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.... except local decisions can have national implications. Low wage flyover states tend to be highly dependent on federal government assistance (states like KY, AL, KS, etc. get more federal aid than taxes they send to DC). If these states make misguided decisions by keeping minimum wage too low, more local residents qualify for federal assistance, costing all US taxpayers more. Personally I think the federal government should threaten to withhold federal aid to any state that has minimum wage below that state's poverty line. No excuse for that.
Kansas? You might want to check your numbers Skippy.
In Kansas, residents see $0.54 back for every dollar they pay in federal incomes tax, the sixth lowest ranking in the country. 25.22% of the state's revenue comes from federal funding, which is sixth lowest in the country.
This is false, these very low numbers only account for the labor rates of those making minimum wage at the restaurant. There is much larger chain of employees involved with getting that burger into your hand whether it's the person driving trucks, working the fields or in the meat processing plant.
All of their wages necessarily increase whether they are making $7.50 an hour or $50 an hour. Anyone making $15 or more now and does not see substantial increase has effectively taken a pay cut.
Have you seen the newest thing? Robotic Pizza stores and delivery. About half way through you'll see the automated truck they've developed, lined with ovens. Wait until self driving takes over...
I had this idea 20 years ago for a pizza vehicle that could cook the produce while the driver is going to the destination, but of course I had no money to make it happen. The vehicle would be stocked with a (refrigerated) shift's worth of toppings and cheese pizzas and the driver would receive orders on the road via radio contact (like taxis); the driver would take orders from dispatch, apply the desired toppings, set the pizza oven appropriately, and deliver the orders. Today everything could be done online and/or through smartphones.
What about that store where you take the pizza home and cook it yourself? Marco's? I don't know how much that pizza costs because you have to cook it but call me old-fashioned. I want to pick up a HOT pizza.
There's a chain called Papa Murphy's that does 'take and bake' pizzas.
1. Again, crime and poverty go hand-in-hand. Giving more people livable wages will decrease crime rates. And what in the U.S. is currently and historically always had a higher percentage of poverty than others. Blacks. Sorry you don't understand and you want to believe it's "their culture" or whatever bull**** you wanna read off a flash card, but less people in poverty=less crime. It's that simple. And only about 13% of the U.S. are veterans and live .4% are actually active duty. The vast majority of the U.S. didn't join the military either when there are down and out. Not everybody wants to go die or be homeless. We can find a middle ground.
2. So you understand that the price of things are going up but minimum wage hasn't, but can't understand why people would want the minimum wage to increase. Again STUPID. Even when people have pointed out that for McDonalds to pay their employees $15/hr they would only have to increase their prices by like $.30.
I'ma let you read this them you'll be ingored later on. Every post you make on this site is borderline racist or stupid.
Crime and "young males who are NOT married, NOT employed, and NOT in school" go hand in hand, high correlation.
Hell, since it is so great, why stop at $15? Why not make everyone better off and raise it to $50 or even $100?
Anyway, Seattle's unemployment rate is just decreasing along with the national average, it is incorrect to correlate it to the minimum wage increase. Seattle's unemployment was even lower in 2008...
Additionally, someone is an idiot if their measure of wage success/non-success is the unemployment rate...
If the higher wage is so great for businesses, then why are not businesses everywhere doing it then?
Because if you raise minimum wage to $15, everyone earning more than the current minimum wage but less than $15 is angry at you. This is a significant number of people.
Because if you raise minimum wage to $50, everyone earning more than the current minimum wage but less than $50 is angry at you. This is now a large number of people.
Because if you raise minimum wage to $100, everyone earning more than the current minimum wage but less than $100 is angry at you. This is now even a larger number of people.
Businesses everywhere are not voluntarily paying higher wages because they have to compete with other businesses. Paying higher wages means a business must either raise prices (decreasing the competitiveness of said business) or accept lower profits (something unlikely in a selfish world).
There's nothing wrong with being satisfied with your job, but if that job happens to be a minimum wage job that virtually anyone with a pulse could do don't expect it to be enough for a very comfortable lifestyle.
A minimum wage job is NEVER going to be enough to really support a family on and no one should expect it would, it's minimum literally the least someone can legally be paid. People on the bottom rung of the economic ladder should expect to have to share rent with someone else on the bottom rung, they might only be able to afford to rent a room somewhere, they certainly shouldn't ever expect to raise a family and buy a house etc on it.
Back in the day you could work at a factory doing basic jobs that anyone could do and were paid a wage that could support a family. Really it was no harder then any retail or fast food job we have now. So why do we think it is okay to pay less for those jobs.? As a society we should be wanting to raising the standard of the people on the lowest bottom rung instead of keeping them down.
Protesters are still going strong for a minimum wage reset of $15.00 an hour.
Minimum wage was set, many years ago, to keep people/businesses from taking advantage of kids.
years ago, kids worked all the minimum wage jobs....
so, now you raise the minimum wage and what happens...
either the businesses will find a way to do away with the workers, or charge much higher prices...
the ramifications of this will be bad....this isn't a win/win
and the worst thing about this, is, it won't give many an incentive to work hard and do better by themselves, to take night courses, and go the extra mile....to educate themselves and get better jobs.
Over 100 posts in this thread and so far nobody has fully identified the root problem. When the root problem is correctly identified, I believe the correct solution is easy to discern. Unfortunately, the correct solution is politically unacceptable, which is why politicians eventually find it easier to accept minimum wage increases.
I believe people these days are protesting for a $15/hr minimum wage - or for higher minimum wages generally - because a critical mass has emerged of adults actually trying to live on minimum wage. Initially, minimum wage was intended for marginalized minorities - the original minimum wage legislation is actually an artifact of our racist past - and with the decline of Jim Crow, teenagers and 'secondary' earners (e.g. seniors choosing to work part time, and stay-at-home moms who went to work part-time once their kids started school) took up minimum wage work.
In 2012, 48.5 percent of minimum wage workers were 25 or older - that proportion surely is higher today and quite possibly over 50 percent.
Someone in this thread did mention that minimum wage workers today are largely adults. But they missed the other element of today's problem.
Simply put, rents today are too damn high. Personal finance geeks and policy wonks recommend paying no more than 30% of your income for housing, but today 11 million renters spend at least half their income on shelter. This is unsustainable long-term.
People are protesting for a $15 minimum wage because they are having difficulty paying the rent, and because paying today's high rents is unsustainable for many.
Building an adequate supply of housing for low-wage workers would cool off most of the protesters. but high regulation, land prices and development fees make it unprofitable to build housing that low-wage workers can afford. NIMBY-minded homeowners make it politically unacceptable for municipalities to encourage opr allow affordable new development. Since expanding supply if politically unacceptable, elected officials find it easier politically to increase minimum wage. Since increasing minimum wage does not resolve the housing shortage, political pressure for higher minimum wages will continue indefinitely - the problem will never be solved in the foreseeable future.
and the worst thing about this, is, it won't give many an incentive to work hard and do better by themselves, to take night courses, and go the extra mile....to educate themselves and get better jobs.
Incentivizing people to do "better" is not the purpose of a wage in the first place, so your approach to this is a complete non-point. The purpose of a wage is to adequately remunerate people for doing the work they do.
Further what imaginary pedestal of arrogance do you imagine yourself to be on to call it "better" anyway? Who are you to look down on people doing things like sweeping floors, selling hamburgers, or any other labor and declare they should do "better"? What is WRONG with what they are doing? Who are you to judge their quality or worth, or the quality or worth of their career? What is SO great about you or what you do that lets you declare others should be "better" than they are?
With Seattle raising minimum wages in 2016 to $10.50 to $13 (depending on the size and type of business), some analysts predicted jobs would be cut and unemployment would go up. They were wrong: what actually happened is that hiring increased and unemployment fell:
"The unemployment rate in the city of Seattle – the tip of the spear when it comes to minimum wage experiments – has now hit a new cycle low of 3.4%, as the city continues to thrive. I’m not sure what else there is to say at this point. The doomsayers were wrong. The sky has not fallen. The restaurant business, by all accounts, is booming..."
When low wage workers are paid more, they have more money to spend. Local businesses see more traffic, revenue and sales. To meet the demand they hire up.
Red states still stuck at $7.50/hr would be wise to follow Seattle's lead and raise the minimum wage. They will be pleased with the result.
This can't be right,I mean Seattle was suppose to fall off the face of the Earth when this happened!
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