Column – Who would oppose raising minimum wage?
March 21, 2013 at 7:00 pm in Alexandria Echo Press
Who but Scrooge himself could possibly oppose raising the federal minimum wage?
President Obama called for raising the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $9 an hour. If anything in this world is reasonable, it’s that. Continue Reading
1. Finish school.
2. Get a job.
3. Get married.
4. Start a family.
In that order.
…When was it decided the government has to clean up after people who won’t prepare for life in the real world?
Look at H.S. graduation rates, unwed birth rates, single parent families and then blame employers for your hardship. You Betcha.
It’s always someone else’s fault isn’t it?
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I don’t understand…why stop at $9? I think it would be best to raise the minimum wage to at least $25 per hour. Then the people who are just starting out will have a much better chance at making it with ‘living wage’.
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I hope I’m correct in reading sarcasm into that.
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How did I know before reading the byline that this was going to be yet another wonderful piece of propaganda by Dennis Dalman plopped into the pages of the Echo Press? Maybe it was because if there’s a stupid argument to be made, Dalman is invariably the one to make it. People like Dalman think that minimum wage is intended to be a living wage, but it’s not. They think that raising minimum wage will allow people to “catch up,” but it won’t. They think that money to cover the increase in minimum wage will magically appear from nowhere, but it won’t. They think that minimum wage workers will have more buying power, but they won’t. They think that products will remain the same price, but they won’t. All the arguments for raising the minimum wage by such an absurd amount are utterly disingenuous and will not pan out in the end.
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Oh, and quite frankly, while it is true that Dalman’s straw man argument about the sky falling doesn’t come to pass when minimum wage is raised, neither do the grandiose predictions about how wonderful people’s lives will be.
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The sky doesn’t fall, unless you’re a 17 year old kid who wants a summer job and about all you know how to do is sweep a floor. There is a reason why unemployment among teenagers is so high; it’s called the minimum wage.
Interesting that Dahlman reminds us that the minimum wage was a creation of the New Deal in 1933, in the middle of a depression which didn’t end until there was a second world war eight years later.
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Does the average 17-year-old living at home with parents and still going to grade school need anything more than minimum wage in a part-time job?
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WOW a mind reader are you??? How do you profess to know what other people think?
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One does not need to read minds when people like Dalman openly pontificate on what they believe.
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Countries that have a higher minimum wage than the US also have a higher cost of living. Take Australia for example; their minimum wage for people 20 and over is $15.59 but the cost of housing and the price of goods are very high. They stagger their wages in the following way…
Under 16 $5.87
16 $7.55
17 $9.22
18 $10.90
19 $13.17
20 and up $15.59
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Frankly, I have no problem whatsoever with the minimum wage being periodically tweaked in order to keep up with inflation. What I have a SERIOUS problem with, is the way the self-appointed “do-gooders” arrive at what an appropriate number ought to be. That other article in which the “benchmark” being used is what a “modest two bedroom apartment and utilities” costs…is a perfect example. Back when I earned minimum wage, I wasn’t going to work to afford a modest two bedroom, it was to afford a VERY modest one bedroom….and that bedroom was shared with another person making the same wage. We thought we were living extravagantly when we added a third roommate sleeping on the couch because THEN….we could scratch enough together and get HBO added to our cable TV.
What in the world, (or our free market *wink*), is keeping the do-gooders from starting a business or expanding the business they already operate….and leading by example? Why aren’t they ACTIVELY pooh-poohing the minimum wage voluntarily and paying their new-hires $10 per hour right now?
There are probably a few contributing factors, one of which is that bumping the wage up a couple of bucks per hour seldom (or never) affects ONLY the new or recently hired. If you have a guy that’s been working for you for a year or two and he’s been given a dollar per hour raise each year, what happens when we increase the minimum wage by two or three dollars an hour all at once? If he was hired at $7.25 and now is making $9 or $10 per hour and the minimum wage increases TO $9 or $10, doesn’t the person that has put in the time, effort, and dedication STILL deserve to earn $2 or $3 more per hour than a new-hire? Of course he does. Everybody does. And where is THAT money going to come from?
Periodic adjustments are appropriate. BUT….those periodic adjustments ought to be made APPROPRIATELY. In other words, the “do-gooders” WILL NOT make the case for what’s appropriate by “proving” what an appropriate minimum wage target is with nonsense such as what a modest two bedroom apartment with utilities costs.
Let’s be more “literal” in out interpretations. MINIMUM wage translates to MINIMUM amenities. Two bedroom apartment? Nope. Smart phone with a data plan? Nope. Premium TV channel package? Nope. One wage earner in the household earning enough to feed a family? Nope. $500 worth of ink down at the tattoo parlor? Nope. The list goes on and on….
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You make a very good argument for eliminating the minimum wage rather than tweaking it. Let’s change your example to someone you hired at minimum wage a year ago and now you pay him $8/hour. You pay him $8/hour because that’s what he’s now worth to you. Now you have a modest 75 cent increase in the minimum wage and you have to pay a new hire, who does not have the year of experience, the same wage you’re paying the guy with a year of experience. If the minimum wage is legitimate, aren’t you really taking advantage of the guy you’re now paying $8/hour? The principle is the same as in your example.
The folks posting on this subject are, by and large, making good points, but I do not understand this reluctance to admit that the minimum wage is a bad idea altogether. Why not trust the free market to figure this out on its own? Has this idea that minimum wage is some kind of labor protection, as embraced by the likes of Dahlman who understands absolutely NOTHING about economics, become so ingrained in our national conscience that we’re afraid to challenge it, as though it were some kind of constitutional right?
I will repeat what I said in the first post on last week’s article on this subject: it’s a jobs killer. Maybe not my job or your job or the jobs of most people, but it does kill jobs on the lower end of the economic scale and for all the reasons so well-articulated in many of these posts: that’s not a good thing.
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“If some companies cannot afford to pay an increased minimum wage, there should be a mechanism that if they can show why, they could be exempt from the wage raise.”
And let’s have another layer of bueacracy to decide who should be exempt and who shouldn’t. No, better yet–let’s have the government decide how much every employer should pay their employees. Better yet still—let’s have the government decide how much every individual in the country should make based on how society values their work and so they will “know their hard work is appreciated.”
(And yes–I’m being very sarcastic and I too wasn’t quite sure if Gnibs was being sarcastic or not).
When it comes to economics, Dahlman thinks like a junior high schooler. To answer the question in the title of the column: grown-ups.
Hot debate. What do you think?
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I just don’t understand why the Echo Press wastes resources to include Dalman’s material. Sure, he used to work for them, but so what? I used to work for a lot of places, but that doesn’t mean I should have any pull or input at those places anymore.
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Jay–just to be clear: we’re on the same side of this issue. My point is that teenagers don’t get hired, because of the minimum wage. There are so many jobs that could be there for teenagers, but are not because the government sticks its nose into the process. There are a lot of jobs kids could do but it’s simply not economicaly feasible to hire them, precisely because of minimum wage.
As an example, I’ve noticed in the last couple of years that it’s nearly impossible to find a clean table in a fast food restaurant and the grounds around these places are litter filled and dirty. It would probably be worth it to those businesses to hire more labor to clean tables and take care of the facility, but not at the wage they must pay for the labor to do it.
Dahlman’s straw man argument about the sky not falling doesn’t have a grain of truth to it. It’s just plain false. Minimum wage does prevent kids from getting summer jobs or after school jobs that would put some money in their pockets and, more importantly, give them the experience of working for a paycheck.
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“All of you seem to believe….”
Hardly. Re-read some of the posts. Lots of us have worked for minimum wage. Many of us did so with very realistic expectations. Those realistic expectations RESULTED in aspiring to earn more than the minimum wage and taking action.
Waving your “all of you” finger accusingly only proves that you either didn’t read all of the posts, or you’ve come to the conclusion that the only opinion that matters….is yours.
I posted this, for example:
“Frankly, I have no problem whatsoever with the minimum wage being periodically tweaked in order to keep up with inflation.”
and this:
“Periodic adjustments are appropriate.”
See anything there you’d like to discuss/debunk/debate?
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Have you ever checked out SayAnythingBlog—touted as ND’s premiere political blog? If you ever get bored you should because there are several people on there that would benefit from your insight.
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