenging a 100+ year old gluttony machine that has grown accustomed to it's multi-trillion dollar diet as just too difficult, and instead have lead us to tacking yet another band aid on an infected wound, with no hospital in sight.

Lets talk about a bureaucratic pipe dream that would never work and even if it did would take years and years to implement instead of one simple fix that you could pass in months? =p

Yeah, sounds kinda like that.