JFLNYC wrote:

The thing about us businesspeople is that we love our customers rich and our employees poor. So for as long as there has been capitalism, capitalists have said the same thing about any effort to raise wages. We’ve had 75 years of complaints from big business—when the minimum wage was instituted, when women had to be paid equitable amounts, when child labor laws were created. Every time the capitalists said exactly the same thing in the same way: We’re all going to go bankrupt. I’ll have to close. I’ll have to lay everyone off. It hasn’t happened. In fact, the data show that when workers are better treated, business gets better. The naysayers are just wrong.

It makes perfect sense if you think about it: If a worker earns $7.25 an hour, which is now the national minimum wage, what proportion of that person’s income do you think ends up in the cash registers of local small businesses? Hardly any. That person is paying rent, ideally going out to get subsistence groceries at Safeway, and, if really lucky, has a bus pass. But she’s not going out to eat at restaurants. Not browsing for new clothes. Not buying flowers on Mother’s Day.

Is this issue more complicated than I’m making out? Of course. Are there many factors at play determining the dynamics of employment? Yup. But please, please stop insisting that if we pay low-wage workers more, unemployment will skyrocket and it will destroy the economy. It’s utter nonsense. The most insidious thing about trickle-down economics isn’t believing that if the rich get richer, it’s good for the economy. It’s believing that if the poor get richer, it’s bad for the economy.

The Pitchforks Are Coming... For Us Plutocrats

TenuredVulture wrote:Well, it seems to me that while it's a good idea to raise the minimum wage, the question is by how much--is $15 really optimum? What if it were $12? or $18? I mean, at some point you would have to think business couldn't operate profitably.

I do think we absolutely somehow index the minimum wage to inflation.

results of this study confirm previous findings, namely, that the relatively modest mandated increases in employees’ regular and tipped minimum wages in the past twenty years have not had large or reliable effects on the number of restaurant establishments or restaurant industry employment levels, although those increases have raised restaurant industry wages overall. Even when restaurants have raised prices in response to wage increases, those price increases do not appear to have decreased demand or profitability enough to sizably or reliably decrease either the number of restaurant establishments or the number of their employees. Although minimum wage increases almost certainly necessitate changes in restaurant prices or operations, those changes do not appear to dramatically affect overall demand or industry size. Furthermore, there is strong evidence that increases in the minimum wage reduce turnover, and good reason to believe that it may increase employee productivity as well.

For example, Econ 101 theory tells us that minimum wage policies should have a harmful impact on employment... That’s theory. Reality, it turns out, is very different. In the last two decades, empirical economists have looked at a large number of minimum wage hikes, and concluded that in most cases, the immediate effect on employment is very small.

Another example is welfare. Econ 101 theory tells us that welfare gives people an incentive not to work. If you subsidize leisure, simple theory says you will get more of it.

But recent empirical studies have shown that such effects are usually very small.

SK790 wrote:It's almost like the world is more complicated than Econ 101...

Graham Brady, chairman of the 1922 committee of Conservative lawmakers, said that there was “no need to rerun the election,” and that Ms. May was now the only candidate to lead the party — and therefore succeed David Cameron as prime minister.

Werthless wrote:I like how people opposing a doubling of the minimum wage are asked to make am argument against it.

momadance wrote:

smitty wrote:LG's opinion in regards to this issue would be very valuable as he is up to date on this stuff.

It would be:

A) I'm too lazy
B) His clearance is probably closer to Hillary's. His SSBI is higher.
C) I'm honestly tired of dealing with the clearance shit. So are my family and neighbors.

drsmooth wrote:

Werthless wrote:I like how people opposing a doubling of the minimum wage are asked to make am argument against it.

Again, fixating on the dollar figure used as the concept's marketing slogan is insipid thinking on the part of advocates as well as opponents. Please stop doing it. That will make you appear intelligent, rather than merely truculent

Werthless wrote:
Very interesting that the supporters of Clinton's position want me to ignore the specifics of the position.

Woody wrote:If the working poor in this country start to earn more money who will I be able to look down upon as the butt of my classist jokes?

pacino wrote:If we had previously indexed min wage to inflation it'd be in the 20s by now