Economics: Minimum Wage, Who Gets Hurt?

[C-Mag]

I've been doing reading lately on the never ending welfare and warfare of Rome, and how it destroying traditional Roman values of responsibility, self sufficiency and honor.

Rome had a chance to change that, it went to a vote of the people and they voted for more welfare. Their empire died with over 50% of the Roman people on the government dole. No one wanted to have a business or produce anything because the government would take so much there was no profit in it. It snowballed.

[nmoore63]

I see people surrender to the dole all the time.

I also see people surrender their filling job just to get on the government take healthcare.

I don’t think the process can be reversed, outside of a Great War.

[SuburbanFarmer]

Remember, I preach that money is imaginary, and can be printed at will as long as consumption=productivity, and there are Markets.

Heh. You still think we have markets. How droll.

[Hastur]

[Viktorthepirate]

I've been doing reading lately on the never ending welfare and warfare of Rome, and how it destroying traditional Roman values of responsibility, self sufficiency and honor.

Rome had a chance to change that, it went to a vote of the people and they voted for more welfare. Their empire died with over 50% of the Roman people on the government dole. No one wanted to have a business or produce anything because the government would take so much there was no profit in it. It snowballed.

People were on the grain dole even during the Republic days.

Their civilization also lasted a millennia. Not exactly a bad run.

[Martin Hash]

I've been doing reading lately on the never ending welfare and warfare of Rome, and how it destroying traditional Roman values of responsibility, self sufficiency and honor.

Rome had a chance to change that, it went to a vote of the people and they voted for more welfare. Their empire died with over 50% of the Roman people on the government dole. No one wanted to have a business or produce anything because the government would take so much there was no profit in it. It snowballed.

People were on the grain dole even during the Republic days.

Their civilization also lasted a millennia. Not exactly a bad run.

Obviously slavery will cover for diminished Work Ethic for a long time.

[jediuser598]

I have a solution to make LeninJedi happy.

Here is what I propose:

Let's just set the minimum wage to 0. If we do that, then the price of goods like milk will also drop to 0. He can buy anything, and not make anything, which is the Marxist dream. I make above minimum wage so this wouldn't affect me. I'd be poor, but if we lowered min wage I would now be able to buy just about anything I wanted, like a Buick Envision or a big mac. And it wouldn't cost anything. Its a win/win.

I think you misunderstood my point.

You talk to people at the bottom, they say that if minimum wage is higher the price of everything else is higher, so you gain nothing. That's demonstrably untrue, at least within the ranges I've seen. Min Wage is $11.50 here and the price of milk $2.40.

You could do this with anything.

I'm simply stating that just because the minimum wage in one place is higher than another place, doesn't mean that the price of everything else is more expensive. If it was, then there's no way the milk I buy would be cheaper than the milk you buy, if my minimum wage was higher. I'm willing to test other items if you wish, we don't have to restrict ourselves to groceries.

[Ph64]

I think you misunderstood my point.

You talk to people at the bottom, they say that if minimum wage is higher the price of everything else is higher, so you gain nothing. That's demonstrably untrue, at least within the ranges I've seen. Min Wage is $11.50 here and the price of milk $2.40.

You could do this with anything.

I'm simply stating that just because the minimum wage in one place is higher than another place, doesn't mean that the price of everything else is more expensive. If it was, then there's no way the milk I buy would be cheaper than the milk you buy, if my minimum wage was higher. I'm willing to test other items if you wish, we don't have to restrict ourselves to groceries.

So you have a dairy farm using machines to milk the cows, probably hiring illegal workers unaffected by minimum wage rules to attach the pumping machine to the cows... Jack up minimum wage and it doesn't affect the price of milk, go figure.

Restaurants and other service related industries maybe don't see increased costs for inputs, but they have to pay their servers, cooks, cashiers, etc, more... So either they raise prices (your Big Mac costs more) or they cut workers and/or automate (sales kiosks) to cut costs and 15 workers at $10 becomes 10 workers at $15.

The "made in USA" clothing shop, already selling their clothing at a premium to foreign made goods, closed up shop because they have to raise prices to compensate for the increased labor cost, and raising their prices to compensate loses them profitability. 100 U.S. workers lose their $10/hr jobs instead of getting $15/hr.

"We've done it! We helped U.S. workers!!"

[Zlaxer]

Min wage is mostly a polotical ploy, but necessary because of government quantative easing - real inflation fucks the poor and middle class - just look at the decrease in pirchasing power since the 60’s.

[Speaker to Animals]

I think minimum wage, as an argument either way, is fucking retarded. It's not that big of a deal.