Ooo, the minimum wage issue. My feelings on it are that minimum wage is not MEANT to support a family, and certainly not on only one minimum wage income.

Raising the minimum wage would simply drive jobs out of the country, or to illegals willing to do it, because to be quite honest, there are some jobs that just aren’t worth any more than $5ish an hour.

So, “How can a family survive?”. They’re not supposed to. Don’t have kids, and hopefully keep a roomate, to support the lifestyle minimum wage was intended to support.

Get a skill worth more than what any sullen teenager can do, or get some birth control.

[/rantypants]

Get a skill worth more than what any sullen teenager can do

The problem is that we’re getting better and better at making machines, and creating production processes that allow MANY jobs to be done by “sullen teenagers.” Economists are always pointing out how we’ve moved away from a manufacturing base to a “service based” economy.  Of course “service” can mean anything from sweeping floors at the local McDs to working as a network administrator for a fortune 500 Co.  But most service jobs that pay a fairly decent wage require more than a highschool education-- and we don’t fund education (in general) the way we used to. 

On top of all of that, even jobs that DO have a fairly developed skillset are being exported these days.

I can understand the libertarian objections to minimum wage, but when you look at the way that capitalism functions, the only way for workers to get a “living” wage is for the labor pool to be dramatically reduced (relative increase in worker value in Medieval England after Plague), or for individual workers to acquire skillsets that are invaluable.  If there’s enough competition in the domestic labor market, companies can always find someone to do the work for dirt cheap.  Early industrial America and England are pretty good examples of the kind of things that can happen when you adopt laissez faire economic policy.

These days, most workers are pretty replaceable.  If there was no minimum wage law, companies would be happy to pay people 50 cents an hour.  And they’d be able to find people to do the work, too.  Would there be enlightened companies that would not try to cut their labor expenses to the bone?  Sure.  There are companies like that today.  But the vast majority of companies, if they’re feeling the pinch, look to “streamline.” And that means squeezing more work out of fewer employees-- because that IS productivity.

All of this creates an increasing pressure on businesses to extract more and more labor for less and less pay.  And if they’re not willing to adopt those methods, their competitors will.  That tends to make even companies with moral objections take a second look at their approach.

I have a sneaking suspicion that your hostility toward the minimum wage is because you ARE an employer (but I could be way off base!).  I can understand that you might occassionally look at an employee and think (What the HELL am I paying this person for?) But laissez faire economic policy isn’t the answer.  And I guarantee that it would create the kind of economic pressures that would again force laborers to unionize.  (How do you feel about unions?)

The truth is that my understanding of economics is --very-- limited, and I’m no authority on this.  But I believe industrialization has led us to a point where we have more than enough people, and not enough “necessary” jobs for them to do.

A Malthusian might say “Excellent.  Starvation is there to restore the natural balance.” I can only think YIKES! 

On top of all that, if everyone runs out and gets themselves some sort of advanced skill set, then that skillset is no longer invaluable-- it’s common, and the labor pool is once again huge. . .

Hell, I WANT the peasant who’s cleaning my mansion to have a living wage.  Otherwise they might kill me and eat me.

(If I actually knew what I was talking about, I might be dangerous.)

I have a sneaking suspicion that your hostility toward the minimum wage is because you ARE an employer (but I could be way off base!)

Sort of, but not really. I’ve never employed anyone for minimum wage. The least I’ve ever paid a full time employee was around $7.50 and hour, 4 years ago.

My business doesn’t have much requirement for a minimum wage type of position. Skilled workers only. I can wash my own coffee mug and sweep the floor myself.

But jobs like McDonalds, the greeter at WalMart, etc., etc. I just don’t see them being worth more than that. If businesses are FORCED to pay more than a position is worth, they may just reconsider even having that position. I would.

My housekeeper averages around $20/hour. Not bad. Although she’s not paid “hourly”, but by visit. Considering her other houses, she’s raking in a tidy sum.

Adults SHOULD have a living wage. I agree. But minimum wage is not supposed to be a living wage for a family with kids. It’s a living wage for a single person who maybe has a roomate.

And if one is not happy with that lot in life (and they shouldn’t be for long), I suggest they develop a skill that is worth paying more money for.

People can not expect to live the “American Dream”...house, kids, daycare, and two cars...when they’ve never learned to do anything more than that a 16 y/o kid can do. Everyone os not entitled to a comfortable living by just barely being a warm body for 8 hours a day. You have to provide the employer with a skill worth paying for.

I maintain that minimum wage was never intended to support a family, and only barely intended to support ONE adult (living very frugally)...which is why it’s called MINIMUM.

I agree that minimum wage shouldn’t be a comfortable wage.  But it should at least meet basic food, housing, and transportation needs.
That’s not comfortable by any stretch of the imagination.  How many people are “happy” eating, sleeping and working, and having no expendable cash to go on vacation, see a movie, etc?  Having a weekend off, with no money to actually go and do anything tends to “motivate” people to acquire more valuable job skills.  I don’t think it’s necessary to keep them teetering on the brink of homelessness.

As for families supporting kids on minimum wage, I’m conflicted.  1) Don’t breed if you can’t afford it.  2) Kids don’t choose their parents.

The last difficulty that I have with minimum wage is that it is often determined in the most random way.  It’s 7 something dollars an hour in WA, which makes perfect sense if you’re in Pullman, because the rents here are comparable to what you’d pay in Sacto CA. (ie: really high).  On the other hand, if you drive twenty minutes away, to Colfax, it’s no longer officially a University Town, and the rents drop substantially.

So cost of living can fluctuate pretty wildly within the range of a few miles, but the minimum wage tends to be adopted on statewide levels.

I don’t have any solutions for any of these problems.  I just remember what it was like to be a dishwasher, to work at Toys R’ Us, to stack palettes in a warehouse, and the sort of hopelessness that came with those jobs.  I really thought that I was never going to get out of there.  I remember living with two roomates, while working at Carl’s Jr., and losing about fifteen pounds over the summer while the cupboards were fully stocked with food that wasn’t mine.

Of course I’m a teacher-- so I’m going to spend my entire life sucking the govt. tit.  Hardly a place from which I can tell others how their tax dollars should be spent.

I think you’ve hit on a good point. It doesn’t make sense to set a minimum STATE wide, much less nationwide. MW (minimum wage, my fingers are cramping up) is an entirely different lifestyle depending on where you live. We have the numbers for comparitive local costs of living, and the MW should reflect that, IMO.

I’d probably starve making MW in the city I live in. But if I lived over in the piss-pot town where our marina is, less than an hour away, I’d be in comparitively pretty high cotton.

But it should at least meet basic food, housing, and transportation needs.
That’s not comfortable by any stretch of the imagination. How many people are “happy” eating, sleeping and working, and having no expendable cash to go on vacation, see a movie, etc? Having a weekend off, with no money to actually go and do anything tends to “motivate” people to acquire more valuable job skills. I don’t think it’s necessary to keep them teetering on the brink of homelessness.

But the thing is, if MW is raised signifigantly, low skilled or unskilled jobs either go away or give way to a machine. Nobody gets any on-the-job training if there are no entry level jobs. For many people without education (but with brains), working for awhile at MW while aquiring new on-the-job skills and value is the ONLY way for them to work up the ladder.

I could pull up all sorts of studies on the negative impact on jobs of raising MW. But I’d rather look at it from a personal view. I’d like to have someone answer my phones. It’s not necessary, it’s a business luxury (for me). I’d be glad to pay some college kid $5/hour to do that. But at $7-8/hr? No, I’ll do it myself, or just cope with the staff I have. It’s just not worth any more to me, and that potential job has just evaporated. Maybe that job wouldn’t have supported a family of four, but it sure as hell could have kept someone in groceries that wouldn’t otherwise be working. No, I don’t expect that to be somebody’s dream job from which they retire and get a gold watch. But it’s a job where there previously wasn’t one.

As for families supporting kids on minimum wage, I’m conflicted. 1) Don’t breed if you can’t afford it. 2) Kids don’t choose their parents.

True on both counts. But as a taxpayer, a business owner, and a very hard worker, I find it extremely distastful for the government to force me to support or reward someone else’s continual bad decisions. The whole thing creates an attitude of entitlement. Is everyone who choses to breed ENTITLED to a two bedroom house, two kids, and a stay-at-home mom? No way. You have to work hard for that. My thoughts, as vicious as they may sound, are that you are no more entitled to anything just by virtue of having children. The children are entitled to things by virtue of being here. And then it gets all sticky. There has GOT to be some level of responsibility envoked before we find ourselves in a country full of lazy entitlement-minded whiners.

Nobody I know of has ever stayed at a MW job for very long, and certainly not expected to make a lifelong career out of it if they did. That’s the issue, MW jobs are NOT lifelong vocations. There is the assumption that even an 8th grade dropout will eventually work their way up from an entry level MW job, just through hard work and dedication.

Even *I*, who took a MW job right out of highschool (to get through college) had worked my way up to $12/hour within a short amount of time, and that had no bearing whatsoever on my pursuit of education at that point. What I mean is, I could have been considered just a basic highschool graduate with no college, making $12/hr. at 19-20. How? I worked hard, kept my attitude in check, and I attempted every new task that was thrown down the pike at me...with a smile. They were getting cheap labor up front, but I was gaining value every day.

Of course I’m a teacher— so I’m going to spend my entire life sucking the govt. tit. Hardly a place from which I can tell others how their tax dollars should be spent.

Ha! Don’t be so hard on yourself. I live in a defense contractor town. I don’t do government work directly, but you could say it’s indirectly put a few burgers in my mouth. Working for the government is just as noble as any other line of work.

“entitlement-minded whiners.” I mean no offense, but I am picking up on a little bit of that in these posts. Raising minimum wage creates problems, and job-losses, but so does the cost of living which is getting a bit ridiculous. I think you are paying for the people’s continual bad choices alright, but alot of them are coming from those running this circus. Our utility companies are flat out ripping people off, as are the medical and insurance industries.
Neither of you are considering the people this country has let down. I live in an area rampant with such cases. The government requires schooling, but does not ensure that schooling is sufficient. I cannot count on both hands and feet the number of people I have had to fill out checks for because they cannot write out more than their names, and it wasn’t because they did not go to school, it was because the school passed them along anyway; whether to save their stats or rid themselves of a headache one can only guess. You can put this responsibility with the parents, but some of those children became the parents, and regardless, the blame doesn’t matter unless it fixes the problem - so far it hasn’t.
You make it sound as if you truly believe that everyone out there is given - or able to create - the same opportunities, but that is simply not reality. Have either of you sat down, for free, to teach these people something that will take them further along in life? Not many people do, and yet they complain they are entitled to better spent taxes. Said quite frankly, unless you take an active role in helping the lower-rung people, then I don’t think you should really complain about them bringing the rest of us down.
As for the “ don’t breed if you cannot afford it “ comment, I wonder if either of you have children. I do, and it looks as if I will have to take a job well under my qualifications and pay history just to have something coming in. A few years ago, I had no problem supporting my children, but circumstances change, especially in an economy like this. If you are saying that a person making minimum wage should probably wait to have children until they are making better money, then so be your opinion. But the way you are putting it is rather insensitive to people who once were doing just fine and to those who are the greatest of parents but do not have the skills, the education, the intelligence, and/or the opportunity to climb that latter. There are people out there like that, you know.

This is one of those issues I always have a hard time with mainly because I can see all the sides. Yes, there are people who would settle for minimum wage jobs as an entitlement and not work to move up if it provided enough to live on, but there are also a lot of people out there whom I believe want to move up the ladder that don’t have the opportunity and for whom minimum wage would remove them from the welfare qualification without providing enough to subsist on for any length of time that might allow them to work their way up the ladder or gain the skills they need. I know this because I’ve met them.

Honestly, that’s one of the biggest issues I can think of is that the inability to live day to day on minimum wage is the main reason so many people don’t bother to try and just sit on welfare using the breeding method to give themselves “raises” as it were. As the news article itself points out even if these people were inclined to put their kids in daycare and go out and get a job the cost of daycare alone would eat up so much of their minimum wage that they’d not be able to feed themselves let alone pay for necessary utilities.

Honestly, if it’s more beneficial to them to pump out kids and sit on welfare than to go out and get that entry level job then is it any surprise that they don’t? There’s no easy way for most people who are so inclined to move from the welfare situation to working full-time successfully. Even if we boot them off of welfare more often than not the end up back on it before too long.

So I guess it comes down to do we want to spend the money on welfare where they don’t contribute back to society in any significant way or do we want to spend the money on a minimum wage that might encourage more people to get off of welfare and stand on their own two feet without risking their very survival in doing so?

Everything is expensive in New York, and $5.15 is a REDICULOUSLY low minimum wage in such a hauty-tauty state (with the exception of maybe some upstate boonie towns).  Hell, I live in Connecticut, and it was a year before my boss gave me a raise (and that, they admitted, was based on their own irresponsibility).  I can’t even imagine living on the wage that I make now - and we only have a 6% sales tax.  In fact, I have a 16 year old friend who CAN’T.  And she lives with her 30 year old boyfriend in an apartment that they can barely afford, even when he has a job.

Even if New York’s tax is 1% higher, they shouldn’t have a wage $2.00 lower than what’s considered normal in the state next to it.  Not only that, but prices are higher EVERYWHERE because of our crappy economy and gas prices are still skyrocketing compared to what they were 2 years ago.

As for the kids: THIS IS WHY ABORTION SHOULD BE FULLY LEGAL.  I really hate to say it (and I don’t think abortion should be the way out of everything), but the choice should be up to the women, and many times these days it isn’t.  Take out the “chance” factor, and let ‘em do it.  And it’s not like it’s an easy way out either way - they’re really expensive, they practically destroy the reproductive system, and they’re morally reprehensible.  So if they want to, with all of those negative factors, LET THEM DO IT.  We’re ALREADY starting to get overpopulated - and in eastern countries where the problem is rampant (like Japan - a FIFTH world country at it’s maximum state of societal development), abortion is ENCOURAGED.  In cities, children are not a commodity - they’re a hindrance.  I’m definitely not saying that we should be like that; I’m saying we shouldn’t wait until we have to be.  No child should be raised in a world where he isn’t wanted by anyone.

I agree with Brandi.  If people are too poor to have children, they shouldn’t.  Ever.  They shouldn’t even be taking CHANCES with getting pregnant.  But 5 bucks an hour is still too low to live on - it’s just not reasonable.

I just KNOW I’m gonna get the riot act for this one.

Greetings from the State of Florida:

I have noted the alarming trend of companies PUSHING wages down to $5.15 an hour from a higher level.  In a consumer based economy, this is the equivilent of hemlock.  The less money you have, the less you have to spend and the slower the economy progresses.

In this state, housing is not affordable or rentable at $5.15 an hour.  Public housing helps when it can be found. One city, Tampa, is actually eliminating ALL public housing units and replacing them with upper scale units.  In that city 96% of the poor housing residents fled the city and have turned up in homeless shelters, living with other people, or in very used and decaying trailers.  Some people are even living in shacks made from discarded lumber and plastic. I know of one person who lives in a small, wooden livestock barn because there was no other way to afford a house.

The remaining 4% managed to get Section 8 HUD vouchers to get their homes.  One could day there was economic cleansing going on in that city.

Unlike NYC, there is no organized mass transit.  If you cannot afford to run and support an automobile, you have to either walk or use a bicycle in even the larger Florida towns and cities.  The nearest bus stop from the location that I am at is 6 miles away in the next Florida county (Orange, seat of Disney World and Orlando).

The federal minimum wage is an insult to the 25% of the Florida work force that earns it.  About 40% of the state workforce lives with less than $9.00 an hour.  The “Living Wage” that was calculated for basic survival for singles is around $8.50 an hour.

I hope the New York State Legislature does pass its increase in minimum wage.  Perhaps the feds will follow.

MM

Off topic. But I can’t leave this one alone.

they’re really expensive, they practically destroy the reproductive system, and they’re morally reprehensible.

None of those are true. Well, expense and morality is subjective, but not true IMO. But abortion has no automatic ill effects on the reproductive system. It’s a myth.

As for minimum wage. I maintain it simply isn’t intended to be a living wage, and raising it across the board will cause job loss and higher unemployment in the very people that need help...the bottom rung of the socio-economic ladder.

Look at these statistics (pdf):
http://www.epionline.org/study_detail.cfm?sid=8

Brandi -

Thank you for telling me that about the physical effects of abortion.  I was a complete idiot and didn’t check to see if the rumor was true, and it wasn’t.  A truly stupid mistake.  I will brutalize myself as punishment after I finish this letter.

But then again, the cost of an abortion is comparitively high to a person who’s getting minimum wage, in my opinion (ESPECIALLY when you only make just over $200 before taxes in a full workweek).

And as for the cost of minimum wage shortening the “job pool” - I don’t think it would make too much of a difference, considering that current wages are too low for current employees to live on (I would rather have fewer people with jobs who are somewhat FED than a bunch of 40-hour workers starving their asses off).  You have to understand that not all jobs for sustainance, but a majority are (Hell, that’s the only reason we HAVE jobs).  Minimum wage jobs aren’t meant as permanent vocations, but you NEED more than $5.15 an hour either way; if not for life, then just for the weeks that you’d be working there to move up the ladder to a better occupation.  Perhaps less than $7.10 would be required to sustain oneself (and, most likely, a family with it), but $5.15 is still far too low.

But then again, the cost of an abortion is comparitively high to a person who’s getting minimum wage, in my opinion (ESPECIALLY when you only make just over $200 before taxes in a full workweek).

And the sad thing is that someone who can’t afford $200 for an abortion is certainly not going to be helped by the cost of raising the resultant full-term child. It’s a catch 22.

But I also question how many people REALLY have a baby because they truely wanted to abort, but just couldn’t afford it. I think that’s often a convenient excuse (or the morality “excuse” when they really don’t feel that way) for irresponsible breeding when they really just WANTED to have a baby, circumstances be damned. As an employer, I’d rather my taxes be raised to subsidize affordable abortions than be forced to pay a labor force more than their service is worth.

You have to understand that not all jobs for sustainance, but a majority are

The majority of “jobs” are for sustainance, but the statistics show that majority of minimum wage jobs are NOT the single source of family-supporting income for even a tiny percent of people over 30.

And I don’t see changing the entire face and purpose of minimum wage just to cater to the tiny percentage that are trying to use it as a single source of liveable income for a family. Their problems are the result of other poor decisions in their lives.

The argument seems to be that someone should be able to support themselves on 40 hours a week on minimum wage. I don’t agree. There are plenty of reasons for jobs to exist as only supplemental income, that of a teen, or apprenticeship/starter jobs. Raising the minimum wage takes away those jobs and the opportunities they provide for people to begin on the road to advance themselves.

The other flaw I find in the minimum wage argument is that some seem to want to base it on perceived “need” (livable wage) rather than the actual value of that labor. Well, maybe some people do “need” more money to live. But if we’re going to determine things by need, then why don’t we mandate that single people automatically make less than married people. Or that people automatically get raises with every child they have or every dependant they take in. Or if a non-working spouse dies, their pay gets lowered...since they don’t “need” that much money anymore.

Of course that would be ridiculous. But the logic of “need” makes that seem reasonable.

I think the minimum wage should be $20 an hour.  That way everyone could have a decent house and clothing and food.  Also there should be a minimum car because people wont be able to get to these jobs unless they have dependable transportation.  My car is six years old and Im afraid to take it on vacation.  Every American who works hard enough to earn $20 an hour deserves a (paid) vacation and a decent SUV to drive to Disneyland.  Did you know it costs $50 to get into Disneyland?  There should be a maximum entry fee.  I say no one should be able to charge more than $25 admission.  And one more thing, there should be a maximum wage.  No one needs more than $50,000 a year.  All wages earned over 50,000 should be taxed at 100% and given to people who arent as lucky.  Yes 20 bucks per hour and no more than 50K.  Oh yes, free healthcare.  Who pays for it?  No one.  Its free.  The government pays for it.

OK, I got a little carried away, but if $7 is a good minimum wage, $20 would be even better.

This is why people in Europe say that the United States is socially fucked up. For all the talk about how in America, anyone can live the American dream, there is very little social/economic mobility in this country. This is something that statistics are available for, and it can be tracked. Addressing this problem is a more viable solution than a band-aid (as an engineer, Minimum Wage certainly looks like a band-aid solution to me). How can this problem be addressed? Easy. Education. Make higher education free. Find out what’s keeping individual minimum wage earners from moving forward, and address THOSE issues. If you build it, they will come. Etc. Christ. Engineers should run this country.