Kerry/Democrat Economic Proposals...

[Dr. Tom 0]

An increase in minimum wage would not increase in layoffs. I have no basis in economics, but it seems that most places that actually pay minimum wage are service jobs (McDonalds, convience stores, shops etc.) and small buisnesses. Naturally, you can't outsource these types of jobs, so it really wouldn't.

No, you can't outsource those jobs, but small businesses have set budgets for employees that they can't exceed. Asking them to soak up a sizable raise in the minimum wage means people (usually young, and often minorities) will be laid off or fired because their boss simply can't afford them anymore.

 

We'll use a real, if simplified, scenario. Let's say you own a small business, something service-oriented. You're open 12 hours a day every day of the week, and you need at least two employees working at all times. Figure you'll have three working at times to cover breaks, handle busy periods, etc, and we'll say you use 200 man-hours per week. Let's also assume you pay your employees between $5.15 and $6.00 per hour, and they tend to be high-school kids working their first or second job. Your budget for these employees is about $1100 per week. (This doesn't include management, whom we'll presume to be a fairly fixed cost, and well above minimum wage besides.)

 

Now the minimum wage becomes $7 per hour. You still have the same $1100 weekly budget for these employees. Now, however, that $1100 only buys you 157 man-hours. You're missing 43 hours of coverage that you were missing before. This also means you can't have two employees working all the times your store is open, since that would be 168 m-h. So you now have several options:

 

1. Raise your prices to reflect the increased min wage and keep all your workers.

2. Lay off/fire some employees and keep the rest, and keep your prices the same, forcing you into the 157 m-h/week model.

3. Lay off/fire some employees and keep the rest, and keep your prices the same. Have management or yourself cover some of the gaps in coverage, since it doesn't add to your expenses.

 

The benefit of #1 is that you can keep all your employees. You'll also be making more profit on the items you sell, increasing your budget to be able to pay those employees. They'll have to take some reduced hours for a while, but it should be all good after that. The problem, though, is that some customers won't want to pay the increased prices. Small businesses can't compete favorably with large corporations in terms of pricing, anyway, and this would just further hamper you. If your sales fell by 15% after this, you'd be no better off than you were before.

 

The benefit of #2 is that you don't raise prices, so you'll retain your customers. On that count, at least: the downside is that your coverage is stretched very thin. Customers won't get the same level of service they're used to. Lines will be longer, and waits will be more frequent. This could drive some customers to places where they won't have to wait. The other downside is obviously that you've fired some young people and turned them loose on a job market that doesn't want to pay them $7 per hour for menial labor.

 

The benfit of #3 is the same as #2. Since you and your manager are fillin in the coverage gaps, your service level shouldn't fall off very much at all. Of course, this makes the manager do work s/he really isn't there to do, and takes him away from the work he actually is supposed to be doing. And being made to do min-wage jobs for a couple hours a day might make your manager quit, an added drawback on top of #2. Then you're really in a bind. The drawback about firing kids is the same.

 

So it's really not as simple as saying that layoffs wouldn't increase because the minimum wage went up. Big companies could take the hit. Small businesses... not so much.

[Dr. Tom 0]

The mom and pop places still have a solution, though. Pay under the table.

True, that's an option, but I was working from the presumption that business owners would seek legal alternatives. Especially small business owners, who don't have the wealth and legal might of a large corporation behind them. Besides, all it takes is one disgruntled former employee to spill the beans, and you'll find the feds will kick that door in right quick.

 

I didn't say it should be. Seven bucks an hour still isn't enough to really live on, anyway.

By yourself? No. But if you're still in school and live with your parents, it's fine. No one should have to work a $7 an hour job past college, anyway. And even those who don't go to college can get skill training to ensure they're not going to be making peanuts.

[Guest Cerebus]

Er...I meant outsourcing not layoffs. My bad.

[Guest MikeSC]

Wait.. doesn't giving more money to people allow them to spend more, helping the economy?

 

or am I confusing this with the "Massive Tax Cut" debate?

Rob, apparently you're confusing the gov't not confiscating more of our money than they deserve with the gov't forcing employers to pay more for labor than it is worth.

-=Mike

...Again, the gov't doesn't own a dime --- they steal it from the populace...

[Jobber of the Week 0]

Nope, it isn't a straw man.

You made it sound like if Kerry doesn't 100% outlaw all outsourcing, then he shouldn't be talking about it. Nobody is going to make outsourcing illegal for obvious reasons.

[Jobber of the Week 0]

It hasn't been raised since 1997?!

Why should it be? Why should companies be forced to pay increasingly MORE money for a job that CLEARLY is not WORTH the minimum wage?

-=Mike

Because the prices of stuff have gone up?

 

I don't know about you on the East Coast, Mike, but over here in California, I'm TIRED of the illegals getting more and more work because the only price the bosses are willing to pay is the absolute cheapest.

 

You know how they say the illegals are only doing jobs no citizen would want to do? That's just not true. Some time ago, all that work in the fields used to be done by second-generation latino Americans, and they did get enough money to make ends meet. Then, at the beginning of one season, people were told they had to work for the lower price the illegals do if they want to keep their job. That money wasn't enough to make a living. And so now the illegals do that work.

 

Americans, even low-end ones, shouldn't be having to fight to survive even on a low end job. I don't mind the illegals having to struggle to keep their finances together because they shouldn't even be here in the first place. If wages remain too low to make an acceptable living in the US, then people who live in the US won't want that job, and the illegals and their friends will win again.

[teke184 0]

This isn't going to help Kerry in some battleground states, especially Louisiana.

 

Cleo Fields (D-Baton Rouge) of the Louisiana House has been trying to get a law passed through that would make Louisiana's minimum wage PERMANENTLY $1.00 to $1.50 above the nationally-mandated minimum wage. ("Permanently" as in the state will have a new minimum wage of $8 if Kerry gets his way and rases the national minimum wage to $7).

 

Needless to say, this subject has been under a LOT of debate recently, with the current feeling being that Cleo knows he doesn't have a hope in Hell of getting it passed and is trying to ingratiate himself to his constituents in poor North Baton Rouge while pissing off some of the constituents of other representatives fighting him on the subject.

 

Most people speaking on the subject besides Cleo bring up a lot of the arguments listed previously, which are that small businesses take it up the ass when the minimum wage gets raised and either someone loses their job or the business suffers, which is the exact OPPOSITE of what someone needs to be doing in an economy that is supposedly the worst since the Depression according to some.

 

 

Considering that this bill seems to be panned by a vast majority of LA representatives and LA *IS* a battle-ground state in this election, I think Kerry may have just stepped in a giant mess.

[NoCalMike 0]

The worth of a job has no baring on what the company pays. The CEO's quite frankly don't give a damn what the guys in the factories make, as long as their pockets are full. Do you honestly think Mr. Shareholder cares if Johnny Assembly line is struggling with his rent for this family? Come on now. Shareholders and CEOs don't give two shits about assesing any value into anything besides what can put more money in their own pockets.

 

Just witness what is going on in third world countries with labor violations abroad, and you certainly will see how much concern these corporate con artitsts feel "minium wage jobs" are worth.

[AndrewTS 0]

Nope, it isn't a straw man.

You made it sound like if Kerry doesn't 100% outlaw all outsourcing, then he shouldn't be talking about it. Nobody is going to make outsourcing illegal for obvious reasons.

Well, what I meant and what you thought I meant were totally different things. I meant if he's going to bring it up, he should actually discuss what he would do about it.

 

Instead, he seems to dismiss it as an evil without any positive effects and wants to get rid of it. If he truly believes it is such a major problem, I'd think he'd have *something* to say about what could be done about it.

 

Of course, he probably just wants to cite it as a problem, and since Bush is president, he wants voters to automatically connect the two, as if cause-effect.

[Guest TheZsaszHorsemen]

Why not make it $100/hour? That's MORE fair, correct? What makes $100/hour ridiculous --- but $7/hour isn't?"

 

Um..93 dollars? Seven bucks is a gross of $280 in a week, full-time. A hair over a thousand a month (not including what taxes takes out), that's enough for shitty rent, meager food, and a shitty conveyance for a single person with a lousy job. That's fair, and what minimum wage jobs are worth.

 

I hope that quote's just out of context from the rest of what Rush was trying to say, otherwise it's one of the dumber things I've ever read.

No, it's quite logical.

 

The work, CLEARLY, is not worth $7/hour. If it was, they'd be GETTING $7/hour. So, since we're going to overpay them ANYWAY --- let's go all out. Let's GUARANTEE $1M/year for every person. Let's make sure everybody is rich.

 

If you're going to pay people more than their work is actually work --- go all out with it. I want a Republican to reject the $7/hour minimum wage bill and propose a $100/hour minimum wage bill instead.

It hasn't been raised since 1997?!

Why should it be? Why should companies be forced to pay increasingly MORE money for a job that CLEARLY is not WORTH the minimum wage?

-=Mike

Because OF COURSE companies ALWAYS pay what the work is worth.

[NoCalMike 0]

The fact is, a lot of these global corporations try to disguise themselves as american blue collar industries. Ford & Chevy for one. Now it pains me because it is a fucking mouse click away for people to get the proper information to realize just how much they are ripped off when they buy a car, however Ford & Chevy have been correctomundo so far in their assumption that your average Joe Blow isn't going to research his car/truck any further then.......Is there a hemi, does it come in race car red?

 

Advertising works, and it is a bitch, but not much you can do really. I mean we are ingrained with it from childbirth.

 

The argument that companies leave america because a job is worth less, is ludicrous. I would even give a company the benefit of the doubt if POSSIBLY their opening up shop in a third world country could benefit their overall economy, but that is flat out wrong. Paying a worker 13cents a day offers them no money to pour back into the community except maybe the barest amount of rice, where as a worker in american while not making a fortune, should come away with a little bit extra on the check to feed back into the community and help things grow somewhat.

[Vyce 0]

Of course, he probably just wants to cite it as a problem, and since Bush is president, he wants voters to automatically connect the two, as if cause-effect.

Nuts!

 

You've figured it out.

[Stephen Joseph 0]

An increase in minimum wage would not increase in layoffs. I have no basis in economics, but it seems that most places that actually pay minimum wage are service jobs (McDonalds, convience stores, shops etc.) and small buisnesses. Naturally, you can't outsource these types of jobs, so it really wouldn't.

1) No. You're wrong. Economically speaking, it will mean that employers will actually discriminate on other characteristics more

 

Minimum wage laws are BAD BAD BAD. They do NOTHING to help any economy, and only serve to hurt those that they are supposed to help. If you disagree with this, I'll cite journals to help my case. Hopefully, you'll take me at my word.

 

As the economist around here...

 

2) We talk about outsourcing. What about insourcing? Last 6 months, more jobs have been insourced than outsourced.

3) Jobs are trade. If you believe in free trade, which almost no one today wants to go against, jobs are the same damn thing. Free trade hurts in the short term, and pays hella dividends in the long-term.

4) To ZsasZ: If you apply Keyne's seasonal model of wages along with Lucas' rational expectations, you derive a model that very accurately predicts how wages change. In short, over the short term workers receive wages that are below market clearing levels when that short term is near equilibrium or recession. In the long-term and instances when the economy is booming, labor receives wages much higher than market clearing levels. Keynes also refers to efficiency wage arguments which I find convincing, paying higher wages to elicit higher returns, which occur during booms.

 

My Take: Bush's Energy Policy - Bad. Kerry's Building Program - Bad. Lower Taxes - Good. Prevent outsourcing? Bad. Educate workers? Good.

 

Morale: Politician's Economic Proposals are inherently more harmful due to their special interested nature. Don't believe the hype.

Edited June 21, 2004 by Stephen Joseph

[Guest MikeSC]

It hasn't been raised since 1997?!

Why should it be? Why should companies be forced to pay increasingly MORE money for a job that CLEARLY is not WORTH the minimum wage?

-=Mike

Because the prices of stuff have gone up?

At the risk of sounding cruel --- that isn't companies' problem. The work isn't worth anymore now than it was then. You don't get raises because employers' want to be nice --- you get raises because your work is worth it.

I don't know about you on the East Coast, Mike, but over here in California, I'm TIRED of the illegals getting more and more work because the only price the bosses are willing to pay is the absolute cheapest.

That's because that is what the work is worth. Don't blame them for hiring illegals --- blame the gov't for pricing Americans out of the jobs.

You know how they say the illegals are only doing jobs no citizen would want to do? That's just not true. Some time ago, all that work in the fields used to be done by second-generation latino Americans, and they did get enough money to make ends meet. Then, at the beginning of one season, people were told they had to work for the lower price the illegals do if they want to keep their job. That money wasn't enough to make a living. And so now the illegals do that work.

That's what the work is worth. Like it or not, the MARKET dictates wages. Man, I feel like Stephen Joseph here.

Americans, even low-end ones, shouldn't be having to fight to survive even on a low end job.

Of course, you raise the wages of low-end jobs, goods become more expensive and the increase in wage doesn't really end up benefitting anybody.

I don't mind the illegals having to struggle to keep their finances together because they shouldn't even be here in the first place. If wages remain too low to make an acceptable living in the US, then people who live in the US won't want that job, and the illegals and their friends will win again.

Blame the gov't and unions for making the work too expensive to use Americans for.

The worth of a job has no baring on what the company pays. The CEO's quite frankly don't give a damn what the guys in the factories make, as long as their pockets are full.

They ALSO don't want to lose employees who do the job. Believe it or not, training new employees isn't cheap. They will pay you what you're worth to keep you. If you demand more money than your job is worth, you lose the job.

 

You're mistaking intrinsic worth to market worth. Is teaching a more valuable commodity than, say, athletic talent?

 

Yup.

 

But athletes get paid MUCH more for a WIDE array of reasons --- all of them market-oriented.

Do you honestly think Mr. Shareholder cares if Johnny Assembly line is struggling with his rent for this family?

It's not their job to care. Their job is to keep the best employees they can. Thus, they offer things like insurance and the like to keep employees.

Come on now. Shareholders and CEOs don't give two shits about assesing any value into anything besides what can put more money in their own pockets.

It's called business. You spend as little as you can on ANY commodity. To give people a clue --- if you can't get $7/hour for your skills, then your skills aren't WORTH $7/hour.

Just witness what is going on in third world countries with labor violations abroad, and you certainly will see how much concern these corporate con artitsts feel "minium wage jobs" are worth.

In those countries, the wages CLEARLY aren't as horrible or else THEY WOULDN'T BE ABLE TO GET EMPLOYEES.

Because OF COURSE companies ALWAYS pay what the work is worth.

They absolutely do. They pay you what your work is worth to the company. The market is stunningly accurate with valuing of work and skills.

The argument that companies leave america because a job is worth less, is ludicrous. I would even give a company the benefit of the doubt if POSSIBLY their opening up shop in a third world country could benefit their overall economy, but that is flat out wrong. Paying a worker 13cents a day offers them no money to pour back into the community except maybe the barest amount of rice, where as a worker in american while not making a fortune, should come away with a little bit extra on the check to feed back into the community and help things grow somewhat.

Of course, they'd have to jack up prices to make up for the difference in labor costs, leading to inflationary pressures...

-=Mike

[Guest cobainwasmurdered]

Minimum wage has done nothing but help everyone I've ever encountered.

[Guest MikeSC]

Minimum wage has done nothing but help everyone I've ever encountered.

CWM, anecdotal evidence, scientifically speaking, is about as useless a thing as there is.

-=Mike

[Guest Salacious Crumb]

Minimum wage has done nothing but help everyone I've ever encountered.

So how is it going to help anyone when small businesses have to lay off people left and right. If this does go through every small business will probably have to cut one or more person off it's staff.

 

And again, being a small business man this would completely fuck me over. Such a raise in the minimum wage completely destroys my business model and means I have to work twice as hard to expand and will probably make less money in the process. This also means that while someone who works for me will make a few extra bucks I'm going to work them twice as hard for those few extra dollars. They will now have to do the work that was going to be spread out among two different workers.

[Stephen Joseph 0]

CWM, I mean no offense when I disagree with you here. But, your evidence is of people you know who got the job. The corollary is all the people you don't know that didn't get the job, were not re-hired, or worked less hours.

 

Research evidence suggests that as the minimum wage rose, so did non-outlawed discriminatory practices. Thusly, in the United States, fast-food managers had to have high school, and now college degrees. Employers laid off older employees in favor of younger more pleasing faces.

 

I speak to this out of my own anecdote. I worked at McDonalds during a min wage rate hike. We had two older women who worked the eating area, one was a greeter and the other cleaned and occasionally held bingo games.

 

Within 3 months, we didn't have either. We did have one more high school student though.

 

But that is just an anecdote. Min Wage increases lead to price increases as the costs of providing a product rose when the wage rose. While in the very short-term a min wage can help those who are employed, the long-run effects extinguish any gains and wind up either employing less people are employing less people of a certain kind.

 

I leave these to you to read. I chose these articles not because I read them, but because I know the names and that they are reputable high standing economists, not because they prove my points or share my ideology. the AER is the foremost economics journal in the United States, so I used it.

 

 

David Card; Alan B. Krueger

The American Economic Review, Vol. 85, No. 2, Papers and Proceedings of the Hundredth and Seventh Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association Washington, DC, January 6-8, 1995. (May, 1995), pp. 238-243.

Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0002-8282...%3E2.0.CO%3B2-M

 

Donald Deere; Kevin M. Murphy; Finis Welch

The American Economic Review, Vol. 85, No. 2, Papers and Proceedings of the Hundredth and Seventh Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association Washington, DC, January 6-8, 1995. (May, 1995), pp. 232-237.

Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0002-8282...%3E2.0.CO%3B2-7

 

Charles L. Betsey; Bruce H. Dunson

The American Economic Review, Vol. 71, No. 2, Papers and Proceedings of the Ninety-Third Annual Meeting of the American Economic Association. (May, 1981), pp. 379-384.

Stable URL: http://links.jstor.org/sici?sici=0002-8282...%3E2.0.CO%3B2-V

Edited June 21, 2004 by Stephen Joseph

[Justice 0]

Huh. I work at Mickey D's right now for my summer job and I'm making about a $1.35 above minimum wage, and I find that pretty good for a mentally unstimulating job that requires little to no skill.

[Jobber of the Week 0]

At the risk of sounding cruel --- that isn't companies' problem. The work isn't worth anymore now than it was then.

Gee, I guess we should pay people who make clothes wages from 1925, then.

 

That's because that is what the work is worth. Don't blame them for hiring illegals --- blame the gov't for pricing Americans out of the jobs.

 

STUFF. COSTS. MORE. Economic factors can indicate what someone should be paid more than "the value of work," which appearantly is always set by the bosses. Unless everyone from CEOs to the guy who makes blue jeans should be paid what they were paid when the first generation of people who made a living from that were paid eras ago. Which doesn't help anyone.

 

 

That money wasn't enough to make a living. And so now the illegals do that work.

That's what the work is worth. Like it or not, the MARKET dictates wages. Man, I feel like Stephen Joseph here.

 

But how is the work worth less? BECAUSE OF THE PRESENCE OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS WHO SHOULD NOT EVEN BE A FACTOR. Hiring illegal workers who you don't have to provide benefits for because they snuck in and don't want the government to know, is not a legitimate excuse to reduce wages. They shouldn't even have these jobs in the first place! They should be wherever they came from.

 

Of course, you raise the wages of low-end jobs, goods become more expensive and the increase in wage doesn't really end up benefitting anybody.

 

Most low-end go-nowhere jobs these days involve running cash registers and stocking a store. The only place I imagine you might see a price increase is fast food.

 

Believe it or not, training new employees isn't cheap.

 

Yes, I'm sure training illegals on how to pick food in the fields is expensive.

 

It's not their job to care. Their job is to keep the best employees they can. Thus, they offer things like insurance and the like to keep employees.

 

So then what's with the hiring of the illegals, who don't need these benefits?

 

 

Mike, what you don't seem to understand is that work is already worth more when it's own worth isn't enough to make a living. Nobody wants to have a job that takes all their time AND doesn't give them enough money to own a stable life with food and a roof over their head. Because of the fact that the pay, by it's worth, isn't enough to keep someone alive, nobody would take it if they were simply paid on "what the work is worth."

 

BUT YOU KNOW WHAT THAT DOES?

 

That makes the work worth more! So rather than complaining that people are being paid more than what their work is worth, you should realize that people are being paid more BECAUSE nobody would do the work if they weren't.

[Guest MikeSC]

At the risk of sounding cruel --- that isn't companies' problem. The work isn't worth anymore now than it was then.

Gee, I guess we should pay people who make clothes wages from 1925, then.

If you can find somebody to work for that amount, more power to you. You won't be able to find anybody.

That's because that is what the work is worth. Don't blame them for hiring illegals --- blame the gov't for pricing Americans out of the jobs.

STUFF. COSTS. MORE. Economic factors can indicate what someone should be paid more than "the value of work," which appearantly is always set by the bosses.

JOTW, bosses want the best employees they can get. Thus, they will not work WITH one another to keep wages low. They will do what they can to attract BETTER employees.

Unless everyone from CEOs to the guy who makes blue jeans should be paid what they were paid when the first generation of people who made a living from that were paid eras ago. Which doesn't help anyone.

You seem to missing the whole "The market sets the wages" thing here.

That money wasn't enough to make a living. And so now the illegals do that work.

That's what the work is worth. Like it or not, the MARKET dictates wages. Man, I feel like Stephen Joseph here.

But how is the work worth less? BECAUSE OF THE PRESENCE OF ILLEGAL IMMIGRANTS WHO SHOULD NOT EVEN BE A FACTOR.

Simply put --- if you can find people to work at a jbo for a wage --- then that wage is what the job is worth.

Hiring illegal workers who you don't have to provide benefits for because they snuck in and don't want the government to know, is not a legitimate excuse to reduce wages.

And I'm sure instances of this happening will soon be forthcoming.

They shouldn't even have these jobs in the first place! They should be wherever they came from.

No argument --- but you want to know why American companies have factories' overseas?

Of course, you raise the wages of low-end jobs, goods become more expensive and the increase in wage doesn't really end up benefitting anybody.

Most low-end go-nowhere jobs these days involve running cash registers and stocking a store. The only place I imagine you might see a price increase is fast food.

JOTW, you seem to be mistaking that you will have to give EVERYBODY a raise. A person making $7/hour NOW will not accept being paid the same as somebody who just got hired.

Believe it or not, training new employees isn't cheap.

Yes, I'm sure training illegals on how to pick food in the fields is expensive.

And I'm sure you can find Americans who will do that work to begin with.

It's not their job to care. Their job is to keep the best employees they can. Thus, they offer things like insurance and the like to keep employees.

So then what's with the hiring of the illegals, who don't need these benefits?

That's called keeping prices down so inflation is less of an issue.

Mike, what you don't seem to understand is that work is already worth more when it's own worth isn't enough to make a living. Nobody wants to have a job that takes all their time AND doesn't give them enough money to own a stable life with food and a roof over their head.

That doesn't change that some jobs AREN'T WORTH more than that. There are more than a few jobs NOT WORTH the minimum wage today.

Because of the fact that the pay, by it's worth, isn't enough to keep someone alive, nobody would take it if they were simply paid on "what the work is worth."

 

BUT YOU KNOW WHAT THAT DOES?

 

That makes the work worth more! So rather than complaining that people are being paid more than what their work is worth, you should realize that people are being paid more BECAUSE nobody would do the work if they weren't.

OK, I'm going to make this real simple:

 

Employers need employees to GENERATE more revenue for a company than they cost a company to pay them.

 

$7/hour for a job that isn't worth $5.25/hour is hardly going to achieve that goal.

-=Mike

-=Mike

[Jobber of the Week 0]

JOTW, bosses want the best employees they can get.

Boy, are you set in the old thinking.

 

You seem to missing the whole "The market sets the wages" thing here.

 

It does, but it sets it by the value of life's necessities. Food, water, shelter. These are the core reasons why people will do ANY job, universally. You seem to think it's okay if a person is paid so little that they can't afford to have a fixed address.

 

Simply put --- if you can find people to work at a jbo for a wage --- then that wage is what the job is worth.

 

Now that's not being fair to your country or your people. The reason the Americans cost more is because they have to pay for so much more, including the hospital bill when the illegal that took the job injures himself.

 

This would do absolutely nothing to help immigration, as people who came here legally would be punished so the people who jumped the border could work for cheap with the public taxpayer funding his benefits for him.

 

Admit it, there's a line here that should not be crossed, even in the name of "what the work is worth." We have to protect our nation's interests somehow. If not it's economy, it's borders, and your answer supports more illegal immigration.

 

No argument --- but you want to know why American companies have factories' overseas?

 

That's a different issue and, amusingly enough, because of economic factors. Namely that it costs a lot less to live in a third-world country than in a one as costly as it is to live here just by taxes alone.

 

JOTW, you seem to be mistaking that you will have to give EVERYBODY a raise. A person making $7/hour NOW will not accept being paid the same as somebody who just got hired.

 

Most people above the dead-end job line are making above the minimum wage. This doesn't affect the guy making $50,000 a year as long as he's still making his $50,000.

 

And I'm sure you can find Americans who will do that work to begin with.

 

Before illegals became the new work standard, you could.

 

OK, I'm going to make this real simple:

 

Employers need employees to GENERATE more revenue for a company than they cost a company to pay them.

 

$7/hour for a job that isn't worth $5.25/hour is hardly going to achieve that goal.

 

You yourself said that a job is worth whatever you can pay someone to do it, but appearantly that only works when pricing down.

 

If you can't get anyone to do the work for less than $5.25 an hour, then isn't it actually worth $5.25 an hour?

[Guest MikeSC]

JOTW, bosses want the best employees they can get.

Boy, are you set in the old thinking.

No, more like set in the thinking that employers are, in fact, humans --- not evil demons.

You seem to missing the whole "The market sets the wages" thing here.

It does, but it sets it by the value of life's necessities. Food, water, shelter. These are the core reasons why people will do ANY job, universally. You seem to think it's okay if a person is paid so little that they can't afford to have a fixed address.

No, it's set by scarcity of your skill, level of experience, etc. This is why pro athletes are paid so much more than school teachers.

Simply put --- if you can find people to work at a jbo for a wage --- then that wage is what the job is worth.

Now that's not being fair to your country or your people. The reason the Americans cost more is because they have to pay for so much more, including the hospital bill when the illegal that took the job injures himself.

Thank you, Pat Buchanan.

 

The illegal aliens will take a job FOR WHAT IT IS ACTUALLY WORTH.

 

See, if you can find a guy to take a job for less than minimum wage, rest assured the job requires no special skills, no experience, no --- anything. Just a pulse.

This would do absolutely nothing to help immigration, as people who came here legally would be punished so the people who jumped the border could work for cheap with the public taxpayer funding his benefits for him.

And RAISING THE MINIMUM WAGE is going to create an immigration panacea?

 

I think you need to look into WHAT JOBS illegal immigrants tend to do. Needless to say, they aren't exactly meaningful ones. And, sadly, they work HARDER than a lot of Americans.

Admit it, there's a line here that should not be crossed, even in the name of "what the work is worth." We have to protect our nation's interests somehow. If not it's economy, it's borders, and your answer supports more illegal immigration.

And your idea FIXES the problem in what way?

 

How does insisting that companies use Americans to pick fruit, causing the PRICE OF FOOD TO RISE, benefit America in the slightest?

No argument --- but you want to know why American companies have factories' overseas?

That's a different issue and, amusingly enough, because of economic factors. Namely that it costs a lot less to live in a third-world country than in a one as costly as it is to live here just by taxes alone.

Also because the jobs they ship overseas COST TOO MUCH TO DO HERE.

JOTW, you seem to be mistaking that you will have to give EVERYBODY a raise. A person making $7/hour NOW will not accept being paid the same as somebody who just got hired.

Most people above the dead-end job line are making above the minimum wage. This doesn't affect the guy making $50,000 a year as long as he's still making his $50,000.

Actually, it impacts everybody. Everybody down the line will demand raises based on this.

And I'm sure you can find Americans who will do that work to begin with.

Before illegals became the new work standard, you could.

Clearly you couldn't. Illegals were not the first option.

OK, I'm going to make this real simple:

 

Employers need employees to GENERATE more revenue for a company than they cost a company to pay them.

 

$7/hour for a job that isn't worth $5.25/hour is hardly going to achieve that goal.

You yourself said that a job is worth whatever you can pay someone to do it, but appearantly that only works when pricing down.

Yup, basically.

 

If a government REQUIRES you to pay somebody a certain amount --- even if the job is not WORTH that amount, then you have an unnatural influence on the market.

If you can't get anyone to do the work for less than $5.25 an hour, then isn't it actually worth $5.25 an hour?

Yup. If they couldn't find anybody to do it for less, then $5.25 would be the worth.

 

However, a government saying you can't offer less than that kind of proves that even the gov't realizes the jobs aren't worth that much.

-=Mike

[NoCalMike 0]

Ok, the worth of a job is definately never set by the company, it obviously must decrease as the cost of living goes up. This would explain how companies like Nike consistently find poorer and poorer nations to exploit while they get rich.

 

When you make the argument that a "job is only worth such and such" who is making that decision? Are they assesing the actual labor of the job, or are they just considering the fact that they want a couple more million in their pockets for the next annual profits, so they move on to the next poor country so they can lower wages from 13cents to 7cents?

[NoCalMike 0]

I think you need to look into WHAT JOBS illegal immigrants tend to do. Needless to say, they aren't exactly meaningful ones. And, sadly, they work HARDER than a lot of Americans.

Umm, how is keeping our grocery store stocked with produce, a meaningless job?

[Guest MikeSC]

Ok, the worth of a job is definately never set by the company, it obviously must decrease as the cost of living goes up.  This would explain how companies like Nike consistently find poorer and poorer nations to exploit while they get rich.

Or, they find jobs for people in poor countries and pay them a fair wage in that country.

When you make the argument that a "job is only worth such and such" who is making that decision?

The market.

 

You can't find a job that pays better than what you have? Then your skills aren't WORTH more.

Are they assesing the actual labor of the job, or are they just considering the fact that they want a couple more million in their pockets for the next annual profits, so they move on to the next poor country so they can lower wages from 13cents to 7cents?

They go with such things as scarcity of skill, experience, etc.

Umm, how is keeping our grocery store stocked with produce, a meaningless job?

How is it worth $5.25/hour? Picking fruit and vegetables isn't worth that at all. And, thus, THEY AREN'T PAID THAT.

-=Mike

[Dr. Tom 0]

Umm, how is keeping our grocery store stocked with produce, a meaningless job?

Because you can train a gorilla to do it. And any job that fails the gorilla test can't be worth much.

[NoCalMike 0]

Umm, how is keeping our grocery store stocked with produce, a meaningless job?

How is it worth $5.25/hour? Picking fruit and vegetables isn't worth that at all. And, thus, THEY AREN'T PAID THAT.

-=Mike

never said it was worth 5.25, I just said it wasn't a quote, "meaningless" job. Since having grocery stores stocked seems to be rather important.

[Guest MikeSC]

Umm, how is keeping our grocery store stocked with produce, a meaningless job?

How is it worth $5.25/hour? Picking fruit and vegetables isn't worth that at all. And, thus, THEY AREN'T PAID THAT.

-=Mike

never said it was worth 5.25, I just said it wasn't a quote, "meaningless" job. Since having grocery stores stocked seems to be rather important.

It's also a job that --- as Dr. Tom so eloquently pointed out --- you could train a gorilla to do.

-=Mike

[teke184 0]

Mike's right about a lot of this... raising the minimum wage will either cut jobs here or INCREASE outsourcing of low-level jobs and some mid-level jobs.

 

The reason that accounting departments of some major companies are now overseas is that paying an American to investigate a $50 discrepancy was not cost effective. Paying someone a fraction of that made it possible to investigate VERY small errors in payment, thus making outsourcing a better bargain than they thought it would be.

 

 

To change the subject slightly, I'll talk about the downside of out-sourcing. Mainly, that downside deals with the fact that a US company is now dependant on a foreign country's stability to maintain its current productivity. Have a plant in Pakistan? There's a chance that Al Qaeda could bomb it or that a war could break out between Pakistan and India.

 

Have a business in Europe? Good luck if you ever try to fire a worker. European job-protection laws are so fucked that you'd have to pay them a severance package equal to what they've earned during their employment to that company. The inability to close several unprofitable factories in France sent a large French company to its destruction a few years ago. They couldn't lay off the plant workers without paying them exorbinant amounts of severance pay, so the entire company went bust.

 

Cuba was a businessman's paradise until Castro forced Batista to abdicate then nationalized all the assets within the country.

 

Iran was considered to be a solid beacon of stability in the Middle East until Khomeni overthrew the Shah.

 

The point being that out-sourcing is high-risk in the long run if you don't evaluate the possibilities beforehand.

 

 

In addition, there are many hidden costs to running business in foreign countries. One of these is that the country's workers may rely on "grease" payments in order to let your company do business as normal. ("Grease" is permissable for corporations because it is to ensure business continues to run normally, NOT to bribe people to get undue influence.) If you're selling cars in Brazil, you may have the choice between paying grease to a customs official and getting your cars right away or not paying it and risking the cars being destroyed, stolen, or rejected and sent back to the US.

 

 

 

Etc. Etc. Etc.

 

 

The point being that out-sourcing could be a HUGE pain in the ass for a company if they aren't planning it out well. Dell's been paying for it lately and is in the process of bringing their customer service lines back to the US from India because of it. (There was such a backlash against people in India using the Dell playbook to troubleshoot problems that there were MASSIVE amounts of complaints).

 

Out-sourcing is only a short-term problem UNLESS someone does something stupid to encourage more of it, like hiking the minimum wage by $2 and making even MORE jobs too pricy to compete against foreigners. It's already bad enough that some unions have priced their industries out of competition, but this would make it far worse.

 

 

 

This has all been a bit of a ramble but the point is that you have to think long-term about how to realign your economy to compete against other countries. We don't need to be propping up any businesses that are not essential to this country. All that does is keep the business from becoming as competitive as it can, which sets it up for a bigger failure down the road.