Reducing the federal minimum wage also reduces the median wage. (accounting, union)

[Supposn]

Originally Posted by yowps3

GDP Per Capita doesn't really show a clear picture of the average wealth of a citizen in the certain country.

USA has a high Per Capita GDP.

But in countries such as Japan & Australia, the people have more disposable incomes

YOWPS3, what precisely do you mean? Are you deducting contractual obligations such as mortgages, home rent or car loans from disposable income? Those are incomes. You chose where and how you live or what car you do or do not drive.

I would agree that income taxes are not disposable incomes, but others may argue otherwise.

Respectfully, Supposn

[Supposn]

Originally Posted by Merkin

"median wage" changes with the economy, minimum wage went up last 10 years and middle class incomes went down.

also Australia standard of living is ridiculous high, $2/bottle of Corona anyone?

Merkin, what do Australian beers cost? Is the Corona you purchase brewed in Australia or Mexico? I haven’t a high regard for the Corona I’ve tasted but my son tells me that my taste in beer is pedestrian.

In the USA (aside from sales taxes, state tax on a 12 ounce bottle of beer can vary from nil to 0.011 per 12 Ounce bottle. Normally the size found in retail stores is six 12 Ounce bottle packs. I’d prefer a 16 ounce pint with my meal and but it’s generally not sold that way. There’s a 5 cent deposit on the bottle that doesn’t make it worthwhile to store and return empty bottles. There some federal tax on beer but I’ve never found out what it is.
In NJ where I live, I pay $1.08 per 12 Ounce bottle of domestic beer and $1.33 for Presidente beer that’s brewed in the Dominican Republic. That’s the beer I prefer.

I have very common tastes but I’m fussy about how my beer is served to me. I want it served with my meat dish; I want it as cold as possible but not to the extent that it has ice needles within it; I want to drink from a glass rather than sucking it out of a can or a bottle; I want that glass to be Ice cold before I pour the beer into it; and I pour it along the side of the glass because I don’t care for foam. I’m so fussy that I feel obliged to tip well to waiters or waitresses that put up with my nonsense.
I don’t eat out that often and if I’m driving I have to consider how many hours until I’ll be on the road again. Auto accidents are not rare and you don’t want a cop testifying that he smelled alcohol if you’re in any manner involved in an accident.

Respectfully, Supposn

[oaktonite]

Originally Posted by mysticaltyger

This bears repeating. (Edited for spelling corrections.)

It was useless tripe and contained more than mere spelling errors. Congress for instance make laws, not rules. Nearly all rule-making is carried out in the executive branch through a painstaking process of collecting and reviewing both public comment and the views of any and all stakeholders.

Originally Posted by mysticaltyger

This is the best explanation of the difference between all the different types of government than I've ever seen (including democracy and republics). A short 10 minute video that explains it all:

LOL! It is low-grade, self-contradictory, libertarian hogwash. First it claims that government power enhances freedom, but later it claims that government power erodes freedom. It cannot do both in the general sense. Further, the so-called founding fathers did not start with a clean slate as claimed. They drafted in 1787 an amendment to the already existing Articles of Confederation. That earlier system was drawn much more along small government, libertarian lines, and it had turned into a dismal failure and absolute disaster within the first ten years of its adoption. The founders intent in Philadelphia was indeed to create a strong central government, one with broad powers sufficient to the actual task of internarional governance and that of thirteen diverse, selfish, and quarrelsome American states.

[Supposn]

Originally Posted by pie_row

Taking this as two separate questions instead of one combined question.


How does massive inflation make the economy better not worse?

How does massive inflation not put every small business out of business?

The Minimum rate’s not particularly inflationary; all spending contributes to inflation.

over years’ durations the changing values of the U.S. dollar often dilute and undermine. if not completely distorting the purposes of laws and regulations within which numbers of dollars are finitely expressed.
[USA social security benefits are annually adjusted to a USA cost-price index. It’s worked very well. Rather than being modified, I prefer the method be continued and applied to the minimum wage and all other mention of dollars within federal law].

The federal government has increased the federal minimum wage, (FMW) rate due to the annual rate of the U.S. dollar’s inflation. This can only occur after a prior year has passed. The first step of an act increasing the minimum rate generally (if not always) been enacted a number of months after the new rate has been determined. This gives enterprises a “heads up” to deal with the future enacted change but it also somewhat contributes to the minimum rate’s purchasing power’s lag behind that of the U.S. dollar. I suppose and hope these practices will continue.

Enterprises may and often have increased their prices to whatever the market will bear. They do so regardless of the minimum wage but of course minimum wage rate increases are among but are not particularly a primary factor that affects enterprises’ price increases. I suppose this will continue to occur in the future.
All of a nation’s spending to some extent contributes to their currency inflation.

The actual practice of the U.S. Congress has been to permit years to pass before updating the minimum rate. Due to political determinations, their rate updates have usually been insufficient to catch up with the minimum rate’s loss of purchasing power. There was 10 year duration with no update of the minimum rate. The usual case at any given moment is for our minimum rate to be losing purchasing power. The minimum wage rate's been a victim rather than a cause of inflation.

I’m among those advocating the minimum rate's annual update to stay abreast with changes of our cost-price index. This can only be done after the prior year has passed and we will thus to somewhat continue to lag behind the U.S. dollar’s purchasing power. We should continue our delay between determination of the updated minimum rate and the enactment of that rate.

The annual change of the U.S. dollar’s prior calendar year’s purchasing power will be reflected in the updated minimum rate that would be enacted on the first of July of each year. Rather than permitting the minimum rate to lag for many years behind the U.S. dollar’s rate of inflation, it will never lag further than 18 months.
That is effectively what would be accomplished by pegging the minimum rate to the U.S. dollar’s purchasing power,

Respectfully, Supposn

[Dayton Sux]

Reduction of the FMW’s purchasing power will not decrease but rather increase needs for public assistance. It will drive the working poor deeper into poverty and they will be joined by many that are now our middle income earners dependent upon wages and salaries. This is not conducive to improving an economy.

I think this is whats called the convergence of wages/salaries due to globalization. We become poorer and they become richer, and we all converage to some standard....or something like that.....

[Supposn]

Originally Posted by Dayton Sux

I think this is whats called the convergence of wages/salaries due to globalization. We become poorer and they become richer, and we all converage to some standard....or something like that.....

Dayton Sux, globally our wage earners are in competition with lower wage nations that cannot or will not increase the purchasing powers of their nations’ wages. I consider the minimum wage and foreign trade, (although related), are separate issues subject to their individual remedies.

I’m a proponent of an Import Certificate trade policy that prevents our global imports of goods from exceeding our exports. Values of specifically listed scarce or precious minerals, (e.g. petroleum, diamonds, platinum) integral to goods are excluded from their assessed values.

Wage earning families benefit from cheaper imported goods but every day of every year they’re dependent upon their U.S. wages. USA consumers will be able to purchase cheap, (but not the absolute cheapest) imported goods. We cannot afford the absolute cheapest.

Refer to
Reduce the trade deficit; increase GDP & median wage
or Google: “wikipedia, import certificates “.
Respectfully, Supposn

[MrWillys]

This ideology supports a greater income gap between the rich and the working class that only brings us closer to a two class society, and third world status as our middle class continues to dwindle. We're already looked down on by other industrialized nations due to the inequities in our class warfare allowed by big media's indoctrination.

I would suggest a more even reward, because it takes all of us to make the system work. To claim a CEO'S value is 1000 times greater than a fire fighter rushing into danger too save the CEO's family is ludicrous at best. The longer this trend continues the more security for the wealthy will be required, and the middle class shrinks, so will the quality of life for even the wealthy. They can't steal from people that have nothing.

[oaktonite]

Come on, people. While the desire to oversimplify everything can sometimes be overwhelming, the busboys and burger-flippers where I am and where you are do not compete with anyone in China, India, Thailand, or Vietnam.

[Supposn]

Originally Posted by oaktonite

Come on, people. While the desire to oversimplify everything can sometimes be overwhelming, the busboys and burger-flippers where I am and where you are do not compete with anyone in China, India, Thailand, or Vietnam.

All USA wage and salary rates are related to each other.

Oaktonite, the minimum rate is applicable to the nation’s least demanding, least unpleasant tasks.
(Being hired is among a job’s demands. If a job’s tasks are pleasant to perform, the minimum rate is still applied to that job).

The minimum rate’s contribution to USA employees’ earnings are proportionally and inversely related to the purchasing power differences between the minimum and the jobs’ rates. I.E. it’s a greater assistance to those earning the least and a lesser assistance to those earning the most but it is of some assistance to all employees and thus promotes the median wage.

USA’s annual trade deficits of goods are detrimental to our nation’s economy.
USA’s annual trade deficits of goods are particularly detrimental to numbers of USA jobs and the wage scales of jobs due to those deficits.

Refer to:
Trade deficits are ALWAYS an immediate detriment to their nations’ GDPs.

and
Reduce the trade deficit; increase GDP & median wage

or google “import certificates” wikipedia

Respectfully, Supposn

[oaktonite]

Your GDP insight consists of a tautology. Only those in the immediate vicinity of a restaurant have anything at all to do with what busboys are paid there. Some flimsy undertandings of real-world economics are letting you down here.