The Terrible Fear of Paying the Poor Too Much

a reply to: diggindirt

So you would support suspending care of the elderly if they happen to have politicians in their family? To make a point about money???? How far into unethical and immoral behavior are you willing to go? Until the means justifies the end?
My question remains unanswered: Is that the way you wish to be treated?

Okay, you've made your point. Let's leave the care-workers out of it.

Let's just talk about the people washing dishes, cleaning toilets, changing sheets, dusting, mowing lawns, doing dry-cleaning, etc for others. The scenario I actually had in mind was a large hotel; I can tell you from experience that if the housekeepers aren't there - the management will scramble to try to get those rooms ready. And when you only have six 'bosses' they can't turn 720 rooms to provide for the next high-power convention arrivals in time. They NEED those housekeepers, but do not value them enough to make sure they (the workers) are healthy, safe, and regarded as PEOPLE and not fractions of percentage points on a stupid spread-sheet.

Okay? And even if we did go with the elder-care, or child-care workers - would the family members step up and do the care-giving? Or just hire some other stranger to care for the needs of their dependents?

But that's a whole other subject - farming out children and elders to strangers or high-schoolers rather than caring for them yourself is a big problem in this society also.

Maybe I'm missing something, but I believe there can only be so many people working high paying jobs at one time. The more people vying for that job, the lower the potential pay will be, right? Now either by circumstance or inability to qualify for those jobs, a person would be left with other less skilled, lower paying jobs, that are also rather competitive.

I'm just thinking out loud here, but isn't this a problem? Especially considering inflation and whatnot?

The argument made about Walmart, or any minimum-to-low wage business, raising wages from $9 to $12 an hour is wildly over-simplistic. This kind of watered-down pay bump would cause average low-wage workers' salaries to rise to around $20,000 gross, at which point, all of the single, head-of-households would lose a good portion of their state and federal government benefits and subsidies. This would amount to a huge wage loss for these individuals. The actual amount that a company would have to pay a minimum- or low-wage worker to compensate for the loss of these benefits and subsidies once wages have exceeded the poverty thresholds per household is the true cost that companies would have to pay for this idea to make any kind of practical sense. Think about it- you want to raise average annual wages from roughly $15k/year to roughly $20k/yr for a net gain of $5k. This pay bump results in loss of benefits of over $15k for many workers. You really want to advocate for higher prices for consumers, which means less spending at Walmart and McDonalds, which results in job loss and a private, per low-wage worker loss of $10k annually? That's what you are advocating in this post. You want to argue about capping CEO's salaries and redistributing after some dollar amount or taxing salaries at 90% that are in excess of some $ threshold, be my guest. But if you are going to argue for a private alternative to government compensation of low wages to living wages, let's not kid ourselves that a $5k pay bump from $15k to $20k is going to make any bit of difference. It will hurt these workers and it will hurt the consumers who purchase these types of goods.

a reply to: Dfairlite

Sales associate at walmart vs sales associate at mom/pop shop = same skills, anyone can do that, the supply in the labor market was there, but the prices were artificially inflated by mom/pop shop.

No. Not the same skills. The people at the mom/pop hardware store are knowledgeable about how to use tools, which tools are appropriate for specific jobs, how to recommend nails and screws for a certain job, etc.
The walmart sales associate just knows how to point and say "hardware is in aisle nine."

I'd rather pay $20 for a hammer and the advice of an experienced carpenter than I would pay $8 for a piece of crap made-in-china look-alike. HUMAN RESOURCES. At our local Walmart there are something like 20 check-out lanes. I've never seen more than 5 of them attended at a time. There is NO ONE who knows about hardware.

Hell, the other day I went to Lowe's to find some timer pins for a standard mechanical dial-type on/off mechanism. I did my research, found out what I needed, and went to Lowe's, which said online they had them. I couldn't find them. I asked for help, and the 'guy with the keys' looked at me with annoyance and said, "I don't even know what that is. All the timers are in aisle 15." and walked away. The NEXT time I went to Lowe's, for ceiling tiles, some chunky kid was standing at one of their 'desks' and I asked him where ceiling tiles were. He said, "Eighteen, on your right", and went back to whatever he was doing on the computer.

I went to where he directed me, and couldn't find anything. So I went BACK to him and said, "Try again? Eighteen is plumbing." He slammed down his pen, stood up and walked off with a huffy attitude. I followed him. On the way, another customer came out of an aisle needing help. He glared at that guy, then led me to aisle Nineteen, turned to me, and said, "I was off by one." And stomped off.

That's SERVICE? No. That's crap.

Where, if I go to the local Ace Hardware, there are older people who KNOW WHAT THEY ARE TALKING ABOUT, whether it's what kind of epoxy to use for marine applications, or what types of sand-paper are used for different purposes. Do you know what a pocket screw is?
I do, because I worked as a cabinet-maker for a while. Do you think that kid at Lowe's knows what a pocket screw is? I really, really doubt it. And considering that Lowe's sells cabinets that are held together with staples and plastic tabs, there isn't even a way to SHOW HIM what one is for.
Lame.

a reply to: darkbake

Did you know that raising minimum wage would actually HELP the economy because it would create less job turnover, costing corporations less, and also would generate more money to be spent on consumerism?

Sometimes *cough* these corporate leaders let their clouded opinions get in the way of progress. That is the serious danger of having too much power.

Precisely the whole point.
Thanks.
Now perhaps more people are aware of it. Woot for ATS!

a reply to: Biigs

How long till large factories get together and make real live on site work towns?

You do realize, don't you, that we had that - entire towns built around manufacturing. Then "free trade" happened, and those mfg jobs went overseas. NOW those towns (Detroit, anyone?) are ghosts -

How long till large factories make real-live on site work towns?
Just as soon as it's not profitable to have those on-site towns in China, where razor wire holds the people in.

a reply to: BuzzyWigs

That is a good point!

I was more just referring to having cheap [for the employees] company ran housing (apartments) near the company factory, i went too far when i said towns.

Ive seen those Chinese and korean factory towns and they are so so so not what i meant, did'nt want to remove people so far from the rest of civilization, that was the mistake.

originally posted by: ~Lucidity
HIgher wages might also stimulate the economy.

How long has it been since the middle class has gotten a raise? Well for me it's been 12 years. My son doesn't even believe we used to get bonuses, raises, AND cost of living adjustments. And company picnics too. Oh well. It's a new (bad) USA, and it's no one's fault but our own. We let them divide us.

Higher wages for who? For everyone? That would also create inflation - leading you right back to where you started.

Entire classes don't get raises - individuals do. But here's the issue - I'll give you a counter-example, of a company I worked for, which rode the wave of the .com boom, and decided it would be the new face of employers, with high salaries, bonuses, parties, catered lunches, perks for employees everywhere you looked.

Of course, this made their cost basis higher than their competitors - which mean they charged more than their competitors. Which meant their customers left them for cheaper suppliers. Falling revenues, meant all those perks began to dry up. Then came the layoffs. Now they had fewer employees to do development, support their customers, etc. Came more layoffs and expense cuts. The best employees were cherry-picked by competitors, and soon the remaining people spent most of their days worried about their jobs rather than actually doing them. More layoffs, more customer defections, and soon the company was circling the drain - and no longer exists.

Multiply that story 100x, a 1000x - this happened a lot. Basic rule of the free market - if you can't provide a good or service that people will pay you for, you can't survive. If your employees aren't making you money, they're losing it - and you won't survive. People have this notion that somehow their employer owes them their jobs, their standard of living - but they're not your Daddy, they're a business - and if you're not making them a profit, you need to go. Perhaps you can sell your skills to someone else, someone who thinks they'll make a profit on your labors, and who'll give you a raise, a bonus, etc.

That's business - and those who think they have a better model are more than welcome to start their own business.

The argument about minimum wage is pretty much a distraction - very few are actually paid minimum wage - if they're worth more, they're generally paid more. It costs an employer money to replace an employee - most would rather pay an existing employee more than to replace them with someone new, who'll often be worth less than they're paid for months.

I think what concerns most people about raising the minimum wage isn't because they're part of some monstrous scheme to punish the poor and unskilled. It's that if you push it too high, then you might have several effects, hurting more than helping, such as:

- Employers on razor-thin margins will simply cut back on the number of employees - the CBO study said as many a 1m jobs would be lost with a rise to $10/hour. So, you raise the pay for, perhaps, 1 million, and cause the loss of jobs for the same number? How is that a good thing?

- Entry-level jobs will dry up, so youth unemployment will go even higher, making it harder for students to attend college/tech school, trapping them in poverty.

- Small employers will become even more likely to cheat the system, using undocumented workers and paying them under the table. We have almost no enforcement of immigration laws, and too many employers already cheat - this will mean yet-more cheating.

- Parenthetically, this may lead to inflationary pressures at the low-end providers - a simple example - if WalMart were to increase it's prices by 10%, you'll inflict a 10% cost of living increase on those low-income shoppers who shop there. Do you really think someone who's squeaking by on work and food stamps, who spends $1000 a month on food/groceries on their family, won't notice an extra $100 month out of their budget?

I'm pretty Conservative in economic terms, and while I don't speak for anyone but myself, I think the reason many are reluctant to try to legislate things like the minimum wage is pretty much every government intervention in the free market in the past has created unforeseen consequences that are often as large, if not larger, than the problem they were trying to solve. Will raising the minimum wage to $10 or $15 an hour hurt more people than it helps? That's very possible. Forcing an employer to pay someone more than they're worth can only end badly.

The crushing of the middle-class is pretty much a separate discussion from "minimum-wage", so I won't get into it here, other than to say, the problem isn't free enterprise, the problem is government, its spending, its taxes, the barriers it inadvertently creates to income mobility, (again, those unforeseen consequences), its regulatory regime, and its importing cheap and subsidized labor into jobs that used to be held by the middle-class (see H1-B visas, for starters.)

a reply to: BuzzyWigs

Minimum wage will always be relative to the times. They could raise minimum wage to $25 per hour, but people soon forget that those increased wages just get passed back onto the consumers with higher ticket prices for goods and services....

a reply to: squittles

I pretty much agree with your assessment.

But looking at it from the workers viewpoint and min. wage....."If you pretend to pay me, I'll pretend to work and steal from you"

So does the business suffer from low worker productivity and theft or make the workers grateful for the job with a decent wage and perks.

I have been in business a long time and it's my experience that loyal and happy employees increase profits far in excess of the money you save by paying min. wage.

I have sold some of my enterprises to others and watched it tank due to being motivated by pure profit and greed rather than the team approach.

It doesn't STOP companies from paying high wages, it prevents a mandatory minimum wage. I guarantee there are plenty of businesses in those areas that pay more than minimum wage. How can that be your ask??? Those evil greedy companies actually pay more than they legally have to??? Of course, to employees who add value.

Every job out there is not required to pay a living wage. Someone who works 20 hours a week at McDonalds should get $20k a year?? Really? A teenager working part time should get $25 dollars an hour to mow grass? I honestly don't understand what reality some people live in.

You can't live on twelve dollars and hour, you can't even live on two salaries of twelve dollars an hour.

originally posted by: jhn7537
a reply to: BuzzyWigs

Minimum wage will always be relative to the times. They could raise minimum wage to $25 per hour, but people soon forget that those increased wages just get passed back onto the consumers with higher ticket prices for goods and services....

You can hardly live on 25 dollars an hour.

originally posted by: Aazadan


You do realize that someone with a low IQ is still capable of learning complex information and performing difficult tasks, right? All IQ measures is your ability to learn. It's quite possible to have a low IQ and be a brain surgeon or rocket scientist, it's also quite possible (and very common) for someone to have a high IQ and not have a high paying job to go with it.

Statistically the best paid are average to slightly below average in intelligence.

I am sorry to burst your bubble there, Aazadan, but your comment is discernibly fallacious and logically flawed. Perhaps you are the aforementioned "low I.Q brain surgeon"? I sincerely hope, for the sake of the public, I am wrong in my assumption.

First I will address the logic of your statement "You do realize that someone with a low IQ is still capable of learning complex information and performing difficult tasks" because "All IQ measures is your ability to learn"

Well, Aazadan. According to Websters Dictionary "the ability to learn or understand things" is defined as Intelligence. You stated that all an I.Q does is measure your intelligence. Your logic is flawed and quite fallacious. Having a low I.Q implies that you have a low capacity to learn or understand things. How can a vacuous person, someone who is stupid and thus lacks intelligence, possibly be capable of learning complex information? Put simply, they cannot.

(You might be incorrectly referring to some types of autistic savants that although suffer from varying levels of social and cognitive developmental issues, are able to excel greatly at one particular skill or activity.)

Now to look at your statement about income and I.Q.

Your first statement considers the possibility that just because someone has a high IQ does not necessarily mean they "have a high paying job to go with it". I partially agree with you on this statement, because correlation does not imply causation. Just because someone has a high I.Q. doesn't mean that they will have a higher paying job. This may be the case, but it is not "very common" as stated.

Here are graphs which show the positive correlation between IQ and Income

www.learningrxblog.com...

analyseeconomique.files.wordpress.com...

analyseeconomique.files.wordpress.com...

Since income and I.Q ARE positively correlated, your statement "Statistically the best paid are average to slightly below average in intelligence" is bullshiv. There will be more people making cumulatively more money at below average I.Q levels than those cumulative average wages of higher I.Q individuals, but only in industries where higher I.Q individuals are the out-liars.


You are defending the low I.Q-ers like you are one, and that is fine if it is the case. Just in the future, don't try to push off fiction or opinions as fact. Anyway, I.Q. in reality is just a number, and trust me... The more you know, the less happy you are and the less you want to know. Over-thinking and over-analyzing is much worse a fate than under-thinking and just moving on with life.

a reply to: BuzzyWigs

"The Terrible Fear of Allowing Your Neighbor to Have More than You" is a thread about about selfish liberals who take away things from people who make more money than they do. Basically they think they know how other people's money should be spent so they take it without asking, which is stealing, and use it for their own causes. Obviously that is just as selfish, if not more selfish. And if they are the ones getting the money (like say welfare cases voting for welfare money) then its clearly MORE selfish than a "greedy capitalist".

The most ridiculous and foolish attack on libertarianism is that it is selfish. Sorry but its too obvious that taking other people's things without their permission and either giving it to your own personal causes or just plain taking it for your own situation by the welfare voter is just as selfish. How could it be anything but just as selfish?

The socialists won. Since FDR in the 1930's government spending has gone from under 10% to over 30% in the past hundred years. Capitalism died, so you won. Socialism is now the rule of the land. How is it working out for you? America became a fully mixed economy as of 2009 as government spending exceeded 40% of the economy. The only economies more mixed are economies like Greece and Italy. They must be doing great over there, so please move their and you'll never have to worry about libertarians again.

Apparently taking 16% of people's money and giving it back to them 45 years later at 0% interest in a program called Social Security is the most sacred wonder of liberalism. LOL, wow. Just, wow. These guys cannot be helped. Its a lost cause which is why I strongly recommend you simply move away from these people and into greener pastures while you can. I moved to New Hampshire, the most libertarian state. And now I'm in a place where its easy to find a job and easier to keep your own money. Coincidence? No. And the poor people here do just as well as in the most socialist place next door... Massachusetts.

Amazing how that works... in the most libertarian place in America in New Hampshire where there are the most "greedy capitalists" the poor people are doing just the same as right next door, the most socialist place in America Massachusetts. Shouldn't one wealthy land baron have owned the whole state by now leaving the rest as a surf? No, that is what socialism will do for you as proven by the growing rich-poor gap in the USA. As socialism grows, the rich-poor gap grows until you are like Russia with only super-rich Putin with his oligarch friends and everyone else. And now most of the world is little Russia and economies will be in the crapper for decades. As long as forever... as long as it takes to get rid of the world's cancer... socialism.

You know you have a good system of abuse and slavery when a large group of your own slaves under the system will belittle and berate the others for having the audacity to think they deserve a better life.

I'm expecting the: "If you wanted a better life you should have worked harder!" response so I'll go ahead and riposte that one now and point out that working harder for a better life only to have your body fail, or your kids get neglected, or your wife leave you because your at work so much =/ better life?

originally posted by: Stormdancer777

originally posted by: jhn7537
a reply to: BuzzyWigs

Minimum wage will always be relative to the times. They could raise minimum wage to $25 per hour, but people soon forget that those increased wages just get passed back onto the consumers with higher ticket prices for goods and services....

You can hardly live on 25 dollars an hour.

$52k per year for a single is quite easy to live on, but if you have 9 children it may be tricky...

wal mart is paying below minimum wage to it's employees who the taxpayers are subsidizing with social programs to keep alive and then wal mart is also depending on one of those programs food stamps to support it's customer base!!!

how many here thinks that the ceo's and upper management of wal mart along with all the other corporations out there who have managed to get themselves into this predicament really wants the gov't to do anything but keep throwing money into these programs???

Without them they'd have all those employees begging for a raise going hungry or homeless and well hungry homeless unhappy employees aren't gonna be willing to work for them long!! they will find another way to to get their needs met weather it be legal or not! And then on the other side they would lose a good portion of their sales since so much of their sales are reliant on food stamps!

So when those in congress are griping about the social programs wanting them cut or ending I think they are either lying or they are too dumb to figure this out!
We can have a soft landing or a hard landing and that probably would be the hardest landing of all!

a reply to: CZ75P01

Nice response and welcome to ATS...

When one says that a minimum wage hike would cause a loss of jobs that the companies would just do without the employees is one considering the fact that they businesses have already cut their staff to the bare minimum now??
And well in many companies it's not the person who is there seeing just how hard you are working or how valuable you are to the company that gets to decide how much money you are making! It's someone far away in a corporate office who is telling the person who would like to give you a raise that no you must cut their hours more instead!!!

So I kind of think that the only way you would see the loss of jobs if the minimum wage was raised is if the company just closed up shop! That more than likely would happen if the social programs were cut and they still didn't raise the wages! But if they raised the minimum gradually with the intention of ending the programs if the companies just made moves to ensure their profit margins weren't affected well I think the companies might have a different view on the subject!

To let the problem go without doing anything is just gonna lead us into a direction that the 90% or whatever americans really aren't gonna like! Those of us who are living moderately comfortable will find ourselves paying more and more in taxes while the corporate world rakes in the money and more and more find themselves having to take the handouts..

Sooner or later only the 10% or so will not be the takers and well then you will see those social programs get cut down to the bare minimum leaving us all begging for our daily bread after we work our 40 hour week!