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"In what has become a running joke amongst those skeptical of the claim that minimum wage increases have no effect on unemployment, a recent report by the Employment Policies Institute showed that 174 of the 184 co-sponsors of a bill to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour hired unpaid interns."
"In a review of over 100 studies, economists David Neumark and William Wascher found that,A sizable majority of the studies surveyed ... give a relatively consistent (although not always statistically significant) indication of negative employment effects of minimum wages. In addition, among the papers we view as providing the most credible evidence, almost all point to negative employment effects, both for the United States as well as for many other countries." http://www.nber.org/papers/w12663.pdf
"Yes, minimum wages still do increase unemployment."
https://mises.org/blog/seattles-minimum-wage-supporters-ignore-facts
(Score: 5, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @06:43AM (43 children)
(Score: 5, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 30 2017, @08:45AM (29 children)
"When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic." -- Ben Franklin
And he was 100% correct in that. Whether it's the rich buying congressmens' votes for money or the Democrats buying the poor's votes for money, it makes no difference. This nation is absolutely doomed unless we remove the possibility to vote corruption in for the sake of an extra dollar. Minimum wage is just as destructive to this nation as the FTC approving every merger it sees.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 4, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @09:47AM (12 children)
Where did FDR say people can vote themselves money? He said business that can't afford to pay a living wage doesn't deserve to be in business. People who can't afford to live can't afford to work. Paying people less than they need to live for a day for a full day of work is exploitative and should be recognized as a crime. Punishing crime is the job of government.
You're a piece of shit, Uzzard, you pathetic excuse for a human being.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:29AM (8 children)
A self evident truth and evidence of market economics at work. A minimum wage distorts this, the end result of a minimum wage is simply inflation. Rent controls are a more sane anti-exploitative proposition than minimum wage, they would also limit the economic advantages of property price inflation by those same exploiters calling for a minimum wage.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @03:58PM
Well, then food prices would just go up.
Okay, so you're adding food prices to your controls.
Now gas prices go up.
Let's add controls for that.
Next is electricity prices, again going up.
...
It's almost as if when some party has an advantage, they may try to prevent losing that advantage.
Side effect of market economics: they (may) work if all participants have roughly equivalent power. If not, i.e. if one party can affect another party to a far greater extent than the converse, you need controls.
And if you start adding in controls for all the tricks that may be employed to preserve the advantage, you end up regulating everything. Sort of like communism.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:55PM (6 children)
This represents a market failure as people have to have some source of food and shelter. The US lacks a comprehensive set of programs to ensure that citizens have access to at least the bare necessities which puts many people in a position where they have to work for minimum wage if there aren't jobs available that are paying more.
Ultimately, the minimum wage itself is lower than it used to be, had it kept up within inflation it would be over $20 an hour now, and if it kept up with the increases in worker productivity, it would be closer to $30. So, to say that there are businesses out there that can't afford to pay $15 an hour is misleading and probably wrong. Back when the minimum wage was closer to a living wage, you still had businesses in business, so one might reason that there were plenty of businesses that could afford to pay it.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @03:13AM (5 children)
Note that having a need is here considered a "market failure". That demonstrates a profound ignorance of economics since the whole basis of economics is that those with agency have needs and wants to satisfy.
Further it ignores that even in the complete absence of government intervention, we have a comprehensive set of programs to ensure that not do citizens have access to the bare necessities, but quite a bunch of other materialistic needs or wants. But you have to pay for them. For most people, that means working.
That's quite the fairy tale. Even if the US were to erect a huge wall to keep out the cheap, evil foreign labor competition that would otherwise put vast numbers of US workers out of work at that inflated level, you still have the outside world progressing faster than the inside one (and that sort of economic and power differential has never worked in favor of the weaker party) and you have institutional runaway inflation (such inflation would probably not be at the level of hyperinflation, where one would strongly optimize for holding US dollars as little as possible, but it's still harming how we plan for the future through investments and savings).
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @03:44PM (3 children)
The market failure here is that companies can bring in labor from other markets, or can send the work overseas to people that can afford to work for less. The result is that an increasing number of people are in a position where they have no bargaining power at all because all of the jobs available are paying the same kind of money.
That's a major market failure. I'm really not surprised that you don't get it though. It's abundantly clear that you failed econ 101.
As for my fairytale, that's not even remotely true. There's more than enough money to make it happen, where do you think all those trillions of dollars that are held by the richest came from? Here's a hint, most of it is money that traditionally would be paid out to people actually producing the products and services that are being sold.
Yes, the jobs may have disappeared, but because of the problems associated with high unemployment, I see no reason to believe that the scenario you're outlining would ever happen. Places with high unemployment and little hope of improvement invariably become cesspools with high crime and terrorism before too long.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @04:18PM (2 children)
You keep using the term "market failure" for something that is actually a market function. Firms seeking out affordable labour and friendly tax regimes are normal functions.
Now, if you were to say that a desirable outcome would be the devaluation of the dollar to the point that midwestern american labour were justifiable again, that would at least be an open question in international finance. Arguably the dollar is overvalued for a number of reasons - but within that context, firms going overseas in search of affordable labour is a simple consequence of supply and demand.
Actual market failures are not simply supply and demand at work, but situations where perverse incentives lead to destructive outcomes, such as pollution, or people eating seed corn or whatever. The fact that some guy somewhere can't get a job isn't a market failure.
Now, if you're trying to make the case that an imbalance in labour rates and outcomes is a market failure, you have quite a hill to climb. For example, you'd need to illustrate that it's not just a temporary imbalance in a high friction market (which labour is well known to be).
But maybe you have that proof on hand. The floor is yours.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @10:01PM (1 child)
This isn't simply a case of supply and demand, this is a case of the virtual cartelization of employment by companies that have no incentive at all to negotiate over the wages offered as for many of them it's cheaper just to buy politicians that can change the rules for them. You see it all over the place with the spread of anti-worker language being required to be employed. Things like those non-disclosure and non-compete clauses that have been proliferating as well as the requirement that disputes be settled via binding arbitration rather than in the courts.
They're probably not literally taking up these terms after talking with each other, but the people that write these contracts know each other and they see what the courts do with them. Everytime there's a new court ruling that says it's OK, those terms magically start to pop up elsewhere.
A lot of this is because there's an inadequate supply of jobs being offered to allow the workers to participate in the market. You can't really negotiate if there isn't another job offer from somebody with different terms. It's basically, take it or leave it and the government itself isn't getting involved on behalf of the employees.
Now, if the government weren't owned by corporations, I'd be more inclined to believe that this isn't a market failure, but it takes a herculean effort to come to any other conclusion. The system nearly ate itself in a literal sense only 6 years ago.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @11:31PM
No, it's not. There's a vast sea of employers out there.
This is a perverse outcome of defending against litigation. Mere inappropriate language can cost a business tens to hundreds of thousands of dollars in the US (with similar consequences in many EU countries as well). So now there's a business case for policing language at work.
Well, there's a solution. Either decrease the supply of labor or increase the demand for it. The latter is nicer and more beneficial.
(Score: 2) by aristarchus on Wednesday August 02 2017, @02:06AM
Who-boi! Sounds like khallow is winding himself all up to show you his! Enjoy!
(Score: 3, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 30 2017, @12:17PM (1 child)
What do you think saying "I will raise the minimum wage if elected" is besides saying "I will give you money if elected"? Fool.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @06:49PM
you better go watch some pr0n kid instead of sprouting all this stupidity. anything mises.org is just shit
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @03:38AM
And Trump promised to Make America Great Again. Maybe you should look elsewhere than the empty words of politicians? FDR was selling his policies 100%. He's not going to talk about the ugly side of those policies.
(Score: 5, Informative) by unauthorized on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:48AM (14 children)
Benjamin Franklin has never been credited with this phrase in any historical context, although Alexis de Tocqueville has been with something very similar.
Corruption... you keep saying that word but I don't think it means what you think it means. Giving the populace what it demands [gallup.com] is not "corruption", but democracy at work. Doing otherwise on the other hand is not only signs that the system isn't WaD, but clear evidence that the system is designed to work AGAINST the people. And, don't give me any canned "but muh tyranny of the majority", that only applies when the majority is demanding something tyrannical.
A state which does not obey the will of it's people, regardless of how destructive, is a state deserving only of doom. All people deserve the right to self-determination, including when this right causes them to destroy what they have.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:07AM (1 child)
"Giving the populace what it demands [gallup.com] is not "corruption", but democracy at work."
So if the population "demands" that you give it all your money... or let's up that a bit... if the population "demands" that you are worthless and should be killed that is "democracy at work"?
(Score: 2, Informative) by unauthorized on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:15AM
Come on dude, at least troll me with something that wasn't preemptively rebutted in the very next sentence. This is just embarrassing.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 30 2017, @12:14PM (6 children)
You don't think "take their shit and give it to me!" is tyrannical? Interesting.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by unauthorized on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:44PM (2 children)
Running a business is not compulsive. "They" are welcome to move to another country, the free market will quickly fill the void as you libertarians love to point out.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @03:49AM (1 child)
You won't trust the market to employ people, but you will trust it to fill a void when you've ruthlessly stamped out the last employer who tried to fill that void? And you think that the market is somehow "free" in that situation?
(Score: 2) by unauthorized on Monday July 31 2017, @06:31AM
Note that I'm not saying that these businesses are going to be forced to fail, I'm merely saying that they can move if they don't agree with the whole "not practicing abusive employment terms" thing.
And "ruthlessly stamped out"? Universal employment terms apply to everyone, and there will still be the need for those services. If some businesses decide to pull out, others can move in and eat their bread so to speak.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @02:24PM
The mighty buzzkill is st it again! Won't someone save us from his "wisdom"??
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:59PM
It's not their money though, it's money that they acquired by stealing the proceeds of people's work. Nobody has ever become a billionaire through solely their own hard work. They became billionaires by appropriating the production of other people and making it their own.
In many cases, like with Bezos, the money doesn't even exist anywhere. It's money that he couldn't access even if he wanted to because selling all those shares of Amazon would result in the price dropping precipitously. He's probably worth only a small fraction of what people think he's worth for that very reason.
(Score: 2) by coolgopher on Monday July 31 2017, @04:52AM
I believe the saying is "democracy is tyranny by the masses".
(Score: 3, Informative) by jmorris on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:02PM (3 children)
Democracy is corruption. Period, the end. The Founders carefully designed a carefully game balanced Republican form of government designed to resist the encroachments of the "universal franchise democracy" they could see destroying France and see numerous examples of similar ends in their history books.
Democracy MUST decay into Socialism because it is the winning move, short term, for everyone on the left side of the Bell Curve. And since a lack of long range planning pretty much defines the left side of the Bell Curve..... see the problem?
We were supposed to have enough popular representation to ensure the consent of the governed, thus preventing revolutions, but the idea of The People simply deciding important policy issues was an idea that almost universally terrified the people who designed our form of government.
A good guide for when the government is doing something it shouldn't, like passing minimum wage laws, etc. is to remember where our theory of government asserts that the State derives its power. It has no powers other than what we delegate unto it. It has the power to tax for lawful purposes because we consented to it, it has the power to wage war because we could delegate our Right to self defense to it. It has no authority to mandate a minimum wage because WE don't have that power to delegate. It doesn't have the power to redistribute wealth because we do not have that power to delegate to it. I DO NOT HAVE THE POWER TO TAKE YOUR STUFF AND GIVE IT TO THE POOR. YOU DO NOT HAVE THE POWER TO TAKE MY STUFF AND GIVE IT TO THE POOR. THE POOR DO NOT HAVE THE RIGHT TO HELP THEMSELVES TO OUR STUFF. Therefore none of us has that power to delegate to the State to do on our behalf. If you do not like this, propose an entirely new theory of government, write out a new specific form to implement that theory and get enough States to ratify your new Constitution... or win a Revolution.
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:48PM
Democracy is a governmental model.
Socialism is an ownership model.
The opposite of Democracy is Authoritarianism.
The opposite of Socialism is Capitalism.
In a Capitalist workplace:
- Someone besides The Workers dictates what will be produced
- Someone besides The Workers dictates how that will be produced
- Someone besides The Workers dictates where that will be produced
- Someone besides The Workers dictates how the profits will be used
In a Socialist workplace:
- You and your co-workers democratically decide what will be produced
- You and your co-workers democratically decide how that will be produced
- You and your co-workers democratically decide where that will be produced
- You and your co-workers democratically decide how the profits will be used
Socialism is Democracy extended to the workplace.
Nitwit.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @12:45AM
Sorry that your country sucks so badly.
(There are better countries.)
The Founders carefully designed a carefully[-gamed,] balanced Republican form of government
True.
They also specified in that document how that document could be amended.
So far, one chance was squandered, outlawing drinkable alcohol.
Another amendment was squandered repealing that idiocy.
Now, imagine that that energy had instead gone into an amendment producing publicly-funded election campaigns--replacing the overt bribery of politicians.
.
...and there is a country that has a democracy that actually works the way a democracy is supposed to work.
Switzerland [wikipedia.org]
(BTW, that's the same country that has lots of guns but a tiny number of deaths due to gunfire.)
...but the U-S-A, U-S-A, U-S-A. WE'RE NUMBER 1 types won't ever recognize that their country can learn from another.
...and they won't get off their asses and demand improvement; they'll stay glued to Lamestream Media, getting the "information" that The Oligarchs want them to hear.
They won't organize and gather at the local office of their Congresscritter, demanding change nor will they attend townhalls where their Congresscritter can be publicly held to account.
Says very successful activist Ralph Nader: [csrl.org]
You get the government that you deserve.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by Whoever on Monday July 31 2017, @04:28AM
Let me suggest that you look up the definition of democracy.
Hint: it's not so restrictive that the USA cannot be defined as a democracy.
(Score: 1) by phantomlord on Monday July 31 2017, @02:19AM
On the Price of Corn and Management of the Poor [archives.gov]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @04:56PM
I think buzzard lives in poverty. Poor people always think the government is just a collection of social programs.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:19AM (7 children)
Nobody wants people to starve. What the article shows is that minimum wages make people starve. If you don't want people to starve, you must reject minimum wages that take away the little they could earn, and takes it out of their mouths. Punches them in the face. And self-righteously declares, it's for your own good.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:57PM (6 children)
<sarcasm>Because we've seen throughout history that when you take away minimum wage, people get paid more out of the goodness of the heart of the benevolent Corporation, amirite?</sarcasm>
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Monday July 31 2017, @03:41AM (4 children)
Summary: Minimum wages are good
I find it endlessly frustrating that USA'ians continue to pronounce theoretical doom from the imposition of a higher minimum wage when there are plenty of examples across the developed world where a (relatively) higher minimum wage has been a good thing. In fact, the economies of many countries with a minimum wage are healthier than the USA's economy at the moment.
To take a counter-example, the removal of a minimum wage could result in conditions similar to those in Industrial-Age England. That is - massive worker exploitation including many jobs which did not pay any money at all (sort of like internships today). And those that could not afford to live without wages did what they needed to survive - turned to crime.
Is it any coincidence that the 1st world country with the lowest minimum wage is also the 1st world country with the highest crime and incarceration rates? The highest homicide rate? Part of what that minimum wage also buys you as a citizen is a lower crime rate and increased personal safety. If the worker-scum can survive on "gub-mint handouts" (I see some posters are conflating unemployment benefits with minimum wage) then they don't need to shoot or stab you for the loose change in your pocket. That's the benefit to the rich, though as usual they fail to see the big picture.
(Score: 2, Informative) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @12:16PM (3 children)
I'll note here that there are eight developed world countries ("Nordic" countries, Austria, Italy, and Switzerland, according to a 2015 OECD report [oecd.org], see page one discussion) without a minimum wage. Most of their industries tend to have sector wage floors, but not everything is covered.
Second, it's worth noting that of the countries that do have a minimum wage, a number of developed world countries have smaller minimum wages than the US: Greece, Israel, Japan, Korea (South), and Spain (see page 3 of the above report). So the US, which is your obvious target has a higher minimum wage that countries with a much lower crime and incarceration rate.
It also ignores that organized crime often fills the gap when there is a minimum wage. There was a study of a Chicago area, crack-dealing gang in the 80s (a blog summary [synchronium.net]) which found that most of its membership made well below US minimum wage. Because of the minimum wage laws, there was no legal competition for the workforce that the gang exploited. This would also increase crime and incarceration rate since the minimum wage has now effectively acted as an inducement to go into gangs in order to earn an income.
(Score: 2) by Mykl on Tuesday August 01 2017, @01:54AM (2 children)
Good points, though I would note that Greece and Spain's economies are not doing all that well at the moment, so they're not exactly poster-children for lower minimum wage.
I read your linked article about crack dealing and two very interesting points are worth noting:
These kids had jobs, but the pay was below a livable wage. They wouldn't be dealing drugs if their minimum wage were higher
Classic pyramid scheme
(Score: 1) by khallow on Tuesday August 01 2017, @03:19AM (1 child)
Ok, so they "had jobs". Why again did they not add another legal, higher paying job then since they were willing to work two jobs anyway?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Wednesday August 02 2017, @02:13AM
The obvious rebuttal is, the gang provided health-care, that's why.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @04:05AM
You get a gold star for saying the dumbest thing in this discussion to date. Workers aren't lemmings who will work for nothing just because a business bothered to throw the job out there. The reason businesses pay at all is because the worker generates more value for the business than they cost. And they can't drop their wages to nothing because a) people won't work for nothing, and b) some other business will offer more.
Free market arguments aren't at all dependent on the goodness of heart of businesses. To even voice that straw man argument is to demonstrate profound ignorance of the market argument, particularly with respect to competition.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @06:19PM (4 children)
The fundamental problem with FDR's argument is that it does not recognize that the "subsistence level" is not the same for all people. Someone who has few living expenses can work for lower wages. So can someone who is able to live on their savings while they learn something new, or someone who is of retirement age but doesn't have enough savings to fully retire. Perhaps they are not very productive, or perhaps the work they want to do is not very valuable. It is damaging to eliminate those jobs by enforcing a minimum wage. The idea that it is evil for a company to specialize in employing people in that situation is wrong. The company is simply filling a niche.
Even the idea that work must be paid by the hour does not make sense. Some work is that way, Wallmart greeters, receptionists, and security guards being good examples. Food harvesting is not. The value of the work is mostly in the quantity of produce harvested, and the time component is actually inverted: it is valuable to spend less time per unit produced so that crops don't spoil.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @12:35AM (3 children)
Not really, subsistence level is where you produce everything yourself. The level that minimum wages are aiming for are where people have food, shelter and the basic necessities of life, but little else. It's supposed to be a temporary situation for people either entering the workforce for the first time or possibly retirees that aren't counting on the income so much as needing something to fill the hours will.
There's relatively little difference from person to person with the exception of healthcare costs andamount of food that one needs.
The problem though is that there are fewer and fewer jobs that pay more than minimum wage, which makes it increasingly tough to fight your way up each rung because most of the money and wealth is now controlled by a small number of people that bribe politicians to let them keep it and more.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @01:07AM
there are fewer and fewer jobs that pay more than minimum wage
To paraphrase Pastor Niemöller: [wikipedia.org]
First they came for the wages of the burger flippers, and I did not speak out
...because I was not a burger flipper.
Then they came for the wages of the warehouse workers, and I did not speak out
...because I was not a warehouse worker.
Then they came for the wages of the teachers, and I did not speak out
...because I was not a teacher.
Then they came for my wages
...and there was no one left to speak for me.
.
Trickle-down is actually a thing--but, like sewage trickling down from busted plumbing, it's only bad stuff that finds its way downward.
Solidarity is the only tool that has ever been effective for The Workers.
...unless you want to do what they did in France in 1789 and start chopping off the heads of The Ownership Class.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @12:25PM (1 child)
As an aside, the higher you make minimum wage, the more and more jobs that will pay it - in addition to the more and more illegal jobs that pay less than minimum wage.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @03:47PM
Yes, and what does that have to do with anything? Nobody is complaining about it because it's the minimum wage, we're complaining about it because people with full time minimum wage jobs can't afford luxuries like food and shelter and have little to no hope of saving money in case an emergency shows up. And this is at the same time when the richest haven't had it so good in a century.
We've got the money to do the right thing, but apologists like you like to blame the people who have the least influence over the system. I'm sure your mother is very proud of what a good brown shirt you've grown up to be.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by coolgopher on Sunday July 30 2017, @06:56AM (5 children)
Everyone carps on about employment numbers as if they're the be-all and end-all. It's rubbish. Employment does not guarantee a lack of poverty, *especially* not without minimum wage guarantees. And really, poverty is the more salient point in this context. Yes, it sucks to be without a job. You know why it sucks? Because your personal economy tanks, and you spiral downwards. If I didn't have to worry about paying the bills, I wouldn't mind being without a job so much. Heck, I could get some personal projects done. But this incessant whining about minimal wages lowering employment completely misses the point of employment - keeping people on their feet so they can make their way in society. Sheesh.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @07:35AM
Oh you don't have to worry about losing your job, when you can get your rich family to keep your fancy things for you, while you pretend to follow the simple life without possessions, live in a tent, pursue your dream of being a street minstrel for a few years, and still be swimming in pussy the whole time. You don't have to worry about a thing, if you live the lucky charmed life of Michael David Crawford.
(Score: 4, Informative) by Common Joe on Sunday July 30 2017, @08:49AM
Indeed. Employment should never be the end goal. Measuring employment is merely a single step towards finding out how we are doing as a society. If employment were the end goal, we could employ everyone by having them dig ditches with a spoon for a quarter per day.
I'm American, but live in another country and I just had a conversation with a coworker the other day. He couldn't understand why I lived so far away from the downtown area where I work. (About 1.5 hours travel each way when there's no construction.) I then dropped the bomb on him -- I'm earning minimum wage. He looked at me astonished and said that's not very much. No. It's not. I couldn't do better, though. No one else would hire me and I was desperate. Still am. Without my wife's income, I'd be toast. And she doesn't earn much either. We are extremely frugal so we can make ends meet. Our luxury spending consists of going out with my mother-in-law to lunch once a month and me paying for everyone's meal. There is no way we could afford to live anywhere near downtown. For us, making our way in society is extremely tough. But hey, we're both employed.
(Score: 0, Troll) by The Mighty Buzzard on Sunday July 30 2017, @09:22AM (1 child)
You want a guaranteed lack of poverty? Sorry, not happening. It doesn't exist under any system involving human beings. You can either have the best and brightest able to pull themselves out of it or you can guarantee it to everyone, take your pick.
My rights don't end where your fear begins.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @08:13PM
Heh, yeah I'll opt for guaranteeing that everyone is out of poverty. Do you even cogitate bro?
Yes yes I know you meant guaranteeing poverty for everyone, but that was just too stupid so I pretended like you had a clue.
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:02PM
Being employed should always guarantee that you've got enough for a modest place to live and food as well as the ability to get sick without going bankrupt and have a week or two that you don't have to work every year.
Now, for those living in the 2nd or 3rd world, that's not necessarily realistic, but there's absolutely no excuse for the US, the wealthiest nation to ever exist, for that not to be true. The only reason it's not true is that the politicians are owned by greedy kleptocrats that feel entitled to steal everything that isn't nailed down. And then to steal the nails and the rest of it.
(Score: -1, Offtopic) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @07:02AM (2 children)
Gimme Basic Income! Pay me not to work!
(Score: 5, Informative) by maxwell demon on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:31AM (1 child)
As far as I know, not a single socialist country had basic income. So stop calling basic income socialist.
The Tao of math: The numbers you can count are not the real numbers.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @01:30AM
I can't name a country where The collective ownership of the means of production was actually a thing.
(When -you- own something, -you- get to decide what happens with that something.)
I can't think of a nationwide instance that had a tight enough feedback loop to qualify.)
The Soviet Union made it clear that they were doing State Capitalism even before Lenin died. [google.com]
That said, there's The Alaska Permanent Fund (since 1976) and Hawaii is talking about a basic income scheme.
Damned Pinkos.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Interesting) by fraxinus-tree on Sunday July 30 2017, @07:17AM (5 children)
Someone discovered America. Well. I don't know if there is such an idiom in English, but anyway. The result is a simple market response and should be expected. But unemployment rate is not THE single measure of the well-being of the working class. I know a lot of people who would be better off not working and even more who are less dangerous to the economy when unemployed.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by theluggage on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:35AM (3 children)
Except that the low-wage economy isn't "the market" - its an artifice created by massive, indirect government subsidies in the form of myriad welfare programs that allow people to work for less than a living wage without starving or becoming homeless (with, of course, many inefficiencies and injustices that mean the benefits don't always go to the right people). Even in the conservative, market-friendly US huge sums of taxpayers money are spent supporting the working poor. Other countries have even more generous in-work benefits (although I wouldn't bet on them being any "cheaper" than the US system).
In a free market, businesses pay the "market rate" for commodities. So either you treat labour as another commodity and just let the surplus (and their children) starve, or accept that labour isn't just another commodity subject to the rules of supply and demand.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:05PM (1 child)
Not really, it's a byproduct of people being allowed to accumulate ungodly sums of money without consequence. If the tax rates for the richest were dependent upon the living conditions of the poorest, you'd see very quickly that there'd be no homeless or working poor left. They'd have all have comfortable salaries as all the other jobs would disappear and the labor market would return to some measure of sanity.
The reason you have all those people hussling like that is because there aren't many viable options left for improving ones standing in terms of income. Any time you have this much money concentrated in this few number of households, you're going to see the opportunities dry up.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @01:55AM
If the tax rates for the richest were dependent upon the living conditions of the poorest
I'd Love To Change The World - Ten Years After (1971) [metrolyrics.com]
Tax the rich, feed the poor, till there are no rich no more
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 2) by fraxinus-tree on Monday July 31 2017, @09:02AM
A distorted market is still a market. There is no "THE" market, there are a lot of minor and major markets everywhere with their respective properties. And, market-wise, labour can behave as commodity or as something else. It depends. Looking around, i wonder where the fuck the surplus of labour and/or workforce is. I know a whole lot of unemployed for extended period people (my dad included) and most of them are unemployed for a "reproducible" reason. Well, I live in Bulgaria. YMMV, but not by much.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:29PM
People like Donald Trump and more than half of the US police force.
It's in your interest to have your tax money go to paying them NOT to work.
Think about it, would you really want Trump to keep trying to pass majorly fucked up legislation or would it be better if he stuck to playing golf and groping pussy?
Similar for your corrupt cowardly murderous cops.
(Score: 5, Informative) by tonyPick on Sunday July 30 2017, @09:22AM (11 children)
Except that, previously, the evidence from various analysis was that it didn't
https://journalistsresource.org/studies/economics/inequality/the-effects-of-raising-the-minimum-wage [journalistsresource.org]
http://www.upjohn.org/publications/upjohn-institute-press/what-does-minimum-wage-do [upjohn.org]
If this study says that the meta analysis shows a definite small trend that's interesting - they're combining statistically insignificant datain some cases, but if it's all pointing in one direction, and if the better studies tend to show larger effect, that's a clear sign that something is going on there. It'll be interesting to see a wider review of this paper.
Of course, if "those skeptical of the claim that minimum wage increases have no effect on unemployment" from the Mises institute previously had the position that the data was clearly wrong when it told them something they didn't want to hear, but now accept it uncritically when it says something they'd like to believe might be true, then this is actually far more interesting in what it tells us about those people.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by aristarchus on Sunday July 30 2017, @09:57AM
It tells us that the people at the Miser Institute are being way overpaid. If we want fairness and equality, and equal opportunity for all to succeed, we need to think more about a maximum wage for right-wing nut-job think tanks. Probably have a far greater effect on the economy as a whole than any pitiful increase in a minimum wage.
(Score: 4, Interesting) by TheRaven on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:01AM (3 children)
Hypothesis one: Minimum wage increases unemployment. When the minimum wage goes up, businesses are unable to gain a cost benefit support low-paid employees and so reduce their workforce. If a business gains $x/hour of value from an employee, and the minimum ways is set at $y/hour such that $y > $x, they will reduce the number of employees.
Hypothesis two: Minimum wage increases the rate at which automation becomes more cost effective. If a business gains $x/hour of value from an employee who costs $y/hour and the cost of replacing them with a machine is $z/hour, they will continue to employ humans until such a point that $y > $z.
Hypothesis one seems less likely, because businesses are run to make money and if they could continue to be profitable with fewer employees then they would do so. The effect that you should observe from hypothesis one is companies going out of business or raising prices if they can no longer make a profit with higher wages. If they are able to cut their workforce with a higher minimum wage and remain competitive, then (in most cases) they would have been able to cut their workforce with a lower minimum wage as well.
In contrast, hypothesis two seems to be directly supported by their evidence. This would be a fine argument against increasing the minimum wage if the cost of automation were constant, but this is not the case: the cost of automation is coming down all of the time and will eventually cross the point at which automation is cheaper than employing humans for a lot of occupations. Keeping minimum wage low will delay this, but won't prevent it.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @04:15PM
So eliminating wages will give us full employment?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @06:58PM (1 child)
>"If they are able to cut their workforce with a higher minimum wage and remain competitive, then (in most cases) they would have been able to cut their workforce with a lower minimum wage as well."
That is true, but the fact that they could cut the workforce does not mean that they would. In fact, it goes the other way. The company has a certain level of profit with a minimal workforce. If they can hire more people inexpensively, they can increase their profit, and so will do that. If the cost of workers increases because of government action, the company will reduce the work force because that will reduce the impact on the company's profit.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @02:24AM
Following on the tack of TheRaven, if they were going to, wouldn't they have -already- done that?
You blockquoted the part I was going to.
they could cut the workforce
I note that since USA's minimum wage was instituted in 1938, it has been raised 22 times.
Not once has that brought about that hand-waving result.
Again: If a boss is keeping a worker on the payroll, it's because he needs that worker.
...and, at the Mondragon cooperative, when they have had a downward demand for a division's products, they moved worker-owners to another division and/or cut the hours of each worker-owner a bit.
Mondragon has never had a layoff.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:24PM
Statistical signficance is based on an arbitrary threshold. Meta-analysis can be performed with statistcally insignificant or signficant results or any combination thereof. There are many examples, where meta-analysis allows to accrue enough statistical power when individual studies weren't, thus: overall significance but not individually per study.
Also when the the larger studies show larger effects, that is rather worrysome and not a sign that 'something is going on'. Effect sizes of smaller studies should be larger as sampling variation is bigger. As it is, I would be worried about biased studies.
(Score: 5, Informative) by mcgrew on Sunday July 30 2017, @03:14PM (4 children)
From Wikipedia: [wikipedia.org]
In short, their numbers are VERY suspect. You are absolutely correct.
mcgrewbooks.com mcgrew.info nooze.org
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @04:52PM (2 children)
Liberal charity evaluator hates conservative charity, news at 11.
Next you'll tell be that the Southern Poverty Law Center isn't fond of Ben Carson. Oh, wait...
I wonder how change.org feels about Trump bring change. Hmmm.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @09:23PM (1 child)
What made you decide that Charity Navigator is liberal and hateful? Is it purely because they remarked on the similarity in the names? They've given Navy SEAL Foundation [charitynavigator.org], Army Emergency Relief [charitynavigator.org], Memorial Assistance Ministries [charitynavigator.org] and Hosanna/Faith Comes By Hearing [charitynavigator.org], which might be expected to embody conservative values, their highest rating.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @12:38AM
It's liberal and hateful whenever the nutters on the right disagree. Which isn't surprising considering how little evidence there is to their political views and their aggressive attacks on education and information.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @02:35AM
I'm surprised Wikipedia has a page on them.
If your operation has a high profile of any sort, these folks will have done a page on you.
The guys in question? Still wannabes. [mediabiasfactcheck.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @09:27AM (6 children)
Here in California, raising the minimum wage pushes more work to the illegals. Things that high school kids (or dropouts) used to do.
If you want minimum wage increases to have the intended effect, you need to get rid of the illegals first
Otherwise you get a 'sub minimum wage' market and unemployed Americans..
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:19AM (5 children)
No, you need to get rid of the employers that illegally hire people. People are not "illegal", actions are illegal. If someone is sans papiere and caught working in a country, they should be let go. But we take the person who illegally employed them, and illegally paid them under the table and off the books at below the minimum wage and with no benefits and no contribution to social safety nets like Workmen's Compensation or Unemployment insurance, not to mention Medicare and Social Security, and that person, the illegal employer, loses all his possessions and is made to work for a period of some years at a job that pays the minimum wage. Or we draw and quarter the pernicious bastard, burn the pieces, and pray for his soul. Either way is fine with me.
The problem is the employers, the job destroyers, and that is where reform is to begin. The market is rigged.
(Score: 2) by Hyperturtle on Sunday July 30 2017, @02:46PM (2 children)
I am wondering what the political leanings are of the people that refuse to pay a minimum wage, and instead hire illegals?
It seems that the Democrats promote and endorse a higher minimum wage, and that the Republicans wish to spend billions of dollars to keep immigrants out.
There is clearly no lack for jobs, considering the immigrants are not coming here to be unemployed.
Once the wall is built, and tax dollars are collected for the continued monitoring and enforcement of it and so on, who are the people that are going to be complaining that they can't find anyone to work the minimum wage jobs?
It seems to be that the libertarians generally have no problem with having anyone do the work. They are also not the ones to be counted on to increase minimum wages, and could quite likely interpret the wall as a means of closing off valuable undocumented workers that can get paid cash under the table and reduce the overall funds paid to both the workers, the economy, and for taxes.
Of course, anyone can decide to pay someone off the books, but deseperate people are usually cheaper and thus are often the preferred solution to a job that requires hire wages to get "regular citizens" to do the same work. (I do not know what "regular" is, other than that it seems that these jobs are not filling themselves with trained union laborers, unskilled citizens doing low and no skill work, nor are the farm and day laborer jobs appearing attractive to "middle class" bread winners.)
I do wonder how the employment landscape will change. I expect that by building the wall and enforcing strict immigration controls, there will be an unintended series of consequences resulting in higher prices than what most people are accustomed to. It won't be free market related and capitalism at work; it'll be costs passed onto the consumers once the price of labor goes up when the pool of inexpensive undocumented illegal workers dries up.
Minimum wage likely won't have to be increased -- employers will either struggle to find people to work these types of jobs, or they will go out of business when they are unable to fill the positions at prices that used to be considered fair.
The remaining businesses will have a better go at it, if they can hold out -- due to there being less competition of the same strained labor pool resources.
That will lead to higher prices over all. It probably also will create greater social equality. It may prove to be that the wall is among the most socially justified thing a right-leaning business owner can support, even (or despite) without recognizing the challenges it may create for their business owner peers that are reliant on those people that no longer can work here.
Whatever happens, I expect all people regardless of political persuasion to complain about higher prices when it eventually happens.
I am not an economist, and so if anyone has an alternate opinion as to what will happen to the businesses that rely on cash wages and undocumented workers of any kind (citizen or non-citizen), it'd be nice to hear what the economical benefits are aside from just hiring more citizens.
Most of the arguments I hear (and participate in) are about companies outsourcing the jobs people already had -- H1Bs, off-shoring, training replacements. The wall fixes none of that. I haven't heard how we can stop IT offshoring with a wall along the Southern border, but clearly it solves the immigration concerns regarding entry from Mexico very neatly--via prevention.
The jobs those undocumented people had will still be there--the work won't somehow disappear, but I don't think IT people and tool-and-die machinists and coal miners are going to take them. Maybe we can get a law requiring the H1Bs to work in them for a year or two prior to being allowed to work in IT? (alright, that was delusional, but someone has to do that work, and it'd give the original IT workers a chance to build a cushion and prepare the documentation for their mandatory replacement training--right?)
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @06:29PM
Lots of illegals are unemployed, or occasionally employed, but by stuffing 5+ people into every room makes it more affordable to be poor. Why would they live such a life? Because their hometown is likely overrun by gangs and their prospects at home very bad. Even underpaid part time work in the US is better.
It would be great if we could solve all the world's problems, but those in power in every country are more interested in maintaining the status quo.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @03:00AM
I am wondering what the political leanings are of the people that refuse to pay a minimum wage, and instead hire illegals?
Google's algorithm gives preference to recent stuff, so Trump's appointees are the first in the results. [google.com]
Go down a bit and you hit the one I half-remembered.
Nannygate had Zoë Baird, Slick Willie's nominee for US Attorney General, revealed to have done this.
Right after that, Kimba Wood got stuck to the same tar baby.
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @05:02PM (1 child)
The formal legal term is "illegal alien". Everything else is incorrect. The "undocumented" (or your silly French "sans papiere") term is especially bad, since the norm is to have fraudulent identity documents. Identity theft is an ongoing crime that really hurts real people. I suppose we could describe them as "transnational trespassers", but "illegal aliens" is proper.
Such people have an ongoing continuous status of "illegal" due to their presence here. Essentially, they are the crime. Most have committed numerous felonies, particularly identity theft and 2nd offense unauthorized border crossing.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @08:14PM
White racist criminal spotted! ICE, please locate this scum and deport him back to the Caucasus Mountains. His very presence in America is unconstitutional.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by wisnoskij on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:22AM (2 children)
A recent study concluded that after the minimum wage hike in the typical minimum wage earner saw a hundred something less per week. These are people living day to day, and suddenly because of some politicians they have to pay the same bills with less then they were making last year.
(Score: 2) by sjames on Sunday July 30 2017, @04:20PM
That same study ignored that the people who lost money weren't actually eligible for the new minimum wage yet IIRC.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @04:46AM
I didn't remember enough particulars on that but it wasn't difficult to find that University of Washington "study".
It was junk.
study+minimum.wage+cherry-picked+inurl:2017 [google.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @12:40PM (11 children)
So when there's a entry decrying trickle down economics, we see all sorts of response denigrating economists. Now that we have one denigrating minimum wage, it's a respectable occupation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:37PM (10 children)
Might work if it was gush-down economics.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:55PM (9 children)
Oh, PLEASE DON'T!!
That "trickle down" is what you get when the rich bastards are pissing on all the rest of us. "Gush-down" would be what you get when they have Roto-rooter pump the septic tanks on us.
And, it's all a crock of shit, no matter how you look at it. The richest of the rich GOT RICH because they are greedy bastards. They don't want to share the wealth, and they're not going to share the wealth. There are some charitable rich people, of course, and they do share some wealth, where they deem it to be necessary. It helps if that rich person can get something named after him, like a street, or a hospital lounge.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @02:30PM (3 children)
Thanks for angrily making the same point with more words.
(Score: 2) by Runaway1956 on Sunday July 30 2017, @04:08PM (2 children)
You're quite welcome. More words, for the price of fewer. Satisfaction guaranteed, or double your money back. And, the educational effect is gratis. So, which new words did you learn today?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @10:44PM (1 child)
Seriously, did you, not pass basic 5th grade grammer or are you just, a redneck? And, that educational system we have here is, gratis. And, you should have made use of it. And, please go back, to reddit or the new slashdot everyone here has, left.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @04:55AM
did you, not pass basic 5th grade grammer?
s/grammer/grammar
That comma is also unneeded.
Did you skip out on spelling class a whole lot?
Did you miss the how-to-install-a-spellchecker class?
http://www.google.com/search?q=Muphry's.law [google.com]
-- OriginalOwner_ [soylentnews.org]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @05:26PM (4 children)
Rich people are hoarders, plain and simple. But instead of old newspapers, magazines, etc. They hoard money. This hoard is part of their emotional well being that like with the ones that hoard other objects, losing 'any' part of it is an emotionally painful experience. So they do 'anything' in their power to keep as much of it as possible. Sadly because of what they hoard they have a LOT of power allowing them to distort nation's economies and affect millions of people's well being.
This also gained them fans and people who want to be like them so they support what they do. The subject starter of this post is a case in point. Eliminating the minimum wage will do nothing but allow them to either pay nothing or next to nothing to the majority of any workforce they have control over. And of course when one company does this, all the others in their field have to do the same or they are unable to compete. One only has to look at both the 1800's here and china in the past few decades to see what 'that' does to the average person.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @08:17PM
After complaining about globalization they are now being sold theblie that businesses need to stay competitive which is why pay must decrease and more people slide into poverty.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @12:43PM (2 children)
Don't quit your day job. First, we start with an irrelevant and incompetent psychological diagnosis which completely ignores that money "hoarding" or investment/savings is vastly different from saving old newspapers. For example, it creates new jobs and businesses while your pile of old newspapers creates a fire hazard.
Because workers are powerless lemmings unable to make decisions for themselves or apply for jobs that pay more.
Except when paying more means you have the stable workforce and your competitor does not.
I must admit when reading stuff this delusional that I hope someone figures out the consequences of throwing a bunch of people out of work.
I have an alternate proposal. Let's make labor valuable again by cutting out all this crap that just discourages businesses from employing people.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @03:56PM (1 child)
First off, other than hoarding, what need does anybody have with a billion dollars? $10m is more than enough to live an entire lifetime without having to do any work more onerous than changing ones own clothes.
Secondly, the workers don't have any meaningful power here. The good jobs were mostly shipped to foreign countries or eroded by importing labor from other countries that can afford to do the work for significantly less, since their governments value education enough to make it affordable.
You're whole premise assumes that there's ample higher paying jobs out there for anybody that wants to go to the effort of finding them. The reality is different though. With the skewed wealth distribution, there aren't anywhere near enough higher paying jobs out there for everybody that's willing to do the work and a lot of those minimum wage jobs are also ones that are incredibly hard.
As for the last point, you're a hypocrite. Cutting regulations and allowing an impossibly low wage as the minimum has done nothing positive for the standard of living of the people doing the work. It's been failing to work for decades now, and I fail to see any reason why continuing in that direction is going to yield different results.
The only thing that's going to solve this is to start actually taxing the wealthy. Chase them the hell out of the country if need be, but do not allow them to continue on welfare while the poorest workers are in poverty with little means of getting out..
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @11:46PM
Colonize Mars, for example. Just because you can't think of what to do with a billion dollars doesn't mean that the people who actually have that kind of money are similarly impaired.
Where would "here" be? The US is doing fine as a counterexample and many other examples of decently functioning countries (the Scandinavian countries, Germany, etc) are claimed to be doing even better. You just have to be willing to work.
Yes, I am.
The wealthy are already being taxed. Why isn't it working?
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @01:05PM (2 children)
Most businesses don't know how many customers are going to buy from them tomorrow.
For these, investment in the business, including hiring, is an act of faith.
It comes from a fixed pot of extra cash flow that the owner feels is worth risking.
Raising the required wage changes the risk equation and on average will lower hiring.
The fear of not meeting payroll makes the business owner think long and hard about the best way to spend his extra cash flow.
Automation, productivity, and taking profits are competing with more wages to optimize the owner's use of the business.
Raising minimum wage is not a free lunch.
The closest thing to a free lunch I know is what Reagan managed to do in the 80's.
He brought about an overall optimism that changed the risk equation.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Monday July 31 2017, @10:07PM (1 child)
That is definitely true. But, I'd also point out that a business that is that close to being bankrupt should be extremely nervous whether or not there's a change to the minimum wage. The minimum wage hike in this case was abnormally large, and probably did cause an abnormal amount of anxiety, but counting on employees to subsidize an inefficient business is a road to nowhere.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Monday July 31 2017, @11:48PM
That's a terrible way to describe what's happening.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by srobert on Sunday July 30 2017, @02:03PM (2 children)
"In addition, among the papers we view as providing the most credible evidence, almost all point to negative employment effects"
According sources of information that reflect our own biases, we are correct.
(Score: 2) by BK on Sunday July 30 2017, @06:59PM
The information sources seem to be biased. Therefore we know nothing.
...but you HAVE heard of me.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Sunday July 30 2017, @11:14PM
Motivated reasoning [wikipedia.org]