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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: 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.