The $15 Dollar Wage vs The Skilled Labor Market

With all the massive amount of debate surrounding the possible increase in the federal minimum wage to as much as 15 dollars an hour, I have not once heard any real discussion of what happens to those who are currently working in the range of 15 per hour. I am currently one of those people. I currently live in North Carolina, a state with a 7.25 federal minimum. I myself do general construction and make 15 an hour so basically my labor is worth twice that of the Walmart greeters. This makes sense because my job takes years of experience as well as the need for a firm grasp of algebra and geometry to do properly. Using this math, a doubling of the minimum wage would necessitate doubling my wage up to 30 an hour. Multiply this increase over an entire construction crew and BAM all of a sudden that new house costs 50% more than it did previously. This effect will be felt over the economy when you really stop to think about what trades currently pay around 15 an hour. One of the big ones I think about is automotive repair. Who is going to want to use their brains anymore when you could just push shopping carts for the same pay??? To me supporting a minimum wage increase says a lot about the intelligence of the person promoting it. It just simply won't work, the value of one's work is based solely on supply and demand nothing more. So what do you guys think will happen to the skilled labor market if this law goes through? Will the skilled laborers demand 30 an hour or will they simply leave their productive lines of work for the stress free life of supersizing combos?

a reply to: JBDTheBeast

I'm in construction as well and there's no way small construction companies can sustain the increase.

They will all be paid under the table. Small construction companies already can't compete because they can't offer the benefits of bigger companies.

Sub contractors are going to become a thing of the past. Laborers aren't worth more than 10-12 an hour, they just don't generate that much of an income.

Everybody will get a $7 an hour raise.
Then prices adjust to the increase in pay and people realize they are still the bottom of the pay scale.

The bottom of the barrel is still the bottom no matter how high you raise the barrel.

a reply to: JBDTheBeast


As usual, the slippery slope will apply. Inflation will jump dramatically, especially for basics as the those close to the new 'minimum' wage demand and receive their adjustments.

With that said, a new higher minimum wage will be demanded, of course, just when the next election cycle is coming up and away we go again. The pontificators will say inflation is the way to marginalize the national debt by lowering the overall percentile of the GDP.

Ironically, both in the Clinton Administration and this Democrat edition when they had complete control of both houses and the Presidency didn't bother raising the issue and could have easily passed that legislation.


My contempt.

I'm in that range as well, but in the medical field. I think doubling our salaries would suffice, although I doubt that that'll happen.

a reply to: JBDTheBeast

If you think working fastfood is easy or carefree... Lol.
The problem is as always in economics, supply and demand.

This simple principle actually works very well when there is balance.

But that is long gone now, decades of idiotic open borders policies have guaranteed that labor prices stay low because of an all but infinite supply of cheap illegal labor.

Thus we are at a tipping point, wages must go up to keep working class people from being priced out of the market entirely by inflation.

Either build a wall and throw all the illegals across it to restore balance, so supply and demand can actually work correctly, or minimum wages must rise.

It is very simple to understand.

I suppose some of the angst depends upon how one considers ones job beyond the pay check. For fifteen dollars an hour, would a person rather be a Walmart greeter, a burger flipper or a person who gets to exercise their minds by using algebra and geometry to calculate projects by fulfilling more complex job requirements. If one wants to be a greeter instead of an auto mechanic then go ahead.

Because basically it's all slavery anyway. The master will pay as little as possible. This has been the rule now for thousands of years. It is the basic thumb of capitalism, work em til they drop. We are all in this chain gang together and it really matters not if one is a house slave or a field hand. Just that some times the house slave gets to feel better about themselves and have a little better diet when they clear the masters table and have the 'special' rinds and crusts left over from his plate.

a reply to: Sargeras

I recall my first experience with alien workers in a cucumber field working for $1 an hour in the hot sun stooping over all day with a big water bottle at the end of each row as incitement to hurry up down the row. Finish a row and get a drink. Burlap sacks to rest on for half an hour instead of lunch. The Braceros were happy for the work, I was not. I moved on the next summer but they were all back.

Yes, people of foriegn origin have been brought here to feed the masters beast for a long long time. Seeking that low wage to bolster their own pockets and keep this miserable scam of an economy afloat.
Remember the Vietnam War? When that was over what happened? Vietnamese were shipped over by the boat load and filled the ranks of the lower paid jobs.

How about back in the late 1800s and early 1900s when 'work councilors' went to Eastern European countries and convinced many of the poor to come to America to work in the meat packing plants in Chicago, just to keep the wages low. They have played this game now for ever. Work the worker harder for his pennies and keep the lower wager earner nipping at his heals. A tried and true practice.

Who is John Galt?

a reply to: JBDTheBeast

Nobody in this country is a slave to anyone. In a free market capitalist society anyone can do any job if they were to seek out the proper training. You act as if someone can just hop from one job to another until they find one they like. It doesn't work that way, if you wanted to go from McDonald's to being a nurse or an electrician then they are going to need to dedicate themselves to the trade for years. The only real incentive to do so would be to better their families lives, ala more $$.

originally posted by: JBDTheBeast
Nobody in this country is a slave to anyone. In a free market capitalist society anyone can do any job if they were to seek out the proper training. You act as if someone can just hop from one job to another until they find one they like. It doesn't work that way, if you wanted to go from McDonald's to being a nurse or an electrician then they are going to need to dedicate themselves to the trade for years. The only real incentive to do so would be to better their families lives, ala more $$.

Sorry ... but we are all a slave to the system ... melodramatic perhaps, but true.

It's funny to me how the people pushing for higher minimum wage are the same people saying that "Corporations are evil". Yet a higher minimum wage actually pushes out small business owners and give more power to the corporations, who will actually just cut jobs to pay their employees a higher wage. If you thought customer service at Walmart was bad now, wait until they have triple the work load due to walmart cutting jobs to pay the new minimum wage.

Many mcdonalds stores are actually franchised. These business owners don't pull in millions of dollars. $15 an hour might just close many of those restaurants entirely.

Oh well, more room for big time corporations to move in (and they are the ones who have the money to automate customer service jobs).

Now, a minimum wage hike to $15 can actually work just fine in some areas. But not every area. It can't be a federal increase across the country. Leave it to the local governments to decide if it is a good move for their local economy.

a reply to: JBDTheBeast

Nobody in this country is a slave to anyone. In a free market capitalist society anyone can do any job if they were to seek out the proper training.

Really? Ok then, I suppose one is free to just get that proper training. But what will that cost? Go to the masters schools and pay him for it? Work for lower wages while in a 'training period"?

The capitalist peon is out chasing the buck, a dollar bill that the bosses have ripped into pieces and scattered on the air above the heads of the workers, each reaching up to grab what they can. Each thinking to themsevles I am of more value because I get more pieces of the buck.

Sure, if one wanted to to be a nurse or an electrician they can play the masters game and dedicate themselves to their trade for years in order to get ahead, but in the end they are expendable, just like the minimum wage slave and when the time comes will be dropped like a used rag.

As long as we continue to buy into this scam that the bosses control, we will be their slaves.

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
I suppose some of the angst depends upon how one considers ones job beyond the pay check. For fifteen dollars an hour, would a person rather be a Walmart greeter, a burger flipper or a person who gets to exercise their minds by using algebra and geometry to calculate projects by fulfilling more complex job requirements. If one wants to be a greeter instead of an auto mechanic then go ahead.

Because basically it's all slavery anyway. The master will pay as little as possible. This has been the rule now for thousands of years. It is the basic thumb of capitalism, work em til they drop. We are all in this chain gang together and it really matters not if one is a house slave or a field hand. Just that some times the house slave gets to feel better about themselves and have a little better diet when they clear the masters table and have the 'special' rinds and crusts left over from his plate.

precis;y why I am self employed. I will not be a link in their chain. I will have my own chain.

In America , anyone can make enough to survive on. With minimal effort.

originally posted by: Pyrrho
It's funny to me how the people pushing for higher minimum wage are the same people saying that "Corporations are evil". Yet a higher minimum wage actually pushes out small business owners and give more power to the corporations, who will actually just cut jobs to pay their employees a higher wage. If you thought customer service at Walmart was bad now, wait until they have triple the work load due to walmart cutting jobs to pay the new minimum wage.

Many mcdonalds stores are actually franchised. These business owners don't pull in millions of dollars. $15 an hour might just close many of those restaurants entirely.

Oh well, more room for big time corporations to move in (and they are the ones who have the money to automate customer service jobs).

Now, a minimum wage hike to $15 can actually work just fine in some areas. But not every area. It can't be a federal increase across the country. Leave it to the local governments to decide if it is a good move for their local economy.

This is 100% BS!!

Walmart did a study themselves, if they paid all employees $15 an hour, it would cost the average customer $0.87 extra a visit.

No catastrophe, no layoffs, just $0.87 extra for an average shopper.

That '15' hour wage 'increase' works like this.

Employers will be shelling out MORE cash to employees social security,medicare contribution.

Employers will be shelling out MORE cash to employees workmans comp, and unemployment insurance.

Employees will be shelling out MORE in payroll taxes that fund their own social security, and medicare.

Since the tax rate is PROGRESSIVE the MORE someone makes the more they pay in FEDERAL and STATE income taxes

The biggest winner is the state, and if your lucky enough to have a job after the wage increase.

Since small business owners will be hit the hardest. That were already working off of tight margins.

Because many business's will have to close their doors. Because it's take more to keep those doors open. They take in.

Then there is the whole $15 an hour crap to begin with especially for unskilled labor.

Guess it sucks to be anyone with skills, or secondary education, and other trademan.

Who put the time, and effort in to make more money versus someone who is 'entitled' to $15 an hour.

Even though they just push a broom, bag groceries, or clean toilets.

If you ask me ?

There should be a wage gap between skilled, and unskilled.

It's the way it always been. and it's what pushes people to go to secondary education, and trade schools.

Make them the 'same'.

Really no reason to go to college,universities, or trade schools now is there?

a reply to: JBDTheBeasti already make 30 an hour plus benefits

a reply to: Pyrrho

They do this across the board. We see this all the time with regulations. The regulations squeeze out the the little guy while insulating the large corporation who can spread out the additional compliance cost over a larger operation.

So yeah, Wal-Mart might not go belly up but the mom & pop store will. I recently saw the financials for a beloved children's book store in my community. The owner is making like $35k year in profit. If she had to double her employee costs it would put her out of business. All the bedwetters in my liberal community keep pushing for this $15/hr nonesense without understanding how it would shut down the local mom & pop stores these dimwits love to claim they care so much about. In fact, one of the non-profits organizations had to come out against it because they can't afford to pay the teenagers that they typically hire at that amount - think teen life guards at the community pool.

a reply to: TerryMcGuire

You act like you couldn't just learn a skill and be your own boss...not everyone works for the man dude. Might I ask what you do for a living?

a reply to: tinner07

So are you going to start demanding 60 when guys like me start making 30 an hour.