Current Events > Someone explain how a $15 minimum wage would work

(+) Yeah! (+)

If the minimum wage was $15, one of these things would happen:

- businesses would not increase prices, but then they would have to hire fewer employees. So while your purchasing power would be higher, good luck finding a job that pays less than $15 today. also, big businesses will be much more able to handle this situation than small businesses, and many small businesses (and perhaps some big businesses) will close.

- businesses would hire the same number of employees, but would have to raise prices to make up for the difference. in this case, employees' purchasing power will range from slightly more than before to the same as before to slightly less than before. alternatively, only bug businesses will be able to keep their prices the same. or not much much than they were before. people will only go to these big businesses that have relatively very low prices, and many small businesses (and perhaps some big businesses) will fail

please explain why this is wrong
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Any reason people give, Washington state has shown that it does not work. And another state (I forget which) is even lowering minimum wage from 10 to 7 dollars bc of the economic impact.
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No one would be paid less than 15 dollars an hour.
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Or

- businesses pull up their bootstraps and adapt like they expect us to. Innovate and stop giving billion dollar bonuses to higher ups. Then they make up the difference in increased sales since people actually have money to spend.
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What we need to do is make Minimum wage go down to 3.50 and let the states decide from there.
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tremain07 posted...

What we need to do is make Minimum wage go down to 3.50 and let the states decide from there.

after we turn off the welfare, housing and food stamps though
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foreverzero212 posted...

Or

- businesses pull up their bootstraps and adapt like they expect us to. Innovate and stop giving billion dollar bonuses to higher ups. Then they make up the difference in increased sales since people actually have money to spend.

Even if the top CEO of a major company took no pay for a year; the employees would get less than $0.10 an hour more... So basically, upper management wages are not an argument for higher paid grunt workers.

There are many more companies (small businesses) that cannot physically support higher wages; especially so fast.
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It wouldn't work. Bleeding heart liberals just advocate it because it seems like an easy, quick fix to those who are utterly oblivious to how Economics works.
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*is from Washington, knows plenty of Seattle friends who are doing much better thanks to the $15 min wage than they ever were before*

*remembers that rent is the highest growing in Seattle and was even before the minimum wage increase*

*remembers that the law always favors land development and landlords*
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Roxborough4Ever posted...

tremain07 posted...

What we need to do is make Minimum wage go down to 3.50 and let the states decide from there.

after we turn off the welfare, housing and food stamps though

Oh, definitely, it's not the government's place to take care of people who don't contribute to society or people at all really, that's why I would like protesting in any form to be outlawed and instead of forcing states to build and maintain prisons, let private organizations do it and let them write their own legislation and standard practices. I also feel that we should arm police with better weapons, do away with tasers and batons and crappy standard handguns, they need things much more powerful so they can end threats quicker such as riots, there's nothing sadder than watching the police flee from human trash with better weapons than them. Finally, I feel that schooling should become much more competitive where failing students are immediately expelled if their averages aren't above B plus. The world doesn't stop to cater to the failures so neither should schooling as it's job is to prepare the kids for the real world environment.
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MaverickXeo posted...

So basically, upper management wages are not an argument for higher paid grunt workers.

Found the manager in the topic.
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DK9292 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

So basically, upper management wages are not an argument for higher paid grunt workers.

Found the manager in the topic.

Not at all. Never been a manager in my life; and am currently working for min wage myself. I actually understand how basic economics work; and how only so much money exists.
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Roxborough4Ever posted...

tremain07 posted...

What we need to do is make Minimum wage go down to 3.50 and let the states decide from there.

after we turn off the welfare, housing and food stamps though

Uh that stuff would need needed even more if minimum wage was lowered to 3.50.
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When tons of adults are forced to work min wage jobs and many of them still need welfare services just to support themselves. There's a need for the min wage to be higher than it currently is. Inflation will still happen regardless if people are being paid more.

If raising min wage gets more people off of welfare services than those who need it from lost jobs then I would say it's a good trade.
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creativerealms posted...

Uh that stuff would need needed even more if minimum wage was lowered to 3.50.

Needed but why should it exist and be provided for people who, and I'm sorry for the bluntness of this, don't matter to the government or society at all?
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tremain07 posted...

creativerealms posted...

Uh that stuff would need needed even more if minimum wage was lowered to 3.50.

Needed but why should it exist and be provided for people who, and I'm sorry for the bluntness of this, don't matter to the government or society at all?

Unless we're going to round up and execute everyone that doesn't matter, it is in everyone's best interest to give a fuck about those people.
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MaverickXeo posted...

DK9292 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

So basically, upper management wages are not an argument for higher paid grunt workers.

Found the manager in the topic.

Not at all. Never been a manager in my life; and am currently working for min wage myself. I actually understand how basic economics work; and how only so much money exists.

Minimum wage worker, economics expert

Sounds totally believable
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hockeybub89 posted...

Unless we're going to round up and execute everyone that doesn't matter, it is in everyone's best interest to give a f*** about those people.

Why? If they try anything just arrest them like any other criminal, no reason to go around executing people
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tremain07 posted...

Roxborough4Ever posted...

tremain07 posted...

What we need to do is make Minimum wage go down to 3.50 and let the states decide from there.

after we turn off the welfare, housing and food stamps though

Oh, definitely, it's not the government's place to take care of people who don't contribute to society or people at all really, that's why I would like protesting in any form to be outlawed and instead of forcing states to build and maintain prisons, let private organizations do it and let them write their own legislation and standard practices. I also feel that we should arm police with better weapons, do away with tasers and batons and crappy standard handguns, they need things much more powerful so they can end threats quicker such as riots, there's nothing sadder than watching the police flee from human trash with better weapons than them. Finally, I feel that schooling should become much more competitive where failing students are immediately expelled if their averages aren't above B plus. The world doesn't stop to cater to the failures so neither should schooling as it's job is to prepare the kids for the real world environment.

come on man, now you're just talking alex jones bullshit
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The people's expectations are that CEOs and higher ups will use some of their paycheck on them but in reality, its gonna be what TC said.
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Roxborough4Ever posted...

come on man, now you're just talking alex jones bulls***

Alex jones is a conman, I'm just thinking in realistic scenarios.
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foreverzero212 posted...

Or

- businesses pull up their bootstraps and adapt like they expect us to. Innovate and stop giving billion dollar bonuses to higher ups. Then they make up the difference in increased sales since people actually have money to spend.

Innovation hurts workers more than anything else. Rather than pay workers more, those workers are now expensive enough to make automating their entire position cost effective. See: McDonalds

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s0nicfan posted...

foreverzero212 posted...

Or

- businesses pull up their bootstraps and adapt like they expect us to. Innovate and stop giving billion dollar bonuses to higher ups. Then they make up the difference in increased sales since people actually have money to spend.

Innovation hurts workers more than anything else. Rather than pay workers more, those workers are now expensive enough to make automating their entire position cost effective. See: McDonalds

They aren't automating to avoid paying employees, they are automating in general because it's a way to bring about faster, more accurate results. Amazon has had its warehouses automated since what, 2010?

Also, weren't the McDonalds kiosks failures? None hamburger with left cheese?
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gunplagirl posted...

They aren't automating to avoid paying employees, they are automating in general because it's a way to bring about faster, more accurate results. Amazon has had its warehouses automated since what, 2010?

Also, weren't the McDonalds kiosks failures? None hamburger with left cheese?

They're not automating to avoid paying employees explicitly, but investing in automation requires funding, and the cost/benefit ratio has to be high enough for companies to bother. Why spend millions on developing a machine, tens of thousands per location to install them, and then an ongoing cost to maintain them... if they end up being more expensive per hour to have than people?

Amazon automated their warehouses because it's cheaper than staffing them. Being faster and more accurate is a product of how many people you can employ and train. If Amazon warehouses had a person at every shelf, people would still be faster, but not cheaper.

As for the kiosks, I'm sure their version 1 had kinks that needed working out, but they're nothing that can't be patched.
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Well, raising a minimum wage is supposed to work like this:

People work the same amount but get paid more, so that they can use that money to further stimulate the economy, which feeds more money into industries that money is spent on, thereby ensuring that growth happens pretty much all around, ensuring better product and experience for all. Then, when enough time has passed, the consumer goods market would have changed so much that a new, higher price is acceptable to the general public.

However, the way it actually works is this:

Cost of living goes up to levels that most cannot afford, even though the minimum wage was originally designed to be a living wage that would adjust given the market at time of adjustment. Then people complain about how hard it is to make rent and fulfill basic needs with one, or even sometimes two, jobs, despite having to put up with an overwhelming amount of shit from entitled people, for the same amount of time. Then said individuals that complained get thrown a bone in the form of a pay raise that still isn't enough to afford living on your own,

It takes $19/hr to rent your own apartment here, if you're working a full-time job before pay gets taxed. Minimum wage is $11.25. Minimum wage needs to be raised more depending on what state workers live in, to at least match cost of living. .Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.
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gunplagirl posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

DK9292 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

So basically, upper management wages are not an argument for higher paid grunt workers.

Found the manager in the topic.

Not at all. Never been a manager in my life; and am currently working for min wage myself. I actually understand how basic economics work; and how only so much money exists.

Minimum wage worker, economics expert

Sounds totally believable

Also a student, who has taken economics courses. Basic economics is really all you need to understand how wages work...
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ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?
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MaverickXeo posted...

gunplagirl posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

DK9292 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

So basically, upper management wages are not an argument for higher paid grunt workers.

Found the manager in the topic.

Not at all. Never been a manager in my life; and am currently working for min wage myself. I actually understand how basic economics work; and how only so much money exists.

Minimum wage worker, economics expert

Sounds totally believable

Also a student, who has taken economics courses. Basic economics is really all you need to understand how wages work...

Ever see good will hunting? Because you remind me of the apples guy who only took one philosophy class and yet somehow thought he had the whole field understood by then.
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MaverickXeo posted...

Also a student, who has taken economics courses. Basic economics is really all you need to understand how wages work...

This just in, a self-perceived understanding of economics, which is in and of itself, a complicated subject that people with much more experience dealing with it admit is complicated, is actually all you need to fix the economy.

In other news, a psych 101 class is now all that a student needs to treat others as a personal psychiatrist.
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s0nicfan posted...

Innovation hurts workers more than anything else. Rather than pay workers more, those workers are now expensive enough to make automating their entire position cost effective. See: McDonalds

With no real plans to raise the minimum wage, this happened anyway.
http://fortune.com/2016/11/18/mcdonalds-kiosks-table-service/
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tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?
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MysteryMan923 posted...

It wouldn't work. Bleeding heart liberals just advocate it because it seems like an easy, quick fix to those who are utterly oblivious to how Economics works.

Best answer

ManicPlumber77 posted...

tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?

learn a real skill that makes them actually wanted by employers. Last I checked libraries are free
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tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?

learn a real skill that makes them actually wanted by employers. Last I checked libraries are free

Got it, you don't actually have an argument.
Lemme know when you get out of basic high school econ, kid.
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ManicPlumber77 posted...

tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?

Stop having kids would be where I would start.

EnterTheTekken posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?

Stop having kids would be where I would start.

And for the vast majority of people who don't have kids, due to not making enough to actually support the little parasites?
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ManicPlumber77 posted...

EnterTheTekken posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?

Stop having kids would be where I would start.

And for the vast majority of people who don't have kids, due to not making enough to actually support the little parasites?

That's a small percentage of people who are on welfare, EBT, or receive some form government assistance.

I want to be focused on the macro, of which those who generate the most in financial assistance also have children. That's where I would start.

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Got it, you don't actually have an argument.
Lemme know when you get out of basic high school econ, kid.

The tolerant left everybody!
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JSancton posted...

Washington state has shown that it does not work.

Wrong

JSancton posted...

And another state (I forget which) is even lowering minimum wage from 10 to 7 dollars bc of the economic impact.

And also wrong.

EnterTheTekken posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

EnterTheTekken posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?

Stop having kids would be where I would start.

And for the vast majority of people who don't have kids, due to not making enough to actually support the little parasites?

That's a small percentage of people who are on welfare, EBT, or receive some form government assistance.

I want to be focused on the macro, of which those who generate the most in financial assistance also have children. That's where I would start.

Well, sure. The whole "Less mouths to feed" philosophy has always been valid, but you're trying to use a future problem (unconceived future children) as a solution to a present issue, which is people can't afford to have kids, or even really support themselves, and the dependence on government assistance is a direct consequence of a lack of an actual living wage.

So I ask again, how. do. we. fix. this?
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EnterTheTekken posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Right now we just have a bunch of people drowning while trying desperately to swim to make sure they aren't trapped under the current.

And that's their problem, not the government's if they're so unskilled or too lazy to better themselves why bother with them in general?

And how would you so broadly suggest one "better themselves"?

Stop having kids would be where I would start.

lol...shows what you know...you get more "free" govt money to stay home and have kids then you would get working..kids are an investment..you get more stay at home welfare money then working 55 hours minimum wage...you dont get overtime because every illegal whose been given sanctuary doesn't, so because of them you are expected too aswell..this is the future we wanted
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We don't just let the pieces fall where they may.
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tremain07 posted...

ManicPlumber77 posted...

Got it, you don't actually have an argument.
Lemme know when you get out of basic high school econ, kid.

The tolerant left everybody!

The hell said I was any direction.
I'm just saying that you don't actually know what you're talking about, and you're not just out and saying "I'm in a high school econ class, and think I know everything there is to know about an advanced subject I clearly have no actual experience in. Also, John Maynard Keynes was right about everything, and a flat tax is just the best idea ever.", even though your arguments pretty much point it out for you. So it's all good.
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MaverickXeo posted...

Also a student, who has taken economics courses. Basic economics is really all you need to understand how wages work...

Right, I suppose that's why there are competing studies drawing different conclusions about the effects of the higher minimum wages in Seattle. If only those professional economy researchers had taken an intro-level course in economics.
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Damn_Underscore posted...

please explain why this is wrong

Damn_Underscore posted...

would have to raise prices to make up for the difference. in this case, employees' purchasing power will range from slightly more than before to the same as before to slightly less than before.

What wrong is that employee's purchasing power would be significantly more than before.
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hockeybub89 posted...

No one would be paid less than 15 dollars an hour.

But chances are hours would be cut.
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scar the 1 posted...

MaverickXeo posted...

Also a student, who has taken economics courses. Basic economics is really all you need to understand how wages work...

Right, I suppose that's why there are competing studies drawing different conclusions about the effects of the higher minimum wages in Seattle. If only those professional economy researchers had taken an intro-level course in economics.

I suggest you look into actual papers on the subject; and not just what the mainstream media is covering.
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JSancton posted...

Any reason people give, Washington state has shown that it does not work. And another state (I forget which) is even lowering minimum wage from 10 to 7 dollars bc of the economic impact.

Naw, they are lowering it because the legislature in Jefferson City(Missouri) is filled with bunch oh hypocrites who don't give a damn about what the voters in St. Louis want.
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So many actual Luddites still on this board. It's like that Luddite topic never existed. Then again, these are the types of folks with shitty job or tech jobs that is a direct result of their poor understanding of economics.

And yeah that one guy on this topic that says he has a good understanding of wages after 1 class of economics, doesn't even say what that class was, even. Sure if it's a high level human resource class, maybe, but that's hardly just 1 class. You probably needed to take a bunch of other prereqs
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ontario has a 15$ min wage
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