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It's not so much the hourly wage. It is that the government of Hawaii has pretty much guaranteed that nobody can get a full time job.
I'm overdue to be saying saying this... I truly hate it when people from outside the state begin expounding upon politics and matters of government in Hawai'i.
It's not so much the hourly wage. It is that the government of Hawaii has pretty much guaranteed that nobody can get a full time job.
The Hawaii Pre-Paid Health Care Act is one of the biggest reasons that has caused part-time employment to be favored over full-time employment, by employers. Hawaii goverment essentially created the 19 hour job.
Location: not sure, but there's a hell of a lot of water around here!
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Originally Posted by mdand3boys
The Hawaii Pre-Paid Health Care Act is one of the biggest reasons that has caused part-time employment to be favored over full-time employment, by employers. Hawaii goverment essentially created the 19 hour job.
Yes. It's truly a terrible situation when the state government is compelled to intervene on behalf of the employee when the employer is unwilling to provide some kind of sustainable health care coverage. So, the state intervenes, health care coverage becomes mandatory, and the employers, in order to circumvent the law, very rarely offers any jobs in excess of 20 hours a week. Big bad state of Hawaii.
Here we are showing statistics on part-time workers according to this: (which shows almost as many part time workers as unemployed workers - let's say around 5% of the workforce. So when we take the unemployed, part-timers, discouraged workers out of the equation - you still have least 85% of the population in Hawaii working full-time.
While it sucks to be one of the part-timers, it is hardly an overwhelming statistic.
"Hawaii had 38,600 unemployed residents in 2012 according to the CPS. In addition, there were 34,000 workers who were employed part time for economic reasons (also known as involuntary part time). These individuals were working part time because of slack work or business conditions, or because they were unable to find a full-time job."
Yes. It's truly a terrible situation when the state government is compelled to intervene on behalf of the employee when the employer is unwilling to provide some kind of sustainable health care coverage.
Agreed. The law was enacted in 1974, the first of its kind, and it demonstrably improved the quality of healthcare for many Hawaiians. But over time many employers took the low road, trying to minimize their costs at the expense of their employees' welfare by cutting schedules below the mandatory insurance coverage threshhold and hiring more part-time employees. To me this was an abdication of their civic responsibility, and a reduction to gaming the rules to try to gain an unfair advantage over their competition. If every employer simply complied, there would be no economic disadvantage to doing so. As the saying goes, a rising tide lifts all boats equally.
The same can be said of Hawai'i's minimum wage, currently at $7.25/hr. If it had simply kept pace with inflation over the years, analysts say it should be at about $20/hr today, but instead it remains at such a low level that nobody can live on it. And they don't have health insurance, so when they have health issues they wind up as a burden on taxpayers. That means that those of us who pay taxes are subsidizing the business model of all the employers who refuse to pay fair wages.
It's not necessary. Take a look at Costco, which pays an average worker $18/hr and provides health insurance for its people, and the CEO takes a salary of $500,000/year. Compare that to Walmart, where the CEO is paid $20.7 million/yr, but the people on the sales floor and in the warehouse get maybe $9/hr, have no insurance, and a large number of them have to apply for food stamps and other public assistance. Why do we allow a company to operate like this, making big profits for its insiders while costing taxpayers big time to support its workers?
Sure, prices will go up if wages rise... but again, a rising tide etc. ... and many have observed that Walmart sells way too much Chinese crap at prices that are way too low. It distorts the entire marketplace, pressuring competitors to follow suit and vendors to drop their prices just to stay in business.
But how much are we talking about, anyway? According to an analysis I just ran across the other day, if McDonalds DOUBLED the pay of all its hourly wage people, it would only require a pricing increase equal to $.37 more for a Quarter Pounder, for example. It's not really that much, because the cost of labor is only a small portion of their overall expenses. But it is perhaps the most controllable cost, so they squeeze the segment for all it's worth.
So back to JJ's point, it's not that the government created the 19 hour job, it's that businesses invented that workaround to avoid doing what was right and decent and expected for their employees. But cutting costs was just an excuse for developing a business model that would work responsibly within the changed market parameters... like Costco did.
...Take a look at Costco, which pays an average worker $18/hr and provides health insurance for its people, and the CEO takes a salary of $500,000/year. Compare that to Walmart, where the CEO is paid $20.7 million/yr, but the people on the sales floor and in the warehouse get maybe $9/hr, have no insurance, and a large number of them have to apply for food stamps and other public assistance. Why do we allow a company to operate like this, making big profits for its insiders while costing taxpayers big time to support its workers? ...
I suggest you google walmart warehouse worker pay or similar terms.
It ranges from $16-$18+ an hour plus they get benefits, plus they get quarterly bonus pay.
Besides, who gets to decide when a company makes too much money? You? Your neighbor?
Do you want others telling you that you make too much money?
I suggest you google walmart warehouse worker pay or similar terms.
It ranges from $16-$18+ an hour plus they get benefits, plus they get quarterly bonus pay.
Besides, who gets to decide when a company makes too much money? You? Your neighbor?
Do you want others telling you that you make too much money?
Thats a good question, but the problem in my opinion is that companies in the past felt like they had a responsibility to there employees and comunnities it wasn't always about the bottom line(profit) like today.
My Question to you isnt that profit is bad, but how much profit do ppl need to finally say ok were content? Even when the profit is made at others expence? Because the corporations are making four times more now then in our grandparents generation(opp.)
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