Conservatives upset with romney over raising the minimum wage

[dixiegirl7]

Originally Posted by wutitiz

This is a tempest in a tea pot. If you're going to have a minimum wage, why wouldn't it make sense to index it to inflation? I think the minimum wage is a dumb idea, like any price control, but for those who have fallen for it, it would seem that indexing it is a logical consequence.

We have an indexed minimum wage here in the state of WA. I believe our minimum wage is is the highest in the nation. Friends who have teenage kids tell me it's almost impossible for them to find a summer job. The labor unions ran a state initiative (ballot measure) and got it passed about 10 years ago. It's good for the unions because it prices their competition--unskilled, low productivity workers--out of the market.

Kids can't find a summer job, because the underemloyed have had to take the jobs that kids used to do just to have some sort of income. I see so many people working at fast food places and such who are adults with families that used to have good full time jobs, but when the unemployment runs out you do what you can.

[Vegas Joe]

Originally Posted by ptug101

Mitt Romney's position on the minimum wage has some on the right sounding the alarm about his candidacy--and it could expose a dangerous fault line between Romney and some of the Republican Party's most reliable backers.

Romney said last week that he supports regular increases in the minimum wage to keep pace with inflation, a position he took as a candidate for president in 2008. Six years before that, as a candidate for Massachusetts governor, Romney supported linking automatic increases in the state's minimum wage to inflation. "I haven't changed my thoughts on that," he told reporters.

Indexing the minimum wage to inflation is a goal of many labor-backed groups and liberal Democrats, who say it would help millions of working people. In recent years, Republicans, backed by their allies in the business community, have opposed such efforts, arguing that raising the minimum wage would reduce employment. Some on the right have come out against the very concept of a minimum wage.
Romney's comments have caused concern among conservatives inside and outside the party.

"It goes to show he's still very defensive about his own wealth," Steve Forbes, the publishing magnate who made his own bids for the presidency in 1996 and 2000, told Yahoo News. "All it does is give the base another reason to be unenthusiastic about him."

awww its a bad week for Mr Romney.

There should be no minimum wage. Wages should be determined by the market.