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These 19 States Just Hiked The Minimum Wage: Here Come The "Unintended Consequences"
Starting on January 1, 2015, a one year-delayed component of Obamacare kicks in: according to the health care law, businesses that employ at least 100 full-time workers — or full-time equivalents, including part-time workers — must offer health benefits to at least 70% of those working at least 30 hours a week by Thursday, or pay a penalty. This will expand to by next year, when companies will have to provide insurance to 95% of their workers, and firms with 50 to 99 employees must offer coverage as well. As a result, and as even the USA Today reports, "many businesses in low-wage industries have hired more part-time workers and cut the hours of full-timers recently to soften the impact of new health law requirements that take effect Thursday."
More details:
Businesses in low-wage sectors, such as restaurants, retail and warehousing, are feeling bigger effects because health insurance represents an outsize share of their total employee costs, says Rob Wilson, head of Employco, a human resources outsourcing firm. Many of those with just fewer than 100 staffers have hired more part-timers in recent months, while those with at least 100 are reducing the hours of existing employees, he says.
Michelle Neblett, senior director of labor and workforce policy for the National Restaurant Association, says many restaurants are being more cautious about boosting the workweek of part-timers to 30 hours or more, doling out such increases to reward top performers.
Those strategies have not had a noticeable impact on the labor market. Monthly job growth has averaged 240,000 this year, up from 194,000 in 2013. And full-time employment has increased at about twice the rate of part-time payrolls, Labor Department figures show.
Still, the number of part-time workers who say they'd prefer full-time jobs has remained stubbornly high. That can at least partly be traced to the inclination of the restaurant, retail and hotel industries to hire more part-time workers to sidestep the ACA mandate, Royal Bank of Scotland wrote in a recent report.
Of course, the reason why the BLS has not yet revealed the reality of the shifting US labor force, and why there is virtually no real wage growth across the US since the Lehman bankruptcy, is that the BLS simply backs into statistically goal-seeked results, using seasonal and statistical (birth/death) adjustments to smooth a trendline to beat a monthly bogey used by algos to bid stocks higher. Meanwhile, the reality at the micro level, is that increasingly more Americans are seeing their work status transformed from full-time to part-time status, earning less in the process, having no healthcare and retirement benefits and virtually no job security.
As a result, starting this year, some 19 states just increased their minimum wage threshold, with 3 more states due to follow later in 2015. This takes place at the state level because for numerous reasons, there simply wan't enough of a consensus to pass this at the Federal level. The Daily Signal has the details:
In three states—Arkansas, Nebraska and South Dakota—voters approved ballot measures in November to increase the minimum wage, effective Jan. 1, according to the National Conference of State Legislatures.
Alaska voters passed an initiative raising the minimum wage in the state to begin Jan. 1. But the pay increase isn’t effective until 90 days after the election results are certified, Feb. 24.
Meanwhile, legislatures in seven states—Connecticut, Hawaii, Maryland, Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Vermont and West Virginia—approved laws boosting the minimum wage. Those laws go into effect today.
Though Delaware and Minnesota’s state lawmakers voted to raise the minimum wage, those increases won’t begin until June and August, respectively. The District of Columbia will see a minimum wage hike beginning July 1. New York raised its minimum wage to $8.75 an hour beginning yesterday and will see another increase to $9 an hour beginning Dec. 31, 2015.
Nine other states will see increases in their minimum wages today as state laws mandate automatic increases to make up for rising prices. Those states are: Arizona, Colorado, Florida, Missouri, Montana, New Jersey, Ohio, Oregon and Washington.
Among states raising the minimum wage, Washington state will boast the highest at $9.47 an hour–but only until July 1, when the District of Columbia will have the highest in the nation at $10.50 an hour.
These are the states in question:
So in the grand scheme of this this should be net neutral: more part-time jobs offset by higher wages, not too bad right? Wrong.
For one thing, For according to a recent UCSD study, for three years, researchers followed low-income workers residing in states that saw wage hikes and those that did not. The study found that minimum wage hikes had negative impacts on employment, income and income growth. In other words, the probability of part-, and full-time workers to get fired rises even more as a result of an artificial push to the wage/labor supply-demand curve.
In fact, while one can applaud the attempt to boost standards of living, one can be certain that the only thing the media will be focusing on in 2015 will be the "unintended consequences" of this action:
“Minimum wage supporters have good intentions, but those good intentions cannot repeal the law of unintended consequences,” James Sherk, an expert in labor economics at The Heritage Foundation, told The Daily Signal. He added: "Minimum-wage increases reduce the total earnings of low-wage workers — the higher pay for some workers gets completely offset by the nonexistent pay of those no longer employed."
In its study, UCSD researchers found that after minimum-wage increases, the national employment-to-population ratio decreased by 0.7 percent points between December 2006 and December 2012.
In addition, the study found that minimum-wage increases hindered low-skilled workers’ ability to rise to lower-middle -lass earnings.
And then there are rising prices. As shown previously, just the adverse impact to the bottom line already led to increases in consumer prices across various restaurants in the US.
That's just the beginning. As small and medium-businesses struggle across America to make ends meet, it is the big businesses that have all the economies of scale and all the leverage. And, as a result, prepare for this:
Which is just the intended result: after all, the one thing missing from the "recovery" is inflation. Well, prepare to welcome unintended consequences number one of central planning. The only problem, declining wages aren't going anywhere. And that's for those who are lucky enough to hold jobs. Also, don't forget that the only shining spot in the US wage field - shale jobs - is finished, and going forward not only will the shale patch not generate rising wages, but will in fact lead to the largest surge in layoffs seen in years.
Which is precisely what propaganda is for. And after all, Americans who can no longer afford to buy, or even rent a home can always live in their car, and now, thanks to plunging gas prices, heat themselves while sleeping in someone's driveway. Because as the media loves reminding us each and every day, sub $2 gas is a "tax cut" for improverished American consumers everywhere.
Now if only those same consumers had full-time jobs and/or anything resembling stable (forget rising) wages, they would even spend more just as Keynesian theory suggests, if only in theory.
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Just do it already.
Make the schlubs work for nothing. That will be Capitalist nirvana.
Its the Middle class dummies. You have got to give the middle class some spending money or the velocity tanks.
Ah..forget it.. the message is not getting through.
Some morons don't know which side their bread is buttered on.
This is just hysterical now. Debt forgivenness on student loans >10 years, $15 minimum wage, health coverage for all.
What's in it for me buddy?
You forgot tax-payer funded anabolic steroids for the cops and rubbers for the grade-schoolers.
...not to mention the free hypodermic needles for the substance challenged.
And whats the problem?
No wonder McDonald's U.S. sales numbers in November were down over 4%.
That's 6 months negative for McDonalds, maybe 7 after they count December.
They will be bailed out as "too big to fail".
My 'GOD', we've got an extra $40 in our pockets and saving of $20 per fill-up and the hyperinflation statist come out of the woodwork.
Just maybe the few hundred-thousand layed-off energy laborers suffering from 'Shale Shock' can get a reprieve from Uncle`Yellin's poliburo when, and where this terrible`draft opens the closed window of mandatory enlistment.
Baby it's cold outside... and inside?
When fuel prices fall low enough to make running a generator to heat and power the house, I'm there.
You mean you people like to eat at those places? ZH is a class act, heh. Everything I do/buy has gone up even without a minimum wage so how am I going to tell the difference.
Go to school kids. And DON'T major in 17th Century Lesbian English Literature - or psychology.
I agree with the sentiment but quite a few of my friends are experienced scientists and engineers who work in coffeeshops or have similar jobs.
Not complete
People work too much as it is. Maybe this is the universe/illuminaty's way of bringing some rationality to the world of labor. Why must humans work 40 hours a week despite all the automation? 80% of all jobs are bullshit anyway.
The useless cunt CEO and CFO of McDonalds rake in a cool $50M plus bonuses for total under performance. So I call this article pure bullshit. Fuck those wankers off and replace them with an accountant. Then we can talk about minimum wage issues which are caused by inadequate birth control. Pure and simple.
We control the population at the other end the pipeline.
It's the transfats in the fries you are eating.
Enjoy.
The transfats are only a fraction of the harm caused by the sugar in the buns and fries.
The competition from importing two million mostly unskilled busily-breeding people into the USA each year drives down wages, too.
Time to tweak the robot's cost-benefit again.
Time to tweak the robot's cost-benefit again.
I am always confused as to why renting money at a higher interest rate is beneficial to an economy and paying someone more for actual labor is detrimental.
Most money for rent comes from collections from laborers, (pensions, IRA, etc.)
If McDonalds has about 2 million employees – how many make less than minimum wage?
Assuming all are below minimum wage and the minimum wage was to double, from the Federal Minimum wage of $7.35, it would add 15 million dollars to operating expense.(Tax Deductible).
15 million per day is about 5,000,000,000 billion per year.
Mc Donald’s Net Profits last year was almost 6 billion dollars or roughly 20%.
Mc Donald’s serves about 70 million people a day. A one cent increase per person would generate 700,000 dollars a day or about 250,000,000 dollars a year. A 25 cent increase would generate about 6 billion.
I have a problem as to how 25 cents on a food order (not single item) will kill the economy, but $3.00 more for a gallon of gas is good for the economy. Or higher taxes or higher interest, or bigger commissions are all positive.
I know the issue is bigger than this example, but logically it is challenging to see Armageddon.
Beats me too. Maybe the best idea is to wake up every day and say to yourself, "Today I will not look for logic."
If this is supposed to be an unfortunate unintended consequence of raising the minimum wage, bring it on!
Let's raise it to $20.00/hr and then the USA can get rid of all fast food.
The consequences of no poisonous fast food would boost productivity, it'd be spectacularly beneficial to our health and defintely drive down medical costs.
Maybe even get Americans thinking clearly again, even stop all this idiotic war madness.
I wish they would rip the band-aid off and set mw at $100ph...that way I could cut back my part time hours and retire twice as soon.......ouch, thinking like a liberal,progressive puke hurts.
Debate, debate, debate...nothing is going to happen until..people stop talking about and doing. Actions speak, the rest is BS
Massive wage inflation for the 1%
Wage deflation for the chumps who didn't learn how to "invest".
Why outlaw labor that is cheap?
For the unskilled, work becomes illegal.
But how do you become skilled without working?
Bottom rungs of the economic ladder being sawed off. These minimum wage jobs were never careers, just steps on the professional ladder.
We used to have teenagers working these after school, where they functioned both as job training, and source of spending money.
Now only those with a pension, or illegals can do them.
No. Actually in California, these low wage jobs are not given to anybody BUT Mexicans.
Minorities of other races (BLACK) who LEGALLY entered the country were rejected these jobs because "They're Mexicans' Jobs". I wouldn't put it past the medical sector to pull this shit, its' affirmative action all the way and well- they're nasty.
Illegal day labor ships up to the U.S. from Michoacan Mexico with a bunch of drugs.
When teenagers CAN get these jobs, they take them.
I used to be able to get restaurant jobs like a drop of a hat and I had many? I did this to put myself through college?
Now? Managers don't even want to talk to me because (although I do look younger and probably better than I did then?)
I'm OVERQUALIFIED. Not even "just an MBA student", I'm OVERQUALIFIED.
WAY too many young adults had to sign up with the US military. I guess that's our only hope, right? YAY! I've ALWAYS wanted to put up with asshole discrimination so I can die in a draft dodgers' war as an Arab Mercenary with no benefit in the middle of discrimination again.
Right?
The people in the US CHOOSE to hate themselves. Like you.
And therefore don't bother to come up with anything worthwhile to be beneficial to anyone, even at a basic level. So you blame other people.
That's how the Nazis, KKK and Storm front and now the Ukraine became the epitomy of losers in the global market and the US is following suit. So much for the $20,000 that LEGAL immigrants pay to sit on a Greencard for over a decade plus nasty legal hassles. And the US is fortunate, we got the best of the best throughout the world. But duhmerican idiots want to fuck that up and not use ANYBODY right because "it's a threat".
If the good things are a "threat", you're sitting in the wrong position. You can't blame anybody else.
What about these people who couldn't get in the service? I know! Overrepresented minority clause in the middle of narcissistic ideologues and control freaks with UNPAID internships to reward us for the efforts we made to at least stay out of trouble, not cause trouble and pull our creds together to service hiring managers. They want the criminals.
It's fucking reduculous. How do you think this is going to pan out?
Are you just thriving on negativity because you never accomplished anything for yourself so you have to literally fuck up lives in order to be "Better than other people"?
That's the baby boomers' game.
Claiming that it is possible to raise wages by decree is precisely and exactly claiming that supply and demand do not exist as wage setters.
Worse, you already know that it is not true.
How many Ford Fiesta's will you sell if you raise the price of a Fiesta to be the same as a BMW?
What do you do to those who build Fiesta's when you do such a thing?
Low wage workers are Fiesta's.
Now there comes the black market of labor in response to the first decree, where only ILLEGAL workers can do the ILLEGAL jobs (illeagal by virtue of wage, forged tax records and all).
And then you have TWO underclasses, the ILLEGALS and those who would like to do those jobs but can't get past the gun in your hand.
You can't pay for school that way you say?
I did it.
You complain that prices for school today are now much higher than before, and excuse yourself... but you also want free student loans and lowered admission standards - VASTLY expanding the number of students, VASTLY AND ARTIFICIALLY raising the DEMAND for schooling.
I have no hate.
And you have no understanding.
You believe that government is godverment, able to suspend the laws of nature for your comfort.
There is a great supply of CONS willing to tell you they can suspend the laws of nature for your comfort.
You are getting exactly what you asked for, if only you knew it.
America was founded as a slave/indentured worker labor system, and many business owners consider it their birth right to pay rock bottom wages. And then they tell you you're 'lucky' to have a 'job'.
Businesses that pay rock-bottom wages are getting an indirect subsidy from the government 'cause those workers are on food stamps (EBT/SNAP), medicaid, WIC, etc, etc. While a higher minimum wage is going to make your pink slime sewage burger cost more, the wretches who actually have to spend 40 hours a week preparing and serving this garbage to the rude morbidly obese customers won't have to be on public assistance to survive. That's all.
Oh, and while we're at it, let's close down the H1-B visa system that subsidizes tech giants with super cheap indentured foreign workers, and force companies to recruit and hire americans. No more of this bullshit about 'we can't find anyone..."
"America was founded as a slave/indentured worker labor system..."
No. But I'd have to agree that America was converted to a slave/indentured work labor system in 1913.
Right, because indentured servitude and slavery are just a footnote of American history, but the real crime, yes, is a central bank? Because theft of your money via inflation is worse than outright slavery? Right.
Pretty sure they average ,American, although shitty, lives better, now, than in 1913, no?
How about the slaves' descendants a hundred years after the first arrived? Probably exactly the same.
But, yes, by all means continuing thinking whether a nation has a central bank or not is the most important thing in the world. It just lets all of know where your true interest lie above all else...money.
There are so many fallacies in your response it's hard to know where to start. Did I ever say the central bank is the "most important thing in the world"? And as I recall from American History, slavery wasn't legal in 1913.
The question of whether Americans' lives are better off now or in 1913 is essentially irrelevant--there are far too many other issues, most notably the numerous technological advances.
The relevant question is whether we would be better off now in the absence of the Federal Reserve Act, the Sixteenth Amendment or the Seventeenth Amendment--all of which became effective in 1913.
If you (or anyone else) want to argue that one or all of these makes us better off than we otherwise would be, I'm game for the intellectual exercise. But if you want to engage in more ridiculous red herrings or fallacies, don't expect me to respond.
Feel free to say EXACTLY what I said that was incorrect.
You said America wasn't founded on slavery/indentured servitude. It was. That was the point of the colony for England, which was built on the backs of slaves, indentured servitude. When the wealthy whites of the time no longer wanted to pay measily taxes to the Brit's, they revolted by declaring that some of their new prospective citizens would have 3/5 the right of a landowning white man...also known as sticking up for what's right....
Your original, terse response indicated that the Federal Reserve is a greater scourge on America than slavery. (See your above post)
And, yes, we are better off for having a central bank and avoiding financial crises every 3 years and having to turn (directly) to the financiers of the day to bail us out. Is the Fed perfect? Far from it. It's better than no bank at all. Name one legitimate country that does well with either a. No CB, or b. a meager one.
Feel free along with everyone else to tell me how a nation having a central bank is sacrilegious to your freedom, or whatever nonsense you espouse.
This country wasn't founded on slavery. Perhaps you should read the Declaration of Independence. It's no accident that it says, "all men are created equal" -- the fact that slavery was the norm throughout history and was a huge institution at the time of the founding, doesn't mean this country was founded on slavery.
The fact that you can argue that central banks avoid financial crises every 3 years is ironic. Was there a financial crisis every 3 years before 1913? No there wasn't. Would they have been prevented if the Federal Reserve was around then? How, exactly?
Perhaps you can explain how the federal reserve makes us better off. That is, how it supposedly prevents financial crises from occurring every 3 years.
The question of other countries and whether they are better off with or without a central bank is a red herring.
Finally, you ignore the 16th and 17th Amendments. I said we were sold into slavery in 1913. I didn't say it was merely because of the Federal Reserve Act.
I speak of red herrings?
You say Americans were sold into SLAVERY after 1913. Lunacy.
As far as your central bank opinion...
The whole reason the Federal Reserve was set up was after the plethora of financial crises from the 1860's until 1907, and the actual act being signed into law in 1913. It was not meant to steal your money through inflation, create jobs, etc. It had but one purpose, avoiding financial crises. It failed miserably until it was reformed in FDR's administration. After that it did well up an until 2007/2008.
But, yes, let's go back to your elementary gold standard with no CB.
Hey! I just found a pirate ship loaded with gold off the Bay of Biscay, let's inflate our money supply!
What a genius system.
Again, all of this is pointless to someone who actually think the real slavery in America happened after 1913.
The plethora of financial crises was caused by the bankers of the day after the uncivil war to generate the need of their CB. If the CB is so grand why did the bankers run off to Jekyl Island in secret? Sound money and a diverse banking system is better any day than this pitiful debt money system they created.
You talk about inflating the money supply by finding a ship loaded with gold but don't mention all the QE. What's the difference, pray tell. At least the gold had a value to it, even inflated. This debt paper you apparently worship has an intrinsic value of zero. Dividing by the added trillions still comes out to zero.
The 16th amendment made tax slaves out of us. Taxes are required in a debt based money system to pay the interest. Yes real slavery of all the nations citizens happened in 1913.
The 17th amendment ensured the supremacy of the national government by removing the participation of the supposed sovereign states. Their militias was already replaced by the national governments standing armys National Guard.
Any resembalance to the nation the founders founded no longer exists. Each day our people become more enslaved to bankers due to our production and jobs off shored, cheaper labor imported with only demeaning entry level work left and that is being taken by the border jumpers.
Yes,. we're slaves,,, just some of us refuse to connect the dots.
I don't disagree with the tenor of what you are saying, completely.
However, WE (unless you are kept locked in a basement somewhere) are not slaves.
I agree with you QE, at least after the first tranche has been a giveaway to the .01%. I do not agree with much of what the Fed has done recently, but it's better than not having one at all.
Look, when you get down to it, the point of a central bank (at least at the Fed's inception) was to prevent healthy banks, companies form going down because of a lack of liquidity. Without one, unless regulatory standards are high as far capitalization goes and bank activities restricted, you are going to have repeated, preventable financial crisis (1860's-1907). The cause (civil war) is irrelevant, as there is always a possibility of a spark igniting a house already soaked in gas.
That's why the Fed was born. We can argue til the cows come home about what it is today, but that is what it was born out of.
I personally think frac-reserve banking is idiotic along with the gold standard. I'm a proponent of the Chicago plan or narrow banking. But I digress.
You realize gold has an intrinsic value of zero, don't you? It only has value because people perceive it to be valuable......just like the $. The only difference is the govt. mandates that it's legal tender. Feel free to call me a moron because I don't stack gold and don't equate paying taxes with slavery. Slavery is slavery.
Slavery was legal after independence. The constitution or the declaration of independence's preambles are just vague poetry and do not mean shit.
Go visit your local hundred-year-plus neighborhood.
Mostly superior neighborhoods, with better built homes than those made today.
Go look at the average wage list for 1910.
Gawk at how poor people were earning only $5/week.
Then use the official (understated) inflation table to convert those jobs to today.
People in 1910 made more than they do today.
And they also paid a single-digit tax rate all included. Today, between all levels of government you are being taxed north of 50%.
But just go look at their homes.
They lived better than you.
Here's the story: The pie is shrinking. The .01% want to keep getting more of the pie. So everyone else has to get less of it. You included, dear ZH reader.
If the .01% didn't take so much of the pie, there would be more of it for everyone else. Minimum wage isn't the problem. The greed of the .01% is.
Actually fast food prices will crater, as corporate giants automate they'll put human manned fast food out of busibusiness with lower prices.
10 years from nowMcDonald's will have 50% fewer employees.
Because the average worker is responsible for the subprime collapse and the Mudurabah, I mean the "U.S. Federal Reserve" printing of money?
Because the average worker is responsible for these realtors and flippers taking out excess subprime loans to flip houses and increase property taxes?
Because the average worker is responsible for selling the US out to foreign governments on ownership of US Treasuries?
Because the average worker is responsible for the lobby sector's bad stupid decisions? Because the average worker is responsible for reckless government spending?
Because the average worker is responsible for the boomer garbage using their voting majority to use the government to rob us?
If your concern is inflation, keep attacking Congress, the banks and the Federal Reserve.
As the Dixies, Nazis and KKK have pointed out, kicking down the vulnerable to blame for the crimes of influence gets you nowhere. It solves nothing.
Anyone who does these things don't need money, they either has a drug problem or other issues that a licensed psychiatrist can only help them with.
A licensed psychiatrist can't help.
They must help themselves.
Spending money you don't have is never a good idea.
http://www.globaldeflationnews.com/stockmans-warning-on-the-global-econo...
Four Horsemen - Feature Documentary - Official Version
Don’t forget to hug your Barbie American Asia Doll. Free Central Planning money might get harder to find in 2015.
/Sarc
Automate like the old Horn&Hardarts. Make quality good=Homerun.
Or Fastenal, when the parts get caught up on 2nd and 3rd shift card swiping
https://www.fastenal.com/web/en/9/industrial-vending
Had forgotten about Horn and Hardart. Thanks for remembrance. As a child, I recall Montgomery Ward & Woolworths, five-and-dime outlets. Now they call them Dollar stores.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrbyqUOObdU
Self-employment is a useful workaround to minimum wage laws and other labor regulations. Problem is, not everyone is smart enough to be his own boss, and not every value-add can be broken down into pieces small enough to be handled by a single person.
I've also ran into people that like to be told what to do for whatever reason.
Probably because they know they're not the brightest bulb in the box, so they actually will fare better if they shut up and listen to a smarter person.
Bring on the robot burger machines.
The minimum wage will always be $0.00/any unit of time.
What happens when the robot gets robbed? Will it blow green smoke from its ears as deterrent?
BTW, I agree with you. $0.00. It will help knock off croney capitalism..
Robots aren't free.
Think of your PC.
Think of all the admin time loading updates.
In a robot that is a work stoppage.
Think of the factory jobs making the robots.
Think of the maintenance jobs maintaining the robots.
Every set of willing hands is a job waiting to happen...until someone intervenes to stop it.
The interventionists are called 'government'.
Used to start working as a child. Lemonade stand, etc.
Used to start formally working in puberty...doing jobs that are now considered professions.
We didn't have to even get minimum wage. And we didn't have to support ourselves. Parents did that. Each job involved learning a new skill beginning with learning to show up on time, how to clock in, how to clock out.
All we've done here is create an underclass permanently stationed in what used to be OJT.
'
'
'
My thoughts 'zactly.
I think they, TPTB are sitting there, rubbing there hands, half in delicious anticipation, half in fear of what will happen, the first robot that appears in a fast-food restaurant.
Bring on the Rise of the Modern Day Luddites.
The 99%'er crowd that called for the increase in minimum wages will rampage in the streets, as they now know what's coming.
But don't worry, in 10 years, the 'bots'll be replacing lots of everyone else's jobs, too.
•?•
V-V
I have news for you, those machines will end up costing like 8 grand.
In other words, they would make "business sense" at anything over like $3 an hour for a human.
In the end raising minimum wage ends up being an economic wash. True earnings will continue to fall... Afterall, a stable money threatens the welfare/warfare state. Funniest part since the introduction of minimum wage employee earnings have been driven down.
Learn from the Swiss.
http://thesovereigninvestor.com/economic-collapse-2/learn-from-swiss-eff...
Learn from the Swiss.
http://thesovereigninvestor.com/economic-collapse-2/learn-from-swiss-eff...
Raise the wage so payroll taxes go up too. It's never for the people.
The minumum wage has been raised a number of times. What happened in the past?
Or is it "different this time"?
Did the world come to an end?
Did you quit eating at restaurants because the price increased?
I cannot predict the future, my portfolio is proof of that, but I can look at what has happened before and draw conclusions.
The employment ratio is certainly down. It's a lot easier to eat out with an income...
When there is competition, you have choices. Fast food is expected to be inexpensive and fast. But would you rather sit down and have a waitress and an atmosphere for almost the same price? Or is the bathroom-like interior of some of those fast food places too much for some to give up?
So, if I understand you correctly, your argument is this: "minimum wage laws have been around awhile, continually raising the minimum wage, and the world didn't end and people still eat at restaurants." I don't think this really merits any response.
You claim to be able to see what has happened. Really? Can you see all of the people that weren't hired at the higher wage but would have been before it? Can you see all of the things employers would have spent the money on that instead they now have to (over) pay for labor? You have better vision than I do.
It is the little things that add up. In the restaurant business margins are very tight, so a little bump here and there lead to an employee knocked from full-time to part-time, or maybe 2 or 3 hours less a week. Perhaps a new piece of equipment is delayed until next year. Or the seat covers will not get refinished.
Fast forward 10 years, all these little things means going out to eat is 30-40 percent or higher. Not that I am complaining about the minimum wage going up in a few states; it probably needed done. But the effect inflation over the last 100 years needs to be contained once and for all. Our central banking financial system promotes inflation, they need it.
The higher the minimum wage the lower the maximum wage becomes!
Unintended? sure, call them that.
Everyone is so determined to find SOME way to avoid having to make the changes needed to the system. All they do is slap more bandaids on the bleeding bastard...
Inflate asset prices, make more cheap credit available, raise the minimum wage...NONE of these things fixes the fucking PROBLEM!
But they sure will make the inevitable collapse a doozy.
Let the damned economy deflate for the love of GOD already! It will find it's proper level if you leave it alone! Like housing...no-money down loans and zero interest rates will NOT fix housing...letting prices decline by 50% WILL fix housing, without making more bad loans.
Oh, I think they will decline by 50%, to the chagrin of the present owners, many with a mortgage still going. It's simple: everyone out there is working until they drop dead or just can't get out of bed. They realize that social security is boomeraged right back out the door to pay property taxes. Check out states like NJ. Unless you manage to put away about a half million or so, you are screwed. No way to stop working and pay all the bills. So what will happen is all those homes will come on the market when Joe Blow can't get out of bed to work anymore, or his company says "see ya later". All those homes coming on the market? All those kids out of college with 29 hour a week jobs and a 50K student loan? Who's going to pay the $425,000 those owners think the house is worth? Oh, prices will come down, OK. If not that, then the judges gavel will at the foreclosure.
Also, the new home buyers are not going to be two twenty-somethings both working full-time. Look at the labor force participation rate...it's headed back down to where it was before the whole 'bubble-economy' thing took off. It's actually about where it was in the early 70's...right about the time that women were starting to enter the workforce in droves.
But today ounger couples with little hope of great-paying jobs are realizing that after transportation and other costs like child care, it simply does NOT make sense for the woman with younger children to work outside the home anymore. Better for her (or him) to drop out of the labor market, or work part-time, informally out of their homes, and save the day-care costs.
So those new home prices are gonna have to be based on one blue-collar paycheck, which means all those granite countertops and garden spas that homeowners put in might end up having been a REALLY bad idea at the time.
But people who are content to remain where they are will actually be fine, if they don't get all panicky and greedy. The only thing that changes are the numbers...your home remains the exact same place at 50,000 as it was at 250,000. Your PERCEPTION of it has changed. But there ARE ways one can have things like numbers adjusted in one's favor, in most places a significant decline in value would allow you to get a property-tax reduction. But even if you end up paying a bit more than the average renter does, you DON'T have the expenses and inconveniences of having to move, or being subject to a landlord's whims or restrictions. There's a value to that...
You have to pay SOMETHING to live SOMEWHERE after all. The people who can get over the whole housing-bubble mindset will be able to see a pretty good deal in staying put for the most part and letting the storm blow itself out.
There is only one sure way to fix the system - but very few will consider it. A monetary system backed by something which has intrinsic value. Not paper and not debt; central banks must end.
Posted without comment
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lSPNQ82Sq4E
If, in principle, a little (un-economic) raise is good, then surely alot of the same must be better? You can never have too much of a good thing. Proggie's approach is always incremental, though. While in this case it's a technical admission that progonomics has adverse effects, to move more agressively would risk exposing their long run goals to the general public. Apparently, the ultimate goal here is to reduce the supply of low-end jobs (and perhaps assist their debt laden financier friends with a bit of CPI inflation?). Bravo.
On another note, substitute gas station prices for those food pricing signs, and the good little proggies would be flapping their gums about monopolistic/oligopolistic, ie. price gouging. Since when have they chosen to side with the likes of those that finance the lord's work?
My local tavern (and not a dive, either) now beats those new prices, with better food, a waitress, and a draft beer with lunch instead of that toxic 16 oz. sugar drink. Those employees in FF will have an easy job: higher pay, less work. For a while, anyway. It's the American way.
.15 cents for Ohio.There's some hope and change...$6 woopy da dooo.,and that's if they work 40 hours.
That's $0.15 more collective tax dollars Ohio can collect on burger flipping serfs.
/Funny, if it wasn't true.
Ashtabula County, the largest county in Ohio, is so depressed that most of the businesses that are left, only offer minimum wage/ part time.It's nice I'm not one of them but damn this place is starting to look slummy. I see the wage increase as a way to cut EBT benifits while food cost go up. Grocery stores are going to hate it. Just more of the same, nickel and diming everyone.
this raising of minimum wage doesn't work, unless it's done across the board, with rising wages.
this will be a monumental fail, for these states.
Walter e Williams a black American, very intelligent, with a doctorate in economics, for 4-5 decades, he's wrote, and spoke out on the detrimental effects liberal policies have on black youths.
as he explains when the minimum wage rises to a certain point, employers first of all hire less people, and, or cuts work hours, which will hurt young Americans.
taking the employment situation in america, and the stagnation of wages, mc Donald's is going to advertise, or probably just accept applications for future hires, if it's $9.00-$10.50 you'll see people with 10-15-20-25-30yrs. of work history willing to take on a p/t job, to supplement his/hers fixed income, or add it to his/hers other p/t job.
whose mc Donald's going to hire, some adult with a decade, or two of solid work history, or a 17-18 yr. old who thinks he/she is doing you a favor by even applying?
of course they be millions that will do the math, and figure they'd be taking a pay cut, from their monthly mailbox pick-up job, or worse yet endanger it.
There are currently 17 DHS regional office director jobs available at USA Jobs website! Annual salaries 122-171 K a year! Benefits and pension for life!
We have to take this country back. Minimum wage for me in 1971 was 1.65 an hour . A gallon of milk was .89 and a lb oh ground beef .59 a lb. a gallon of milk now 3.60 minimum wage 7.00.
They are starter jobs people . I rented my first 3 bedroom apartment in 1974 for 350 a month plus all utilities. I needed a roommate and was working as an apprentice meat cutter for 4.24 an hour .
We become worth more as our skill sets improve. Period. You don't get paid to show up. You don't get paid to buy your car or fix your teeth and take your girl on a date. You get paid because you provide a skill to your employer that he can use and pass that expense on to his customer.
In the end we all pay.
I believe we have crossed the point of truly fixing the culture, the job situation and he country and you caught me on a good day.
The problem is low wage jobs have become careers . 17 high wage government jobs don't produce anything. They take.
"...government jobs don't produce anything. They take."
Perhaps the reason low wage jobs have become careers.
Gotta feed the parasites...
Hey Deerhunter, your generation sold the country down the river so you could drive Acura's and get divorced three times. The only meatcutting done now is by illegals because again, your generation didn't have the spine to hurt anyone's feelings.
just in this headline..."rents in 19 states to double as landlords say they need the increase more than workers".
I'm probably just preaching to the choir here.. but I think the min. wage just hurts people more than it helps.
you have to be stupid to think that the cost of it won't get passed on. Not just at fast food, but in everything else. the min. wage is just a way for polititions to try to look good, and in the end the hurt the people that voted for them more because of it, by either making it cheeper to automate them out of work, or just price them out of a job.
Along with it, I've been against it for years. Because of the way I funded a business, even though I wanted to collect no salery, I was forced to pay at least min. wage, even though it would be better used to pay additional employees. Who though they all work in unskilled labor positions, all make more than min. wage, because oddly enough it breeds more loyalty to the company to pay them more than the competiton will. though at the same time, the only ones able to afford the service are higher income familes.
Pay a decent wage and shut the fuck up. Not a single worker cares about how you see yourself as a saint for desiring to hire lots of servants for very little money.
The minimum wage law is most properly described as a law that says employers MUST discriminate against people with low skills.. Increase unemployment, increase poverty. - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ca8Z__o52sk
You are the richest nation, you are exceptional and indispensable and you don't have enough economic power to stem $15/h?
What, if you will have to live with TTIP?
For the 'average' person all of the following are far better places to live than the U.S.
http://www.therichest.com/business/the-top-10-countries-with-the-highest...
The trivial minimum wage increase in the states mentioned in this article will have no effect on employment... the article is pure Heritage Foundation BS propaganda funded by the plutocracy.
If you want cheap labor and low wages, the 3rd world beckons. Oh wait, no need to travel, we can just turn the U.S. into the 3rd world.
When you want less of a thing sold, you raise prices and add taxes.
Supply and demand does the rest.
What does that say about Federal Tax and Labor Policy?
Does it escape everyone's attention that until Labor laws started in the guilded age, there was full employment?
Everyone focuses on what someone gets for their work, but ignores what they do for their work.
Yet we know the two are connected.
So, what if we raise the price for entry-level cars to be the same as BMW's?
Great for factory workers, right? Until you figure out that people why buy Fiesta's can't pay for a BMW...or now a Fiesta either.
So, what if we raise the price for Coke? Maybe we raise it to the same as champagne? Price goes up. Demand stays the same. Supply must go down.
Same for the car.
What about for homes?
What about if you artificially raise the price for homes? You could decree the price be higher. Or you could simply give loans to people who cannot repay them.
SUPPLY AND DEMAND. RAISE THE SUPPLY OF mortgagees. DEMAND for home buyers remains the same. PRICES MUST RISE. What could go wrong?
When people make the same mistake over and over, crashing market after market in EXACTLY THE SAME WAY OVER AND AGAIN, there is only one possible explanation:
Whether due to insanity or malice, they want destruction.
This is a good news story. If you are going to inflate the asset prices for things like housing and food by printing money, the least you can do is raise the wages. In Monopoly, if they raise the price of landing on Boardwalk then they have to start giving you more than $200 for passing go. It isn't right or the proper way to play-but in the greater scheme of what's happening right now, it' the right thing to do right now.
our founding fathers initiated the minimum wage laws?