I haven't read
EVERY last post, enough to know that there are vastly differing opinions, some based on facts with documentation,others just based on past experience, and some just opinions.
And like the Movie
WAR GAMES....where the computer plays a war game between Russia and the USA...it comes to the final conclusion "
the only way to win the game is to not play the game".
Let's leave ambition, education, trades learning aside for a minute, as many will default to that argument, but FAIL to see that if there were
NO janitors to clean up after
THEM, and
NO fast food workers, or waitstaff, or cooks in the kitchen, they would
NOT have a place to eat while traveling or for "dining out" on a whim...
IF those jobs did not exist, and condemning everyone who works the to a life of only poverty is
NOT really productive, as there
WOULDN'T be anyone who would work those jobs for those who condemn them, yet
ENJOY their services!
ALso condemning them to a life of poverty, as pointed out, only serves to make them use government services for everything from eating now, to SS for retirement in the years to come causing a rise in taxes on those who DO use those services/goods and are "ambitious", yet would never think of flipping a burger they'd like to eat, except on a Sunday afternoon's BBQ with family/friends. The wealthy clean their
OWN TOILETS? I think
NOT!
I
USED to think they should raise the minimum wage. It was often the only way some people would get a raise. Now I think differently. The minimum SHOULD NOT be raised, but the market should bear the cost of living for each area, and pay an appropriate wage to at least survive, eat, transport to the workplace, and save a few pennies for retirement.
Now, blanketing everyone in a whole state to the same minimum doesn't work if it costs $2000/m to rent a bare room in a rooming house in BIG CITY, USA STATE, but only $400 to rent a 3 BR house in HICKTOWN, SAME USA STATE, it would only reason that BIG CITY should pay more. I commented in another thread about how UNREASONABLE it was that a company was willing to pay the SAME RATE to Expensive BAY AREA workers as they were to the CHEAPER COL site in Phoenix, AZ. Makes no SENSE. SO areal wages should happen.
The second thing, is, if minimum was STILL at a rate of, say, $1.65 as it may have been in years past, NO ONE in their right mind today, even while starving, would take a job that would take 4 to 5 hours of an 8 hour day's pay to buy a meal deal at the Fast food restaurant. So Pay WOULD have to increase on it's own as if NO One takes a job, and the job goes wanting for lack of pay scale, the employer would be forced to pay more to attract workers to fill even the minimalist list of employees to operate the place. It doesn't behoove an employer to "cut off their nose to spite their face" and chop the workforce to such a a bare bones force that cannot adequately runt he establishment, Law of diminishing returns comes to mind! ONly with
adequate staffing can the business operate effectively to serve who? It's customers who demand a certain level of service/goods! SO to assume that many jobs will all be lost is a fallable argument, as far s the necessary staff needed to operate.
RObots and machines can ONLY do so much in personal services of goods and services....I'd like to see a toilet-cleaning robot! {It MAY come yet}
.
I remember when I went to a resort area to work, the employers of all types of businesses and all types of jobs {service/retail/restaurants of all types} were trying to out-do each other during a boom market to have a breathing body fill a position with higher wages, sign on bonuses,and even child care reimbursements, PLUS benefits, yes, even in the fast food industry there. I got offered a job of varying hours, pay rates, and benefits to every place and every job to which I applied. I naturally selected the 2 best, highest paying, full time positions I was offered {I have always be a two job person until recently},
FOR ANY TYPE OF JOB I APPLIED.
NO, DON'T raise the minimum blanketly, let each market pay a REASONABLE wage, allowing for a basic standard of living, eating and saving for retirement so as to NOT be a burden to the system at any time in life. They won't be driving a brand new $50k car, but a used $15k should be within their grasp, especially if needed for transport to the job they need.
The Ambitious can feel good about themselves as they will remain in a station of life in which they CAN buy the $50k new car, and save a vast amount more for a more comfortable retirement, AND still be able to afford to eat in an establishment where the food is good, the service impeccable AND the restrooms needed after the meal is consumed, is CLEAN-all by the "lowly workers" they despise so much..
The ambitious can also feel good about the fact that they KEEP more of their earnings, pay less taxes, as those "beneath them" DO make enough so as to NOT need taxpayer sponsored government services, now to survive or in the future when unable to any longer work!!!
It only takes some common sense to figure out a few things, no special education in fancy statistics or economics-much of which is
theory anyway, and not necessarily provable in real world applications with real people involved. I remember Economics 101: {the theory of} Guns and butter lessons!
SO DON'T raise the Federal Minimum, the states {many of them anyway} already see the value in paying minimum wages or LIVING WAGES in tune to their each own economic state. Let each MARKET within each state set it's own pace for a LIVING WAGE to be in line with the COL.
AND the costs to the consumer needn't rise astronomical whilest making that elusive but real modus operandi: PROFIT!
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