If the $15 Per Hour Minimum Wage is so Good Why are Unions Getting Exemptions From it?

originally posted by: AugustusMasonicus

It is a hypocritical, shameful and blatant ruse by the unions to attempt to increase an ever-dwindling membership.

well yeah it's dwindling....Walmart has closed entire stores and fired all it's workers, when the workers got close to unionizing. companies take active steps to intimidate their workers to NOT form a union.....you might want to read about the labor movement history of this country, and learn why they were formed in the 1st place....hint:...people were murdered for trying to unionize.

originally posted by: AugustusMasonicus

originally posted by: Aazadan
If the minimum wage had kept up with inflation it would be $20.50 per hour right now, and we need to spend atleast half as much time reversing that trend.

Right, because entry level jobs should pay $42,000+ per year.

if that matches up with the inflationary scale, yes......I keep hearing how the economy is sluggish, with very little growth. companies stock however has been going up for years now...why?....instead of taking profits and investing in CAPEX (job producers)...the companies do buybacks of their shares, stock holders get richer, but very few jobs are created....then the government does a "study" of "medium" income, and it shows that it is increasing....ever taken a statistics course?....the people that report the news are well-off, working at a job owned by the well-off, and talking to others that are well-off, about how the economy is doing......closed loop if there ever was one

originally posted by: jimmyx

you might want to read about the labor movement history of this country, and learn why they were formed in the 1st place....hint:...people were murdered for trying to unionize.

As I have done so extensively and was also, at one time, a union member I came to the realization that they are antiquated and superfluous; what they unionized for is now standard employment law.

a reply to: jimmyx

You are aware that the majority of people are employed by small businesses, right? All your hyperbole about stock and profit taking are irrelevant to the bulk of the labor force's employment.

a reply to: AugustusMasonicus
They definitely had their place and were important but I tend to agree with you as thing are currently.

a reply to: JIMC5499

Gddamnit.... it pretty obvious what they are trying to do now when every new policy turns out to be a corrupt way of forcing ever more communist control over the workforce.

"They can either take the hit from the increased minimum wage and try to stay in business or they can let the Union in and be exempt from the increased Minimum Wage."

Kind of says it all..."try to stay in business". $15 per hour for everyone is an unsustainable idea for many businesses. And apparently the federal government agrees by maintaining the less than 1/2 that.

originally posted by: WeAreAWAKE
"They can either take the hit from the increased minimum wage and try to stay in business or they can let the Union in and be exempt from the increased Minimum Wage."

Kind of says it all..."try to stay in business". $15 per hour for everyone is an unsustainable idea for many businesses. And apparently the federal government agrees by maintaining the less than 1/2 that.

It could be sustainable but you can't just increase the wage like that. If you look at purchasing power, minimum wage in the 50's and 60's paid what would be $24/hour today. The government has tied minimum wage to cost of living adjustments, but the problem there is that since the early 80's in order to stop runaway inflation we changed how it was calculated.

Before 1982 inflation was calculated as the change in the cost of goods from year to year, like this:
Year 1 - I can buy 3 turkey sandwiches at $2 each for $6 total.
Year 2 - I can buy 2 turkey sandwiches at $3 each for $6 total.

Inflation is 50%.

After 1982 inflation looks at the total household expenditures from year to year, like this:
Year 1 - I can buy 3 turkey sandwiches at $2 each for $6 total.
Year 2 - I can buy 2 turkey sandwiches at $3 each for $6 total.

I spent $6 each year, therefore inflation is 0%.

With that 0% inflation, comes a 0% increase to the minimum wage and that means all wages don't go up to reflect the cost of goods. Now compound this for over 30 years and you end up with the current situation where minimum wage is 1/3 of where it should be.

If minimum wage really goes to $15 an hour then the price for everything will explode. Think about the fresh college grad making $13 an hour that makes him/her now worth $27 an hour. Then that continues up the ladder. Companies aren't going to take those types of losses.

originally posted by: avgguy
If minimum wage really goes to $15 an hour then the price for everything will explode. Think about the fresh college grad making $13 an hour that makes him/her now worth $27 an hour. Then that continues up the ladder. Companies aren't going to take those types of losses.

The person doesn't become worth $27/hour, they become worth more along the lines of $20/hour. The whole point of a minimum wage increase is that you reduce the spread between the highest and lowest paid employees, that of course also means you reduce the spread between the mid level and low. Those on the bottom have labor that's worth more, while those above the new min wage have labor that's worth less.

Note that smaller gaps lead to less wage inequality, and having a low wage inequality actually leads to having a larger middle class. The middle class was the largest and strongest it has ever been when the value of the minimum wage was at it's highest.

Closing the "wage gap" screws up the merit gap and qualifications gap.

It will produce excessive jealousies and envy.

a reply to: Aazadan

That makes no sense. The minimum wage worker has minimal skills,but would make only a couple dollars less than someone with at least a bachelors degree? That's like saying that the engineer would only make 5 dollars more than the construction worker.

originally posted by: xuenchen
Closing the "wage gap" screws up the merit gap and qualifications gap.

It will produce excessive jealousies and envy.

Was there excessive jealousy and envy between 1955 and 1967 when things were at their peak? Really the decline started about 1975 but it really went downhill after 1982.

Minimum wage used to have the same purchasing power as a 50k/year job has today. If you had any skills it went up from there. The reason that isn't still the case is because we've had 3 decades of wage deflation (and it will take 3 decades to reverse).

originally posted by: avgguy
a reply to: Aazadan

That makes no sense. The minimum wage worker has minimal skills,but would make only a couple dollars less than someone with at least a bachelors degree? That's like saying that the engineer would only make 5 dollars more than the construction worker.

Lets start here: What should the gap be between the lowest and highest paid workers in a company? How about the lowest and the average? Should the average employee make 5x the lowest paid employee? Should the owner make 50x the lowest paid employee?

And to attack this from another angle at the same time, each person can only consume so much. You can go out to a maximum of 3 restaurants per day (1 per meal), you only buy x clothes, x furniture, x everyday goods, and all the rest. Therefore, there is a maximum consumption on each person. When a person doesn't consume more, they cease adding additional value to the economy. A closed economy of 100 people with 1000 dollars in it where 90 people have 90 dollars and the other 10 have 101 each will result in only 10 people moving the economy, the other 90 do very little. On the other hand an economy where things are a little more even (say the bottom 10 have 4 dollars each and the top 10 have 75 each, with everyone else in the middle) has more people moving the economy.

This is why higher minimum wages work, when those at the bottom have additional money to spend, it gets spent right back into businesses which turns employees into customers. If you want a good historical example of this look at Henry Ford who gave a very high wage for no skill labor and earned a profit on it because he turned his employees into customers.

originally posted by: Aazadan

What should the gap be between the lowest and highest paid workers in a company?

Whatever the market dynamics dictate.

a reply to: Aazadan

Minimum wage used to have the same purchasing power as a 50k/year job has today. If you had any skills it went up from there.

Some people might want verifiable proof of that.

originally posted by: AugustusMasonicus
Whatever the market dynamics dictate.

That's not an answer. That's like saying "states rights" is your position on an issue.

What the market will bear is slavery, an open market particularly a market where those who make little are given food, rent, and utility subsidies in exchange for the person working results in wages at or near nothing. This is especially true in a market like we currently have where real unemployment is over 30%. There is an absolutely huge supply of labor, which results in decreased wages, which then reduces the ability of those who are working to spend money in local businesses. That results in less demand for workers, which further lowers wages.

Higher minimum wages correlate very strongly with better economies.

So I'll ask again, what in your opinion is right? Should the gap between the highest and lowest be 4x as Plato said? Should it be 20x as JP Morgan and David Cameron said? Should it be 50x like the Japanese try to practice? Should it be 350x as in the US currently? Should it be even higher?

originally posted by: Aazadan
That's not an answer. That's like saying "states rights" is your position on an issue.

What the market will bear is slavery...

Wrong. If I am not paid enough I get a better job. I have done it several times and have never had a wage decrease. I have value, therefore I get well compensated.

a reply to: Aazadan

The value of employees are based on the industry and specifically the company. The owner should make as much as he can possibly make. He owns all of the risk, debt and liability So in turn he should make as much as he sees fit.

So then everybody in the middle suffers because the government dictates worth? So then what is the incentive to better yourself if you know for sure that you will make a good wage? And where does the redistribution stop? The construction worker works far harder on average then the doctor or scientist, so why not have doctors and lawyers make only a couple dollars more then them as well.

The part about Henry ford is complete crap. He paid them double of standard factory workers because the work was beyond brutal. He had to hire a work force 3x of that which he needed because turnover was so bad and the work week was so long and even then he struggled to keep a full team. So it was not because he was just being generous.

originally posted by: xuenchen
Some people might want verifiable proof of that.

I've written the proof on these forums numerous times. Here's a few sample goods at various years (years the minimum wage changed)

Year UPenn Home Gas Big Mac
1956 800 11700 .22 .32
1967 1770 22300 .33 .45
1979 5250 58100 .86 1.2
1985 9525 124500 1.13 1.6
1992 15198 194100 1.72 2.19
2003 26282 194100 1.72 2.9
2013 40954 311400 3.49 4.2

Converted into hours to earn at minimum wage.

Year UPenn Home Gas Big Mac
1956 800 11700 .22 .32
1967 1264 15928 .24 .32
1979 2625 29050 .43 .6
1985 2878 26556 .36 .48
1992 3999 32763 .3 .58
2003 5113 37762 .33 .56
2013 5648 42952 .48 .58

43,000 hours of work to buy a house today at minimum wage. That's 100% of your income for 20.67 years.

Furthermore, if you would like to look at supply and demand, productivity was first tracked in 1987. From 1987 to today productivity has risen by 150%. There are 2.5 goods produced today for every 1 good produced 30 years ago. If we follow supply and demand that would suggest goods today should be less expensive than they used to be. However they are at best equal and at worst higher.

Unions are nothing but self serving rackets now, with the sole purpose of increasing membership and funneling money .
Years ago, when I was welding and the shop was a member of the sheet metal workers union, there was a glitch in my pay. Dues were supposed to automatically come out of your check [ $55 every 2 weeks ] and mine didn't for 1 month, a total of $110. I talked to one of the big wigs in Evansville Indiana and he said if I wanted to keep working, I had to pay a 6 month penalty, amounting to $660!!! Otherwise, I couldn't work in that shop or any other shop that belonged to that union. Just for accidentally missing one months dues and they knew it was not my fault! I walked off the job and got a new one, doing the same thing for a non union shop the same day.