Author Topic: JP Morgan CEO can't explain how his low paid employee should budget her salary  (Read 39412 times)

DadJokes

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I automatically disregard any article that is designed to play on emotions. It's been a pretty good policy in life.

cloudsail

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https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/video/2019/apr/11/jp-morgan-ceo-cant-explain-how-one-of-his-low-paid-employees-should-budget-her-salary-video?fbclid=IwAR3LAfSZNTo9NpuRbT3Z3Aa8kcbm-0SlFzvTezlczOtHJuT8fl76BY99_CQ



 I would call a $40 cell phone bill a month a luxury but most wouldn't...and should people have to live without what is considered standard now?

I really dislike this argument that cell phones are a luxury. A cell phone and / or internet access is all but required in this day and age. Applying for jobs, being contacted by childcare, schools, work, etc. Maybe there are some cheaper options out there. But to say a cell phone is a luxury is ignoring how dependent we are on them for employment, etc. It don't think its just standard because we all like texting.

A lot of the people in this thread (and forum generally) assume a lot of people who are making below living wage are just not willing for forego luxuries unlike us morally superior mustachians. But sharing a one bed room, having a car (in California, where I believe they are practically required due to distances between locations, lack of public transport) isn't really living the luxurious lifestyle. It is just the minimum to exist.

I think companies should try to pay a livable wage. Cost of living analysis included. But when the populace of a country is taken care of on a basic level, it is better for everyone.

Just based on what was said in the video, the lady drives a minivan. There's only two people in her family, why does she need a minivan? That's probably the reason for her very high gas costs.

And $1600 for a room in a shared apartment? Just a two minute search online showed me that while rent is high in Irvine, it should not cost that much. That's either a really nice apartment or a really nice location.

I think most people here would agree that $400 for food for an adult and a child is more than adequate and not the daily ramen that it's made to sound.

Actually I would argue that the company does indeed pay a living wage, for an adult without dependents. If this lady didn't have to pay for childcare she'd be perfectly fine. The number of dependents that an employee has is not something that companies can control. If we start going into supporting dependents, well how many kids should a living wage support? 1? 2? 3? What about elderly dependents with medical issues? These are all highly individual expenses, and basically what welfare is for. Welfare looks at your wage vs your dependents. It would be pretty messed up if companies had to pay you based on your dependents.

GuitarStv

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OK.

Once poor children are born, it's too late to unburden society.  So what's the solution?

You've got several options here:
- You can sterilize the poor
- You can force the poor to have abortions before birth
- You can euthanize poor children when born
- You can accept that the unsupported poor will create a permanent underclass with little to no hope of improvement, and very high chances of committing crime.
- You can pay extra for the bare necessities for poor children to become healthy/educated/productive members of society, while the companies that employ their parents become richer by not having to do so.  (This is what we currently do. . . lots of handouts.)
- You can force the companies employing poor people to pay a living wage.

I'd argue that only the last two solutions are morally/economically acceptable . . . so you've really got to choose between giving subsidies to the poor (and indirectly to employers), or legislating a higher minimum wage.  Both have negatives, but the current approach of giving rich companies hand outs makes less sense to me.

Social programs are designed to help those in need. The fact that one unskilled worker has a living situation they can't afford doesn't mean all do. As such, forcing companies to pay a 16 year old kid, living at home with mommy and daddy and no bills, as if he'd earned enough to support a family is absolutely ridiculous imo. Same for that 19 year old kid living in an apartment with 3 roommates so they can afford to live on their own before they develop any skills/education/experience that an employer would value more than the minimum wage.

The "woe is me for having a shitty situation" few should not result in the government forcing money out of companies and redistributing it to people who haven't earned it. Got a shitty situation? That's why we have social programs to help people, take advantage of them. Those who didn't end up in that situation shouldn't have their employers forced to pay them more simply because some people make bad choices or end up in a shitty situation.

I feel like there's some misplaced anger in your post.

You've already established that the government is going to force money out of someone to redistribute it to 'people who haven't earned it'.  Why is it OK  (or better) to do this through social programs that tax payers are on the hook for, but unacceptable to do this through minimum wage values that companies are on the hook for?

Right now companies profit because the tax payer is handing money out directly to poor employees, so that the employees can accept jobs that are below the amount they need to live.  A change to minimum wage would mean that companies have to pay the true cost of hiring their employees, without effectively getting hand-outs from you and me.

I don't think that anyone is advocating for a princely living wage (I'm certainly not), just as you're not advocating for a princely government social program hand out.  But the need is not going away, and the money has to come from somewhere.  I don't see why my taxes should continue subsidizing cheap employers.

wageslave23

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It is not the government's or our employers responsibility to pay me what I think I need.  It is my personal responsibility to either find a way to earn enough to pay for what I want/need, or to adjust my lifestyle to be able to live within my earnings/pay. 

I get this sentiment and agree with it to a certain point . . . but we know that people don't always make the best choices.  Actually, it seems that the norm is to make the wrong choices.  Knowing this, what do you propose should happen with all the people who are unable to adjust their lifestyle to live within their earnings and unable to find a job that allows them to earn enough for what they need?

If they are truly unable to change either side of their situation then government assistance is necessary.  If they are able but choose not to, then nothing - hunger is a great motivator.

GuitarStv

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It is not the government's or our employers responsibility to pay me what I think I need.  It is my personal responsibility to either find a way to earn enough to pay for what I want/need, or to adjust my lifestyle to be able to live within my earnings/pay. 

I get this sentiment and agree with it to a certain point . . . but we know that people don't always make the best choices.  Actually, it seems that the norm is to make the wrong choices.  Knowing this, what do you propose should happen with all the people who are unable to adjust their lifestyle to live within their earnings and unable to find a job that allows them to earn enough for what they need?

If they are truly unable to change either side of their situation then government assistance is necessary.  If they are able but choose not to, then nothing - hunger is a great motivator.

Agreed.  That's beside the point of the topic under discussion though.


What about the people who are unable to find a job that pays what they need because wages have been artificially depressed by employers are taking advantage of their ability to pay less because the rest of us will pick up the slack through tax funded social programs?

seattlecyclone

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It is not the government's or our employers responsibility to pay me what I think I need.  It is my personal responsibility to either find a way to earn enough to pay for what I want/need, or to adjust my lifestyle to be able to live within my earnings/pay. 

I get this sentiment and agree with it to a certain point . . . but we know that people don't always make the best choices.  Actually, it seems that the norm is to make the wrong choices.  Knowing this, what do you propose should happen with all the people who are unable to adjust their lifestyle to live within their earnings and unable to find a job that allows them to earn enough for what they need?

We have various public assistance programs available for this circumstance. Food stamps, housing assistance, Medicaid, etc.

Remember that the true minimum wage is $0. We usually refer to this as unemployment. You can view the situation of employed people on benefits as government subsidizing a business, but you could also view it as an employer helping the government out by reducing the amount of public assistance the person would need compared to if they weren't employed at all.

A business isn't going to offer a job if they don't expect the employee to create economic value in excess of their wages. If a person doesn't have the ability to create economic value in excess of the cost of a basic living for themselves and any dependents they might have, we can either let them work for less than a "living wage" and earn what they can so that they only need a little bit of government assistance, or we can have the government pay for their whole lifestyle.

cloudsail

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I don't really see it as tax payers subsidizing employers costs. I see it as the workings of a free economy, with a bit of a social safety net. Call me Randist, but I just don't think increasing government interference in corporations is good for the economy. The radical socialism that some Democrats are currently spouting frankly terrifies me. I come from Communist China; that system didn't work, the country went to hell, and now they're more capitalist than we are. I would hate for the U.S. to repeat a failed experiment at the cost of our economy. A robust economy is pretty important to those of us pursuing FIRE.

GuitarStv

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It is not the government's or our employers responsibility to pay me what I think I need.  It is my personal responsibility to either find a way to earn enough to pay for what I want/need, or to adjust my lifestyle to be able to live within my earnings/pay. 

I get this sentiment and agree with it to a certain point . . . but we know that people don't always make the best choices.  Actually, it seems that the norm is to make the wrong choices.  Knowing this, what do you propose should happen with all the people who are unable to adjust their lifestyle to live within their earnings and unable to find a job that allows them to earn enough for what they need?

We have various public assistance programs available for this circumstance. Food stamps, housing assistance, Medicaid, etc.

Yes, I'd like to reduce the need to give people these handouts.


Remember that the true minimum wage is $0. We usually refer to this as unemployment. You can view the situation of employed people on benefits as government subsidizing a business, but you could also view it as an employer helping the government out by reducing the amount of public assistance the person would need compared to if they weren't employed at all.

Not sure that this argument makes sense in the big picture.

I feel that many people who are working 40 hours a week for their employer, and then depending on government subsidies to make ends meet are trapped.  They don't have the time, energy, and resources to leave and search out a better job . . . and this scenario only really benefits the employer.  It means that people will be using fewer government subsidies than if they were not working at all, but they'll be on those subsidies permanently.  Is that better, or is it preventing a real solution from being found?  I don't know.


A business isn't going to offer a job if they don't expect the employee to create economic value in excess of their wages. If a person doesn't have the ability to create economic value in excess of the cost of a basic living for themselves and any dependents they might have, we can either let them work for less than a "living wage" and earn what they can so that they only need a little bit of government assistance, or we can have the government pay for their whole lifestyle.

Agreed, a business isn't going to offer a job if they don't expect benefit from doing so.  We are living in the most profitable time in history though.  I have suspicions that employers can offer more money but choose not to because they know that they don't have to.  The taxpayer will subsidize them, providing a chunk of effectively immobile workforce.




I don't really see it as tax payers subsidizing employers costs. I see it as the workings of a free economy, with a bit of a social safety net. Call me Randist, but I just don't think increasing government interference in corporations is good for the economy. The radical socialism that some Democrats are currently spouting frankly terrifies me. I come from Communist China; that system didn't work, the country went to hell, and now they're more capitalist than we are. I would hate for the U.S. to repeat a failed experiment at the cost of our economy. A robust economy is pretty important to those of us pursuing FIRE.

Not sure I follow your logic at all.  Employers can pay less because tax payers will subsidize their workers through social programs.  If you don't want to call it a subsidy, that's fine . . . but what else would you call it?

From where I'm sitting it seems like you're advocating for the form of government control that we currently have because you're against and terrified of government control.  Which is confusing.  I guess the difference is that government control via handouts to people is direct, whereas government control by setting a minimum wage is much more hands off, so that's why you dislike the idea?

Bucksandreds

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I don't really see it as tax payers subsidizing employers costs. I see it as the workings of a free economy, with a bit of a social safety net. Call me Randist, but I just don't think increasing government interference in corporations is good for the economy. The radical socialism that some Democrats are currently spouting frankly terrifies me. I come from Communist China; that system didn't work, the country went to hell, and now they're more capitalist than we are. I would hate for the U.S. to repeat a failed experiment at the cost of our economy. A robust economy is pretty important to those of us pursuing FIRE.

Comparing communism to social democracy is quite the straw man.  A more accurate argument on your part would be that you do not want to see the U.S. adopt polices more closely aligned with most countries in Western Europe, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Most who don't want to see more social programs have no actual problem with the social programs in those countries. They just don't want to have to pay higher taxes to fund them.

cloudsail

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To be clear, I don't have a problem with setting a minimum wage, or increasing it over time to keep up with inflation. My issue is trying to ensure that it is a "living wage" for everyone, which I see as impossible unless it is incredibly high, or we force corporations to pay people not based on their position but their number of dependents, living expenses, etc.

cloudsail

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I don't really see it as tax payers subsidizing employers costs. I see it as the workings of a free economy, with a bit of a social safety net. Call me Randist, but I just don't think increasing government interference in corporations is good for the economy. The radical socialism that some Democrats are currently spouting frankly terrifies me. I come from Communist China; that system didn't work, the country went to hell, and now they're more capitalist than we are. I would hate for the U.S. to repeat a failed experiment at the cost of our economy. A robust economy is pretty important to those of us pursuing FIRE.

Comparing communism to social democracy is quite the straw man.  A more accurate argument on your part would be that you do not want to see the U.S. adopt polices more closely aligned with most countries in Western Europe, Canada, Australia and New Zealand. Most who don't want to see more social programs have no actual problem with the social programs in those countries. They just don't want to have to pay higher taxes to fund them.

Have you seen what some of the Democratic candidates are saying?

Elizabeth Warren wants to forcibly break up large tech companies.
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2019/mar/08/elizabeth-warren-amazon-facebook-google-big-tech-break-up-blogpost

Bernie Sanders wants to break up big banks and establish worker cooperatives.

This all goes far beyond increasing the minimum wage.

They may call it social democracy but I'm really getting deja vu here.

mm1970

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It is not the government's or our employers responsibility to pay me what I think I need.  It is my personal responsibility to either find a way to earn enough to pay for what I want/need, or to adjust my lifestyle to be able to live within my earnings/pay. 

I get this sentiment and agree with it to a certain point . . . but we know that people don't always make the best choices.  Actually, it seems that the norm is to make the wrong choices.  Knowing this, what do you propose should happen with all the people who are unable to adjust their lifestyle to live within their earnings and unable to find a job that allows them to earn enough for what they need?
Obviously, make them suffer.
And their children.
Because, WTF were they doing having kids they couldn't afford?
I mean, suck it.
Not my problem, amirite?

seattlecyclone

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A business isn't going to offer a job if they don't expect the employee to create economic value in excess of their wages. If a person doesn't have the ability to create economic value in excess of the cost of a basic living for themselves and any dependents they might have, we can either let them work for less than a "living wage" and earn what they can so that they only need a little bit of government assistance, or we can have the government pay for their whole lifestyle.

Agreed, a business isn't going to offer a job if they don't expect benefit from doing so.  We are living in the most profitable time in history though.  I have suspicions that employers can offer more money but choose not to because they know that they don't have to.  The taxpayer will subsidize them, providing a chunk of effectively immobile workforce.

Sure, I'm certain there are jobs that exist that would still exist if the minimum wage was bumped up a buck or two. I'm also certain there are jobs that would no longer make sense to offer if this happened.

Take Walmart for example. The corporation had a net income of just under $7.2 billion in its last fiscal year. They also had 2.2 million employees. That's a net income of roughly $3,250 per employee. That's not nothing, but it's also not a huge amount of wiggle room to raise wages while still breaking even. They could probably bump up the wages at some of their stores by $3k per employee or more, but a wage increase of this amount would probably make some other stores unprofitable and the company would decide to close them if such a wage increase was forced on them by law.

Regarding the effect of being locked into a job and unable to increase their skills, I do support a universal basic income. This would have the effect of increasing rather than decreasing government spending, but I think the other effects of such a policy would make it worthwhile.

cloudsail

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I just feel that the current democratic policy of demonizing large corporations, as embodied in the video from the OP, is not good for anybody. Do CEOs make an obscene amount of money? Yes, but I see it as a necessary evil of economic growth and robustness. This whole "rich people are evil" mentality is exactly what communism is all about (I grew up on Mao slogans and Communist propaganda).

It is precisely the example of other western countries that show sensible systems like universal healthcare are possible without going to extremes. We should be going forwards, not backwards.

GuitarStv

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Do CEOs make an obscene amount of money? Yes, but I see it as a necessary evil of economic growth and robustness.

So, I don't see rich people as evil . . . but am confused when I see statements like this.

Do you believe that capping a CEOs salary at say, 9 million instead of 20 million would significantly hurt economic growth and robustness?  Or that it would hurt the bottom dollar of the company he (it's almost invariably a white guy) works for?  I'm not saying that the government should be involved in this process at all . . . it's just surprising that share holders stand for the salaries they way they are.

It would be shocking if paying a huge amount (but a little less than is currently the norm) really had any negative impact on the company . . . and even more so if it had an impact on the economy as a whole.

jlcnuke

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OK.

Once poor children are born, it's too late to unburden society.  So what's the solution?

You've got several options here:
- You can sterilize the poor
- You can force the poor to have abortions before birth
- You can euthanize poor children when born
- You can accept that the unsupported poor will create a permanent underclass with little to no hope of improvement, and very high chances of committing crime.
- You can pay extra for the bare necessities for poor children to become healthy/educated/productive members of society, while the companies that employ their parents become richer by not having to do so.  (This is what we currently do. . . lots of handouts.)
- You can force the companies employing poor people to pay a living wage.

I'd argue that only the last two solutions are morally/economically acceptable . . . so you've really got to choose between giving subsidies to the poor (and indirectly to employers), or legislating a higher minimum wage.  Both have negatives, but the current approach of giving rich companies hand outs makes less sense to me.

Social programs are designed to help those in need. The fact that one unskilled worker has a living situation they can't afford doesn't mean all do. As such, forcing companies to pay a 16 year old kid, living at home with mommy and daddy and no bills, as if he'd earned enough to support a family is absolutely ridiculous imo. Same for that 19 year old kid living in an apartment with 3 roommates so they can afford to live on their own before they develop any skills/education/experience that an employer would value more than the minimum wage.

The "woe is me for having a shitty situation" few should not result in the government forcing money out of companies and redistributing it to people who haven't earned it. Got a shitty situation? That's why we have social programs to help people, take advantage of them. Those who didn't end up in that situation shouldn't have their employers forced to pay them more simply because some people make bad choices or end up in a shitty situation.

I feel like there's some misplaced anger in your post.

You've already established that the government is going to force money out of someone to redistribute it to 'people who haven't earned it'.  Why is it OK  (or better) to do this through social programs that tax payers are on the hook for, but unacceptable to do this through minimum wage values that companies are on the hook for?

Right now companies profit because the tax payer is handing money out directly to poor employees, so that the employees can accept jobs that are below the amount they need to live.  A change to minimum wage would mean that companies have to pay the true cost of hiring their employees, without effectively getting hand-outs from you and me.

I don't think that anyone is advocating for a princely living wage (I'm certainly not), just as you're not advocating for a princely government social program hand out.  But the need is not going away, and the money has to come from somewhere.  I don't see why my taxes should continue subsidizing cheap employers.

It's better because then we're only redistributing the money to people that need it, instead of to "everyone earning the same amount as people who need it". Therefore, we don't have to redistribute nearly as much. I certainly didn't need to earn a "living wage" as a fast-food cook at 16, even if the 30 year old cashier with 5 kids working with me would have significantly different needs. Why should we make that fast food restaurant pay both of us enough to cover the spending for an adult family with kids?

Companies profit because their costs are less than their earnings. That some of their employees take jobs that don't pay their bills is irrelevant, whether it's because those employees have decided to buy a house they can't afford or have a lifestyle they can't afford etc, is immaterial. It's not the company's job to make sure their employees can afford their lifestyle. It's the employee's responsibility to ensure they have a lifestyle they can afford with the income they have. If that's not what they're doing, then they need to go read MMM and figure out how to optimize their spending or they need to find a way to earn more. Forcing companies to pay some ridiculous "living wage" to everyone, regardless of their value to the company, is simply absurd to me though.


jlcnuke

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Do CEOs make an obscene amount of money? Yes, but I see it as a necessary evil of economic growth and robustness.

So, I don't see rich people as evil . . . but am confused when I see statements like this.

Do you believe that capping a CEOs salary at say, 9 million instead of 20 million would significantly hurt economic growth and robustness?  Or that it would hurt the bottom dollar of the company he (it's almost invariably a white guy) works for?  I'm not saying that the government should be involved in this process at all . . . it's just surprising that share holders stand for the salaries they way they are.

It would be shocking if paying a huge amount (but a little less than is currently the norm) really had any negative impact on the company . . . and even more so if it had an impact on the economy as a whole.

There's a finite number of people making huge salaries like that, and most CEO's will never see that kind of money. The ones that do, like professional athletes, get that kind of income because it is what is needed to keep them at your company instead of at your competitor, and you feel they bring that much value to the organization. Like NFL quarterbacks etc, some fail to produce while others shine. But it's the rarity of their particular skills and acumen that make them worth that to the organization in most cases. Apple would be a footnote in history if someone without Jobs' visionary thinking had been at the helm of the company, etc. The leadership of a company can burn it to the ground or propel it to amazing heights, and that's worth a lot of money, even if some people don't agree with it.

cloudsail

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Do CEOs make an obscene amount of money? Yes, but I see it as a necessary evil of economic growth and robustness.

So, I don't see rich people as evil . . . but am confused when I see statements like this.

Do you believe that capping a CEOs salary at say, 9 million instead of 20 million would significantly hurt economic growth and robustness?  Or that it would hurt the bottom dollar of the company he (it's almost invariably a white guy) works for?  I'm not saying that the government should be involved in this process at all . . . it's just surprising that share holders stand for the salaries they way they are.

It would be shocking if paying a huge amount (but a little less than is currently the norm) really had any negative impact on the company . . . and even more so if it had an impact on the economy as a whole.

I don't really have an opinion about whether or not CEO salaries should be capped, mostly because I don't think I know enough about the workings of large corporations to make an informed decision. I may think they make too much, but if I were called upon to decide on a cap and what it should be, I doubt it would be an easy decision. And anyway it isn't my decision to make, since I am not a major shareholder.

I just care that the government not try to involve themselves in this kind of thing. It is a very slippery slope.

jlcnuke

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Let me illustrate some of the problems with the "pay everyone a living wage" idea...

1. It's absurd to try and come up with a situation where one wage will be accepted as acceptable everywhere. What a 16 or 19 year old living for free with their parents in a LCOL area needs for an income to "live" is much different than what a single mother of 7 kids in a HCOL area needs. So where do you set the standard? Pay a 19 year old high school dropout with no ambition enough to support a family of 8 in a HCOL area? Make it a living wage for the kid living at home? (heck, our current min wage fits that criteria already). Some randomly chosen amount in-between the two? Probably the compromise that people would generally choose... or they'd tell us to make it based on everyone's individual situation..

2. So, if we make it based on their individual situation, then I'm only hiring the single, living at home people for my jobs that require no skills. Single mothers need not apply as I'm not paying more to get nothing more.

3. If we make it based on some random number, now I'm overpaying a bunch of people for no reason (they didn't need the extra pay, I'm just forced to give it to them), and we STILL have people out there not making a living wage... so we didn't even fix the problem, we just cut profitability of all companies, guaranteed for some to be enough to cause some that were scraping by to fail and put everyone that was working there out of work. So goody, some people are making more than they need or are worth, some people manage to get by and you can cancel their government welfare etc, and others still need the government welfare and some new people are now unemployed and need government welfare to help them out. 
So, we don't get rid of social programs, but we do put some businesses under, cause other businesses to do worse (negatively impacting the ability to reinvest in the business and grow it and prosper) - or alternatively I make up that difference by raising prices, thus increasing your cost of living and you didn't get a raise to offset it because you weren't poor enough, put some people out of work, and we've got 16 year old's flipping burgers for enough money to afford to buy a decent house and car.... I fail to see how that's better than letting the government tax some of our taxes to help out those in a bad spot, which, by the way, the overwhelming majority get out of as it is.
« Last Edit: April 16, 2019, 12:45:15 PM by jlcnuke »

BlueHouse

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It is not the government's or our employers responsibility to pay me what I think I need.  It is my personal responsibility to either find a way to earn enough to pay for what I want/need, or to adjust my lifestyle to be able to live within my earnings/pay. 

I agree with this.  However, when the wage is so low that even the government says it falls under the poverty line, then something is wrong.  Really wrong. 

Want to adjust the minimum wage?  Fine, but it needs to get done. 
The bottom line is that I don't think taxpayers should be paying for something that benefits employers. 
Let's assume for just a moment that the workers are going to be paid some amount that raises their income above the federal poverty level.  Who should pay for that?  The taxpayer or the business that needs the work done?  See that reframing?  I'm not blaming poor people for being poor.   

I wholeheartedly agree that there should be a free-market system, but it seems to me that without some oversight and regulation, the people with the power can take advantage and tip the odds in their favor.  That's what minimum wage is designed to do, but for some reason people vilify raising minimum wage.  The US Government should not be in the business of subsidizing company labor.  Period.  And that's what is happening. 

Income inequality is unsustainable 

gaja

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I can't watch the video right now, but its probably the same argument as Walmart, fast food etc.  I don't understand the concept that employers should have to make sure that you can pay all of your expenses.  Employment is at will for both the employee and employer in the US.  So if you don't want a job at the amount that they are willing to pay, then don't work there.

So major employers paying less than the living wage aren't taking advantage of their workers in your opinion? Don't you think that if those workers had any other options they'd work for an employer who clearly doesn't care about their welfare?

I think it's an absolute disgrace if employees can't afford a basic lifestyle while working one fulltime job. That should be enough to cover rent for a modest apartment, utilities, food, health insurance and yes, shock, even internet, phone etc, all those "luxuries" that are really necessities these days.

Also, as a tax payer I feel strongly that we shouldn't let CEO's and shareholders get away with burdening society instead of taking a pay cut themselves.

When I hire a painter to paint my house, I don't ask him how many kids he has or what kind of rent he pays.  I ask him how much he charges to paint the house.  If I disagree with the quote, I tell him I will pay X amount.  He can then decide to paint my house for X amount or not.  It also doesn't matter whether I make $20,000 a year or $20M when this negotiation takes place.  Employers are the same way.  The alternative is the major company decides that paying a "living wage" for a specific job is not worth it and they sub it out overseas for a quarter of the cost.  Now the employee has no job and $0 income.  Anyone who has an issue with the amount another person pays their employees is free to start their own business and pay said employees whatever their heart's content.

I think I have a ethical duty to pay decent wages when I can. We recently got new sidings, windows, and insulation on our house. When I asked for offers, they varied between $10 000 and $65 000. We did not choose the cheapest ones, but rather went for one in the middle who:
-priced their work including taxes
-had apprentices from local vocational school (you can't get this unless you have good standards for EHS)
-employed local people with all the necessary certificates
-used local materials of good quality

It cost more, and we had to wait for a year before they had time to do our house. But it was worth it; both in quality and peace of mind.
It is more difficult to do this quality control when I buy groceries, clothes or visit a restaurant. But I do try my best to avoid places that deny their employees tariff wage agreements, buy as much as possible second hand, and try to buy directly from the farmers when I can.


BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

TheContinentalOp

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The US Government should not be in the business of subsidizing company labor.  Period.  And that's what is happening. 

Income inequality is unsustainable

But we don't know that the gov't is subsidizing these companies. I made that point up thread.

GuitarStv

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BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

This is an interesting point.  Strong unions (and a large percentage of the work force covered by unions) are the free market solution to solving the problem we're discussing . . . yet most of the people against raising minimum wage tend to be against unions too.

TheContinentalOp

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BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

This is an interesting point.  Strong unions (and a large percentage of the work force covered by unions) are the free market solution to solving the problem we're discussing . . . yet most of the people against raising minimum wage tend to be against unions too.

Unions raise wages by restricting the supply of labor.  Immigration lowers wages by increasing the supply of labor...

Yet most of the people in favor of unions, tend to also be in favor of more immigration.

bluebelle

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I'll start out by prefacing this with "I've never had to live in the real world", by that I mean,  I went university more than 30 years ago, in Ontario, so I graduated with no student debt and started a job 2 weeks after I finished school, making more than my mother and almost as much as my father.  (I choose to get a computer science degree rather than a basket weaving degree - so, there's that).   By the end of my first full year of working, I wasn't short on cash, but couldn't account for a fair chunk of disposable income, and I started paying more attention to where the dollars were going. Still wasn't super smart, but at least was saving......I've never been out of work, or had a spouse out of work, I live in Canada, so I have 'free' health care (I put it in quotes, because I'm taxed pretty heavily).....
I know I don't want to live on minimum wage, but I also know we live in a free market economy.   If we force higher minimum wages, companies just get better and better at automating low skill work.  Think about it, 30 years ago, you had to pay for the privilege of on-line banking, now you pay if you don't.  Grocery stores have self checkout, gas stations have pay at the pump, ATMs are every where and bank branches are closing down.   More and more fast food restaurants have mobile apps for you to order - do you really think that's for your convenience?  No, they need fewer store employees - you're doing the work now. 
And what do we do with the next rung of wages if we raise minimum wage?  If, for example, minimum wage jumps from $11 to $14, as it did in Ontario more than a year ago, do you think the folks with a few years of experience that were making $14/hour suddenly got a $4/hr raise too?  Nope, and food prices at low end restaurants went up at a higher percentage than the high end places.

I resent the amount I pay in taxes, but it's because of the waste and stupidity I see in government, not the hand ups they could be giving.  I'm a fan of hand ups, not hand outs.....I am in favour of heavily subsidized, or even free day care for a working mom even if it costs more, rather than social assistance to let her stay home.  It breaks the cycle.

six-car-habit

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Question for JLCNuke or anyone with a military backround that doesn't believe in a minimum wage's usefullness -

Let me illustrate some of the problems with the "pay everyone a living wage" idea...

1. It's absurd to try and come up with a situation where one wage will be accepted as acceptable everywhere. What a 16 or 19 year old living for free with their parents in a LCOL area needs for an income to "live" is much different than what a single mother of 7 kids in a HCOL area needs. So where do you set the standard? Pay a 19 year old high school dropout with no ambition enough to support a family of 8 in a HCOL area? Make it a living wage for the kid living at home? (heck, our current min wage fits that criteria already). Some randomly chosen amount in-between the two? Probably the compromise that people would generally choose... or they'd tell us to make it based on everyone's individual situation..

2. So, if we make it based on their individual situation, then I'm only hiring the single, living at home people for my jobs that require no skills. Single mothers need not apply as I'm not paying more to get nothing more.


 I have some acquaintances with military backrounds , and it seems for the last several decades USA military / gov't policy has been to have a minimum wage for them. By this i mean E-1 designation, lowest paygrade. With time and demonstrated expanded competance, soldiers can move up the payscale.  But , the E-1 is effectively, a minimum wage. Officers, with more "people managing" responsibility, but not necessarily more technical competency than enilsted, make more $$  in O-1 grades and above.  Middle managers might be a decent civilian counterpart term .So another minimum wage for officers as well.

 More pay can be earned by having a higher technical skill level than average for the command- "pro-pay", or serving in a warzone 'tax free' , or simply being deployed away from homeport "sea pay".  The 2nd and 3rd of those also having a minimum $$ mount associated with them.

 Soldiers and sailors who were married were elegible for even more pay [ BHA basic housing allowance+ basic food allowance] so they could find appropriate housing for their families and not have to live on base in barracks, nor make their kids eat on base military food, bascially.  Where the single soldier was expected to live in a concrete building on base-  but the married soldier got his own yard and bathroom out of the deal usually. Add in the additional costs of the dependant wives/ husbands and children to the federal gov't [ taxes/ military budget] when you factor in the included health care. But both soldiers worked under the same job description, doing the same basic responsibilities.

This violates JLCNuke's rule # 2 from above....why would you employ anyone with dependents like the married soldier

  How did we get to a basic level of "socialistic" care for miltary workers ; minimum wage , providing for basic food + clothing needs, full service health care, etc - but not for the taxpayers / citizens ...?

Bloop Bloop

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It is not the government's or our employers responsibility to pay me what I think I need.  It is my personal responsibility to either find a way to earn enough to pay for what I want/need, or to adjust my lifestyle to be able to live within my earnings/pay. 

I get this sentiment and agree with it to a certain point . . . but we know that people don't always make the best choices.  Actually, it seems that the norm is to make the wrong choices.  Knowing this, what do you propose should happen with all the people who are unable to adjust their lifestyle to live within their earnings and unable to find a job that allows them to earn enough for what they need?

I would recommend the government provide extremely basic shelter and food to them so that they have the basics of living. Beyond that, it's up to them really.

jlcnuke

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Question for JLCNuke or anyone with a military backround that doesn't believe in a minimum wage's usefullness -

Let me illustrate some of the problems with the "pay everyone a living wage" idea...

1. It's absurd to try and come up with a situation where one wage will be accepted as acceptable everywhere. What a 16 or 19 year old living for free with their parents in a LCOL area needs for an income to "live" is much different than what a single mother of 7 kids in a HCOL area needs. So where do you set the standard? Pay a 19 year old high school dropout with no ambition enough to support a family of 8 in a HCOL area? Make it a living wage for the kid living at home? (heck, our current min wage fits that criteria already). Some randomly chosen amount in-between the two? Probably the compromise that people would generally choose... or they'd tell us to make it based on everyone's individual situation..

2. So, if we make it based on their individual situation, then I'm only hiring the single, living at home people for my jobs that require no skills. Single mothers need not apply as I'm not paying more to get nothing more.


 I have some acquaintances with military backrounds , and it seems for the last several decades USA military / gov't policy has been to have a minimum wage for them. By this i mean E-1 designation, lowest paygrade. With time and demonstrated expanded competance, soldiers can move up the payscale.  But , the E-1 is effectively, a minimum wage. Officers, with more "people managing" responsibility, but not necessarily more technical competency than enilsted, make more $$  in O-1 grades and above.  Middle managers might be a decent civilian counterpart term .So another minimum wage for officers as well.

 More pay can be earned by having a higher technical skill level than average for the command- "pro-pay", or serving in a warzone 'tax free' , or simply being deployed away from homeport "sea pay".  The 2nd and 3rd of those also having a minimum $$ mount associated with them.

 Soldiers and sailors who were married were elegible for even more pay [ BHA basic housing allowance+ basic food allowance] so they could find appropriate housing for their families and not have to live on base in barracks, nor make their kids eat on base military food, bascially.  Where the single soldier was expected to live in a concrete building on base-  but the married soldier got his own yard and bathroom out of the deal usually. Add in the additional costs of the dependant wives/ husbands and children to the federal gov't [ taxes/ military budget] when you factor in the included health care. But both soldiers worked under the same job description, doing the same basic responsibilities.

This violates JLCNuke's rule # 2 from above....why would you employ anyone with dependents like the married soldier

  How did we get to a basic level of "socialistic" care for miltary workers ; minimum wage , providing for basic food + clothing needs, full service health care, etc - but not for the taxpayers / citizens ...?
Yes, the military is engaged in social engineering. The minimum wage is also way below the US minimum wage btw, as there is no hourly or overtime pay for an E-1, but they don't work a 40 hour week.

That the US government does this stuff, doesn't mean it would work or should be acceptable in the civilian world (or really if it should be acceptable anywhere).

As for how we got there.. well, it takes some work to convince people to risk their lives for crap pay, ridiculous hours, shit quality of living and work/life balance, etc. To get people to give up the rights that most citizens have necessitates giving them some incentives....

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk
« Last Edit: April 16, 2019, 06:39:10 PM by jlcnuke »

partgypsy

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I've always found these discussions extremely interesting. I get the idea of a "living wage" it makes conceptual sense to me, I guess there are differing definitions of what one means by living wage. I also think the circumstances one is in are an interesting caveat. Obviously it seems harsh to say that a single mother of one "put herself in that situation" as clearly it takes two to make a baby,

So, how would one feel if Republicans get their way and pass legislation making abortion illegal if say you can hear a heartbeat? It means a woman even if she or her partner used protection and it failed, would be forced to carry the pregnancy. And I know from personal situations even when the woman intends to give up the child for adoption, cannot. But it sounds like even though her ability to terminate the pregnancy is prevented by government, the government, and the posters feel the woman, soley, is responsible for all external costs? Doesn't sound too fair to me.

The fact is, a woman might be raising a child solo for all sorts of reasons, including that the father abandoned her and the child at any point after conception. There are some things out of one's control, including at times, being a single parent. These judgements seem uncharacteristically harsh for this internet community.

partgypsy

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Question for JLCNuke or anyone with a military backround that doesn't believe in a minimum wage's usefullness -

Let me illustrate some of the problems with the "pay everyone a living wage" idea...

1. It's absurd to try and come up with a situation where one wage will be accepted as acceptable everywhere. What a 16 or 19 year old living for free with their parents in a LCOL area needs for an income to "live" is much different than what a single mother of 7 kids in a HCOL area needs. So where do you set the standard? Pay a 19 year old high school dropout with no ambition enough to support a family of 8 in a HCOL area? Make it a living wage for the kid living at home? (heck, our current min wage fits that criteria already). Some randomly chosen amount in-between the two? Probably the compromise that people would generally choose... or they'd tell us to make it based on everyone's individual situation..

2. So, if we make it based on their individual situation, then I'm only hiring the single, living at home people for my jobs that require no skills. Single mothers need not apply as I'm not paying more to get nothing more.


 I have some acquaintances with military backrounds , and it seems for the last several decades USA military / gov't policy has been to have a minimum wage for them. By this i mean E-1 designation, lowest paygrade. With time and demonstrated expanded competance, soldiers can move up the payscale.  But , the E-1 is effectively, a minimum wage. Officers, with more "people managing" responsibility, but not necessarily more technical competency than enilsted, make more $$  in O-1 grades and above.  Middle managers might be a decent civilian counterpart term .So another minimum wage for officers as well.

 More pay can be earned by having a higher technical skill level than average for the command- "pro-pay", or serving in a warzone 'tax free' , or simply being deployed away from homeport "sea pay".  The 2nd and 3rd of those also having a minimum $$ mount associated with them.

 Soldiers and sailors who were married were elegible for even more pay [ BHA basic housing allowance+ basic food allowance] so they could find appropriate housing for their families and not have to live on base in barracks, nor make their kids eat on base military food, bascially.  Where the single soldier was expected to live in a concrete building on base-  but the married soldier got his own yard and bathroom out of the deal usually. Add in the additional costs of the dependant wives/ husbands and children to the federal gov't [ taxes/ military budget] when you factor in the included health care. But both soldiers worked under the same job description, doing the same basic responsibilities.

This violates JLCNuke's rule # 2 from above....why would you employ anyone with dependents like the married soldier

  How did we get to a basic level of "socialistic" care for miltary workers ; minimum wage , providing for basic food + clothing needs, full service health care, etc - but not for the taxpayers / citizens ...?
Yes, the military is engaged in social engineering. The minimum wage is also way below the US minimum wage btw, as there is no hourly or overtime pay for an E-1, but they don't work a 40 hour week.

That the US government does this stuff, doesn't mean it would work or should be acceptable in the civilian world (or really if it should be acceptable anywhere).

As for how we got there.. well, it takes some work to convince people to risk their lives for crap pay, ridiculous hours, shit quality of living and work/life balance, etc. To get people to give up the rights that most citizens have necessitates giving them some incentives....

Sent from my SM-G965U using Tapatalk

yes, but military have their housing and food, clothing etc provided to them. After they are discharged they are eligible for benefits not available to civilians. Comparing a GI's pay with a civilian pay (or life) doesn't make sense.
« Last Edit: April 17, 2019, 06:18:36 AM by partgypsy »

cloudsail

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This violates JLCNuke's rule # 2 from above....why would you employ anyone with dependents like the married soldier

  How did we get to a basic level of "socialistic" care for miltary workers ; minimum wage , providing for basic food + clothing needs, full service health care, etc - but not for the taxpayers / citizens ...?

Because we don't have enough people wanting to be soldiers, that's why.

You employ the dude with dependents because there aren't a hundred other civilians lined up behind him all wanting to enlist.

Again, supply vs demand.

GuitarStv

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BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

This is an interesting point.  Strong unions (and a large percentage of the work force covered by unions) are the free market solution to solving the problem we're discussing . . . yet most of the people against raising minimum wage tend to be against unions too.

Unions raise wages by restricting the supply of labor.  Immigration lowers wages by increasing the supply of labor...

Yet most of the people in favor of unions, tend to also be in favor of more immigration.

I'm not sure that I agree with your initial assumptions there.  Specifically, the focus on restricting supply of labour.

Unions restrict flow of labour via strikes in order to negotiate better terms.  Restricting a flow of labour isn't where their power lies, their power lies in organizing a group of otherwise powerless employees.

Immigration as a whole significantly helps Canada's economy, not by providing an increased supply of labour and lowering wages but by providing skilled workers for jobs that otherwise couldn't be filled.  While I support allowing people to seek asylum in our country for humanitarian reasons, I don't know anyone who is heartily in favour of unrestricted/unvetted immigration.

MySpaghettiFork

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If you're a company benefiting from an employee's full-time labor, then you have a responsibility to pay that person enough so that the government is not subsidizing your business.

It astounds me that anyone would see the employee as the problem instead of the employer, who is clearly gaming the system to get cheap labor, while the taxpayers are picking up the bill. 

This is gold.

Bloop Bloop

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Let's say a company pays workers $7 an hour and you think it's not a liveable wage. You want the company to pay $12/hour which you say is a liveable wage for, say, a single parent. (Arbitrary numbers used - just bear with me.)

There are two ways to proceed from here:
1. Force all companies to pay $12/hour, even to workers who don't need that sort of money (because they are in a LCOL area or are single), in order to be generous to single parents in HCOL areas who need that money.

2. Allow companies to pay $7 an hour, put give between $0-$5/hour in welfare to those who are in HCOL areas and/or larger families to tide them over so that they can have a frugal standard of living.

You might say that option 2 causes all taxpayers to have to fork out between $0-$5/hour per affected employee in welfare benefits. And that is correct. There is a cost to society of having a low minimum wage, and that cost is higher welfare spending.

But there is also a cost to society in option 1 - where everyone gets paid $12/hour:

(a) Some people whose skills are worth, say, $5-$7/hour and who therefore might be accommodated under the $7/hour min wage will lose their jobs and go onto complete welfare under a higher min wage.

(b) Everyone whose present job pays between $7 - $12/hour will find the real value of their income diminished. Either that, or their income will go up as a flow-on effect, which just leads to inflation which devalues everyone's income.

(c) Raising labour prices also has an effect on business profits. It is likely this will lead to higher prices for goods/services - especially at the cheap end of the market.

(d) Even if somehow companies magically accommodated a higher min wage without any flow-on effect to the price of goods, lower profits = lower share performance and lower tax on profits, which then affects everyone else in society, directly or indirectly, and causes lower revenue.

So, out of option 1 and option 2, both have a societal cost. You can't just say that a higher minimum wage will magically be absorbed by the companies - because even if it was, the boosting of a min wage has an inflationary effect on everyone else in society.

Steeze

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I would say that if you hire an employee full time that employee should not qualify for any government benefits. The requires the threshold for benefits to decrease or income to increase.

Minimum standards for living to me means a family has at least 1 room, a bathroom, kitchen, minimal food budget to purchase 2000 calories of rice and vegetables per person per day, clean water, access to public education, basic medicine, and preventative care. Cars, phones, TVs, vacation, new clothes and everything else is not required. Keep disabled, children, and elderly from starvation and living on the street. Everyone else should fend for themselves.

In NYC we have 15$/hr minimum wage. If you have 2 full time jobs washing dishes you are clearing 60k a year. Not bad in my opinion, and definitely livable.

I don’t agree that heathy able bodied people are somehow entitled to a certain standard of living. Sure if you are disabled, elderly or a child society should step in, but if you just don’t want to work or don’t want two jobs? Tough for you.

I also think it’s rediculous to think people are entitled to live in certain areas. Should NYC, Seattle, or San Francisco be required to house very poor people within their city limits? Why is this necessary when there are so many dying cities with high vacancy rates and cheap housing?  You want to be a ward of the city or state you should be up for relocating. If you want to live in the most desirable places in the country you should have to work for it, and work hard for it.

I sometimes walk through the projects when I am walking to job sites here. Every time I see a 20 or 30 something man smoking weed and drinking at 11am it makes me want to scream. What a waste. Society owes that man nothing.


Kyle Schuant

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Most who don't want to see more social programs have no actual problem with the social programs in those countries. They just don't want to have to pay higher taxes to fund them.
The US spends 18.7% of its GDP on social welfare, Australia 17.8%.

The US is spending 18.7% of a USDD59.531 per capita GDP, or USD11,132 per capita.
Australia is spending 17.8% of a USD53,800 per capita GDP, or USD9,576 per capita.

As with US healthcare spending compared to other countries, it is plain there are inefficiencies, since other countries pay less and have better outcomes. So it's not clear that paying higher taxes is actually necessary to fund better programmes.

SachaFiscal

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I did a search on Craigslist and found that most 1 bedroom apartments in Irvine are over $1700.  In surrounding areas it looks like most are over $1500.  So getting a cheaper apartment may not be possible for her.  Plus there are the costs of moving.  I can't imagine how I would make it work on that much money either.  I mean, how does she afford childcare, and food, and car maintenance, etc....

She basically has to give up her kid for adoption, or find a partner who makes the same amount to live with and help support her and her kid.  In other words, it's impossible to be a single parent in Irvine and survive on that salary.

I don't think asking the CEO of a company to pay its employees more is going to work though. He's not going to ask to be payed less and ask to give that money to the lowest paid employees.  His greed is part of what got him into that position in the first place.  People who would like the minimum wage to be increased to a living wage need to vote for people who will make that happen, or if it's possible to pass a minimum wage increase through a proposition, do that.  That means they have to pay attention to their local and state politics and hold their politicians accountable. When the wealth gap increases enough that there are enough people not able to survive on their salaries to swing the vote in their favor, then maybe things will turn around.

Right now I think people are just going into debt to survive so they aren't yet squeezed enough to actually take the time to vote for people/policies that would help them.


« Last Edit: April 16, 2019, 10:08:45 PM by SachaFiscal »

market timer

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Not Jamie Dimon's responsibility. I'd vote for universal basic income as a solution, like what Andrew Yang is proposing.

former player

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Not Jamie Dimon's responsibility. I'd vote for universal basic income as a solution, like what Andrew Yang is proposing.

Whether or not it's his responsibility, the Congresswoman did succeed in making me wonder in what way he was clever enough to be earning his $30m a year.

accolay

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The company isn't burdening anyone with anything.

Yeah sure, most workers earning minimum wage can just walk and find something paying better. This side of the argument I think comes from those who have been far removed from doing bottom of the barrel shitty jobs, or don't actually realize that their circumstances could possibly be a little more exceptional than the average Joe-bag-of-donuts. There will always be outliers- the people who don't want to work - but that's really the exception.

And I'm not sure why everybody has to try to reinvent the wheel for this discussion. People study this shit:
http://livingwage.mit.edu/

Companies are allowed to burden tax payers all the time. Just look at the new tax law and how many fortune 500 companies paid nothing, and how much our debt and deficit are increasing. If a company doesn't pay someone enough to afford the basic necessities of life, tax payers get to subsidize the workers. And it's not just shitty pay that these companies get away with. It's also cutting hours so the worker either doesn't qualify for benefits or they offer shitty benefits. And then we can subsidize them again when they get to old and sick to work any more. I'm going to guess that those who only make $15-20k per year aren't really going to save a whole lot and are planning on Social Security as a retirement plan.

Regarding the US Military- Not too long ago a lot of military members would qualify for food stamps. I guess we could argue that it's not the governments (their employer's) responsibility to make sure they are payed well, but then again if you have an all volunteer fighting force you probably want to make sure they have something to fight for.

ETA: I think Costco is a good example of a living wage paying company. When you pay your workers better, you'll get better, more loyal harder working employees who will stick around. Convince me why Walmart can't follow that model.
« Last Edit: April 17, 2019, 04:23:51 AM by accolay »

twbird18

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Most who don't want to see more social programs have no actual problem with the social programs in those countries. They just don't want to have to pay higher taxes to fund them.
The US spends 18.7% of its GDP on social welfare, Australia 17.8%.

The US is spending 18.7% of a USDD59.531 per capita GDP, or USD11,132 per capita.
Australia is spending 17.8% of a USD53,800 per capita GDP, or USD9,576 per capita.

As with US healthcare spending compared to other countries, it is plain there are inefficiencies, since other countries pay less and have better outcomes. So it's not clear that paying higher taxes is actually necessary to fund better programmes.

We are very inefficient with our use of money. I'd argue that we waste too much of it on bureaucracy instead of the people that it's meant to help. The major difference between the U.S. and most countries that provide all of these things(whatever you're concerned about) is the number of people. We have so many more people and thus have developed all these crazy layers to administer all these programs. Also, people have some kind of feel bad over giving out money so they don't want to do it. For instance, we could eliminate veteran's assistance programs by just giving everyone a 6-figure payout when they get out of the service. It would be cheaper (assuming we had universal healthcare & didn't need to provide those services anymore). The general public feels better that I get educational assistance, small business loan assistance, home loan assistance, whatever. They feel bad about the idea that I could work for 6 years and then get a giant payout. I am not advocating that we get rid of the VA, just making an example of something I'm familiar with.


[I'm a veteran. I had a degree when I went in. I earned my M.B.A. while I was in. I have since earned 3 more degrees with my GI bill just to get the housing allowance. The government has spent well over $250K giving me benefits. I did a bunch of math one time figuring out how much money they've paid me plus what I'll probably get in the future. My partner is also a veteran on disability. I could be retired already haha]

TheContinentalOp

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BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

This is an interesting point.  Strong unions (and a large percentage of the work force covered by unions) are the free market solution to solving the problem we're discussing . . . yet most of the people against raising minimum wage tend to be against unions too.

Unions raise wages by restricting the supply of labor.  Immigration lowers wages by increasing the supply of labor...

Yet most of the people in favor of unions, tend to also be in favor of more immigration.

I'm not sure that I agree with your initial assumptions there.  Specifically, the focus on restricting supply of labour.

Unions restrict flow of labour via strikes in order to negotiate better terms.  Restricting a flow of labour isn't where their power lies, their power lies in organizing a group of otherwise powerless employees.

Immigration as a whole significantly helps Canada's economy, not by providing an increased supply of labour and lowering wages but by providing skilled workers for jobs that otherwise couldn't be filled.  While I support allowing people to seek asylum in our country for humanitarian reasons, I don't know anyone who is heartily in favour of unrestricted/unvetted immigration.

Restricting labor supply is exactly how unions work. (And I'm not saying that's a bad thing). You're a developer and want to construct a building or your a car manufacturer. You'd like to bring in folks who don't currently have a job and pay them a lot less (to save money and because their productivity is lower), but the union won't let you. You can only hire from the smaller number of union members who demand higher wages.

I can't speak for Canada, but in the US, employers use Legal Guest Worker programs (H1-B, H2-A, etc.) to increase the labor supply to avoid having to pay higher wages.

As for Open Borders, the Libertarians/Cato/Reason/Kochs are all for unfettered immigration. The Democrats current stance seems to be Anti-Anti-Open Borders. They aren't explicitly for Open Borders, but they're against any measures to effectively enforce them. The Republican Elite combined with the Chamber of Commerce types are all for the status quo where millions of immigrants (legal and illegal) continue to depress wages for US citizens.

TheContinentalOp

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I would say that if you hire an employee full time that employee should not qualify for any government benefits. The requires the threshold for benefits to decrease or income to increase.

What's a government benefit?

Social Security?
MediCare?
K-12 Public Schooling?
Garbage Collection?
Fire Department?

gaja

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BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

This is an interesting point.  Strong unions (and a large percentage of the work force covered by unions) are the free market solution to solving the problem we're discussing . . . yet most of the people against raising minimum wage tend to be against unions too.

Unions raise wages by restricting the supply of labor.  Immigration lowers wages by increasing the supply of labor...

Yet most of the people in favor of unions, tend to also be in favor of more immigration.

I'm not sure that I agree with your initial assumptions there.  Specifically, the focus on restricting supply of labour.

Unions restrict flow of labour via strikes in order to negotiate better terms.  Restricting a flow of labour isn't where their power lies, their power lies in organizing a group of otherwise powerless employees.

Immigration as a whole significantly helps Canada's economy, not by providing an increased supply of labour and lowering wages but by providing skilled workers for jobs that otherwise couldn't be filled.  While I support allowing people to seek asylum in our country for humanitarian reasons, I don't know anyone who is heartily in favour of unrestricted/unvetted immigration.

Restricting labor supply is exactly how unions work in the US. (And I'm not saying that's a bad thing). You're a developer and want to construct a building or your a car manufacturer. You'd like to bring in folks who don't currently have a job and pay them a lot less (to save money and because their productivity is lower), but the union won't let you. You can only hire from the smaller number of union members who demand higher wages.


fixed that for you

Steeze

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I would say that if you hire an employee full time that employee should not qualify for any government benefits. The requires the threshold for benefits to decrease or income to increase.

What's a government benefit?

Social Security?
MediCare?
K-12 Public Schooling?
Garbage Collection?
Fire Department?

Fair point, I mean specifically those afforded to only those with low income such as subsidized housing, food stamps, etc. My point being that either the minimum wage is adequate and the threshold for these welfare programs is too high, or the minimum wage is inadequate and the threshold is ok. You shouldn’t be able to work full time and still qualify for these programs. If you can work full time at the federal minimum wage and still qualify for federal subsidies then the program is designed to benefit the employer. One or the other has to change.

TheContinentalOp

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I would say that if you hire an employee full time that employee should not qualify for any government benefits. The requires the threshold for benefits to decrease or income to increase.

What's a government benefit?

Social Security?
MediCare?
K-12 Public Schooling?
Garbage Collection?
Fire Department?

Fair point, I mean specifically those afforded to only those with low income such as subsidized housing, food stamps, etc. My point being that either the minimum wage is adequate and the threshold for these welfare programs is too high, or the minimum wage is inadequate and the threshold is ok. You shouldn’t be able to work full time and still qualify for these programs. If you can work full time at the federal minimum wage and still qualify for federal subsidies then the program is designed to benefit the employer. One or the other has to change.

Maybe.

The initial reason these benefits were made available to full-time workers, was because workers faced a steep marginal rate if the took a job and lost all their benefits. If you're getting $1100/mo (Numbers made up for illustrative purposes only) in benefits and then take a $1300/mo job but lose the benefits then you're effectively working 40 hours a week for $200/mo.

Now it is possible in the absence of these gov't benefits that employers would have to raise wages to attract workers, and if that's the case then these programs are a subsidy.

But it's also possible that they'd still be able to fill these positions without raising wages, and in that case it's not a subsidy.

Until we know the answer to that question, it's impossible to determine if these benefits are a subsidy to employers.

former player

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BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

This is an interesting point.  Strong unions (and a large percentage of the work force covered by unions) are the free market solution to solving the problem we're discussing . . . yet most of the people against raising minimum wage tend to be against unions too.

Unions raise wages by restricting the supply of labor.  Immigration lowers wages by increasing the supply of labor...

Yet most of the people in favor of unions, tend to also be in favor of more immigration.

I'm not sure that I agree with your initial assumptions there.  Specifically, the focus on restricting supply of labour.

Unions restrict flow of labour via strikes in order to negotiate better terms.  Restricting a flow of labour isn't where their power lies, their power lies in organizing a group of otherwise powerless employees.

Immigration as a whole significantly helps Canada's economy, not by providing an increased supply of labour and lowering wages but by providing skilled workers for jobs that otherwise couldn't be filled.  While I support allowing people to seek asylum in our country for humanitarian reasons, I don't know anyone who is heartily in favour of unrestricted/unvetted immigration.

Restricting labor supply is exactly how unions work. (And I'm not saying that's a bad thing). You're a developer and want to construct a building or your a car manufacturer. You'd like to bring in folks who don't currently have a job and pay them a lot less (to save money and because their productivity is lower), but the union won't let you. You can only hire from the smaller number of union members who demand higher wages.

I can't speak for Canada, but in the US, employers use Legal Guest Worker programs (H1-B, H2-A, etc.) to increase the labor supply to avoid having to pay higher wages.

As for Open Borders, the Libertarians/Cato/Reason/Kochs are all for unfettered immigration. The Democrats current stance seems to be Anti-Anti-Open Borders. They aren't explicitly for Open Borders, but they're against any measures to effectively enforce them. The Republican Elite combined with the Chamber of Commerce types are all for the status quo where millions of immigrants (legal and illegal) continue to depress wages for US citizens.


Funny how it's always the case that people arguing against trade unions -

1) assume that "trades union" inevitably means a closed shop system, and

2) use examples such as building labourers and heavy manufacturing shop floor workers, rather than, oh lets just say, doctors.

TheContinentalOp

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BTW; the Nordics don't have minimum wages. Instead, the unions are very strong, and negotiate tariff wages with the employers' unions. In sectors where the unions are less strong (or more commonly; where we have a lot of foreigners working), the unions and government can decide to use the tariffs as a minimum wage standard. So if you really dislike the government raising the minimum wages, maybe it is an idea to give more power to the unions? (:D)

This is an interesting point.  Strong unions (and a large percentage of the work force covered by unions) are the free market solution to solving the problem we're discussing . . . yet most of the people against raising minimum wage tend to be against unions too.

Unions raise wages by restricting the supply of labor.  Immigration lowers wages by increasing the supply of labor...

Yet most of the people in favor of unions, tend to also be in favor of more immigration.

I'm not sure that I agree with your initial assumptions there.  Specifically, the focus on restricting supply of labour.

Unions restrict flow of labour via strikes in order to negotiate better terms.  Restricting a flow of labour isn't where their power lies, their power lies in organizing a group of otherwise powerless employees.

Immigration as a whole significantly helps Canada's economy, not by providing an increased supply of labour and lowering wages but by providing skilled workers for jobs that otherwise couldn't be filled.  While I support allowing people to seek asylum in our country for humanitarian reasons, I don't know anyone who is heartily in favour of unrestricted/unvetted immigration.

Restricting labor supply is exactly how unions work. (And I'm not saying that's a bad thing). You're a developer and want to construct a building or your a car manufacturer. You'd like to bring in folks who don't currently have a job and pay them a lot less (to save money and because their productivity is lower), but the union won't let you. You can only hire from the smaller number of union members who demand higher wages.

I can't speak for Canada, but in the US, employers use Legal Guest Worker programs (H1-B, H2-A, etc.) to increase the labor supply to avoid having to pay higher wages.

As for Open Borders, the Libertarians/Cato/Reason/Kochs are all for unfettered immigration. The Democrats current stance seems to be Anti-Anti-Open Borders. They aren't explicitly for Open Borders, but they're against any measures to effectively enforce them. The Republican Elite combined with the Chamber of Commerce types are all for the status quo where millions of immigrants (legal and illegal) continue to depress wages for US citizens.


Funny how it's always the case that people arguing against trade unions -

1) assume that "trades union" inevitably means a closed shop system, and

2) use examples such as building labourers and heavy manufacturing shop floor workers, rather than, oh lets just say, doctors.

Oh, I am totally against the way the AMA restricts the supply of medical care in the US. Laws should be changed to allow NPs and PAs to do a lot more. I think most occupational licensing regimes should be abolished.

Papa bear

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So I went back to re-listen to this.  Most of the arguments here in the thread are about minimum wage.  Her gross income is 35,070 per annum.  The congresswoman estimated withholdings (probably taxes, healthcare, etc) to get net of 29,100 per annum.

Her gross salary of 35,070 is 16.86/hour.  This is quoted in the video as a basic,
No skill, right out of high school job. This is already well above minimum wage AND higher than what is proposed in many areas.

The arguments on this thread are about minimum wage.  A national minimum wage above 16.86/ hour would have some nasty unintended consequences.  Hell, RN starting hourly wages aren’t that far off from this number.  And that is a degreed position. 

This is nuts. The employee needs MMM. 

Plus, what jobs can you name that actually pay minimum wage?  I can’t think of many outside of cashier in restaurant or retail.  Labor jobs pay better.  Warehousing pays better. Delivery drivers pay better.  Cleaning services pay better.  Bussing and waiting end up paying better after tips. 

What is a minimum wage job? 


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Bloop Bloop

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$35k USD a year ($50k AUD per year) is more than what I spend each year on expenses - it's about even if I include imputed rent - which is ridiculous because I make way more than the person who is the topic of this thread. And I could identify a million ways to cut my expenses, if I was earning such a modest hourly rate that I wasn't willing to pay for convenience (because it didn't make financial sense).

If you can't budget properly don't ask the state to help. Sort your own shit out.

 

Wow, a phone plan for fifteen bucks!