It seems like it would be more beneficial to greatly increase funding to programs/training/universities that allow people to get better jobs. Leaving someone stuck earning minimum wage is going to suck no matter what you set it to. I have to imagine that most people are capable of some form of skilled labor.
Well yeah, but someone's gotta mop the floors in food courts and drive the taxis. And I wouldn't want to be one of those people and I'm lucky enough that in my situation I probably won't be, but you really can't have an economy (at least with today's technology) were everyone works a skilled and well-paid job.
And I agree with ElJeffe on the idea that you need multiple things to work towards alleviating poverty, a minimum wage isn't the only tool you have to do that.
This is something that I've felt for a decade at least. Sure, it'd be great if everyone went to college and became wealthy and all, but until we can come up with some way to staff menial labor jobs with robots, there are always going to be a huge need for people to clean floors, take out trash, pick vegetables, and serve food.
You can take out your own damn trash and/or just have garbage chutes to dumpsters. Same with most flooring. Don't make a mess, and when you do fix it yourself. Janitors aren't your mommy, and most hallways don't need to be cleaned so often. In fact that tends to shorten their effective lifespan and require replacement more often. In the rare cases that it does require more than you picking up the crumpled piece of paper that didn't quite make it into the basket, well facilities managers get paid more than you think to ensure that the building is properly maintained.
As far as waiters and bussing tables, there are more than enough bad actors to fill them. :P
All those other programs listed can reduce the likelihood of needing the safety net, but it won't prevent the need for a safety net altogether.
You're either misunderstanding the concept of "safety net" or using it in a manner dramatically different from how most people understand it.
The idea of a safety net is that if everything else goes to shit, you have something to rely on to get you back on your feet. Unemployment benefits, and so on. Minimum wage isn't currently premised on being a safety net, it's premised on providing for the long-term well-being of unskilled laborers. If you lose your minimum wage job, the minimum wage doesn't provide you with a safety net, because you're out of a job, and your next job will also probably be minimum wage. And if you're a skilled laborer making more than minimum wage, you won't likely be applying for minimum wage jobs, because you can probably make as much or more on unemployment benefits while you find a job that can actually pay the bills.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
So I guess one would eventually arrive at the question of why have a minimum wage if the amount we set it to isn't going to be enough to live off of?
Because not every job is meant to support a person. There's no reason a high school student working for weed money needs to get paid a living wage; their living expenses are covered by their parents, who are likely making significantly more than the minimum wage.
Surely the US has different minimum wage for adults and minors? That's an obvious thing to have.
So I guess one would eventually arrive at the question of why have a minimum wage if the amount we set it to isn't going to be enough to live off of?
Because not every job is meant to support a person. There's no reason a high school student working for weed money needs to get paid a living wage; their living expenses are covered by their parents, who are likely making significantly more than the minimum wage.
Surely the US has different minimum wage for adults and minors? That's an obvious thing to have.
Nope, and it's not an obvious thing to have - if you create a concession on a certain type of laboe, you will create an emphasis on that type of labor.
So I guess one would eventually arrive at the question of why have a minimum wage if the amount we set it to isn't going to be enough to live off of?
Because not every job is meant to support a person. There's no reason a high school student working for weed money needs to get paid a living wage; their living expenses are covered by their parents, who are likely making significantly more than the minimum wage.
Surely the US has different minimum wage for adults and minors? That's an obvious thing to have.
Only if you want to disadvantage everyone applying for minimum wage jobs who isn't also a minor.
So I guess one would eventually arrive at the question of why have a minimum wage if the amount we set it to isn't going to be enough to live off of?
Because not every job is meant to support a person. There's no reason a high school student working for weed money needs to get paid a living wage; their living expenses are covered by their parents, who are likely making significantly more than the minimum wage.
Surely the US has different minimum wage for adults and minors? That's an obvious thing to have.
Wha? Why should there be a different minimum wage for doing the same kind of job? The raw work that a person is able to do has value. Regardless of where the money gained from that job goes, the work itself has the same value.
Wha? Why should there be a different minimum wage for doing the same kind of job? The raw work that a person is able to do has value. Regardless of where the money gained from that job goes, the work itself has the same value.
If you're willing to assign a minimum wage, you're already throwing the idea of paying the proper value for work out the window. The whole point of minimum wage is that the "fair value" of labor for certain jobs isn't palatable. If you're screwing with the market anyway, there's no real reason not to screw with it relative to different demographics, at least in principle. It's just that in practice, having different minimum wages for different groups fucks things up.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
If you're willing to assign a minimum wage, you're already throwing the idea of paying the proper value for work out the window. The whole point of minimum wage is that the "fair value" of labor for certain jobs isn't palatable. If you're screwing with the market anyway, there's no real reason not to screw with it relative to different demographics, at least in principle.
If you're willing to assign a minimum wage, you're already throwing the idea of paying the proper value for work out the window. The whole point of minimum wage is that the "fair value" of labor for certain jobs isn't palatable. If you're screwing with the market anyway, there's no real reason not to screw with it relative to different demographics, at least in principle.
It's just that in practice, having different minimum wages for different groups fucks things up.
Works just fine in other countries. Minors are already hired over adults, because they're easier to coerce etc.
They also have more drama and are less dependable. They're only preferred when you want a high turnover rate. Which isn't a lot of places. Now, if you can skim down the payroll costs having to yell at people for being late more often isn't a big deal.
If you're willing to assign a minimum wage, you're already throwing the idea of paying the proper value for work out the window. The whole point of minimum wage is that the "fair value" of labor for certain jobs isn't palatable. If you're screwing with the market anyway, there's no real reason not to screw with it relative to different demographics, at least in principle.
It's just that in practice, having different minimum wages for different groups fucks things up.
Works just fine in other countries. Minors are already hired over adults, because they're easier to coerce etc.
They also have more drama and are less dependable. They're only preferred when you want a high turnover rate. Which isn't a lot of places. Now, if you can skim down the payroll costs having to yell at people for being late more often isn't a big deal.
I disagree with that logic. You're not exactly getting the cream of the crop when an adult applies for a minimum wage job. I have never been fired from a job, but when I was working minimum wage in grocery stores there were numerous adults that were fired around me for negligence or just fucking up.
It's just that in practice, having different minimum wages for different groups fucks things up.
Works just fine in other countries. Minors are already hired over adults, because they're easier to coerce etc.
Umm... you're aware that the point of this is to allow people who aren't kids to survive, and disincenting companies from hiring those people is counter-productive, right? I mean, "unskilled adults already get screwed, so screwing them even more is fine" is not the most compelling of arguments.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
If you're willing to assign a minimum wage, you're already throwing the idea of paying the proper value for work out the window. The whole point of minimum wage is that the "fair value" of labor for certain jobs isn't palatable. If you're screwing with the market anyway, there's no real reason not to screw with it relative to different demographics, at least in principle.
It's just that in practice, having different minimum wages for different groups fucks things up.
Works just fine in other countries. Minors are already hired over adults, because they're easier to coerce etc.
They also have more drama and are less dependable. They're only preferred when you want a high turnover rate. Which isn't a lot of places. Now, if you can skim down the payroll costs having to yell at people for being late more often isn't a big deal.
I disagree with that logic. You're not exactly getting the cream of the crop when an adult applies for a minimum wage job. I have never been fired from a job, but when I was working minimum wage in grocery stores there were numerous adults that were fired around me for negligence or just fucking up.
For me, most kids dropped like flies while the adults having a second job, or retirees who wanted to help with the SS check (but not make too much to fuck it up) were there for years and years. Hell, I was the only one under 25 who stayed at the place for more than 3 years, and I was there for 6, though with less hours on top of my day job for the last one, who wasn't training for management.
So, my anectdotes beat your anectdotes. Besides, the point of minimum wage is to help those fuckups you were working with. Not to let teenagers fuck them over as well.
I disagree with that logic. You're not exactly getting the cream of the crop when an adult applies for a minimum wage job. I have never been fired from a job, but when I was working minimum wage in grocery stores there were numerous adults that were fired around me for negligence or just fucking up.
For me, most kids dropped like flies while the adults having a second job, or retirees who wanted to help with the SS check (but not make too much to fuck it up) were there for years and years. Hell, I was the only one under 25 who stayed at the place for more than 3 years, and I was there for 6, though with less hours on top of my day job for the last one, who wasn't training for management.
So, my anectdotes beat your anectdotes. Besides, the point of minimum wage is to help those fuckups you were working with. Not to let teenagers fuck them over as well.
The point of minimum wage is to set a standard for the low rung of required labor on the ladder. It has nothing to do with teenagers working or fuck up parents working. We have social programs already in affect to help people that are unskilled labor or lacking the basic ability to perform labor. What you're advocating is a form of age discrimination.
I disagree with that logic. You're not exactly getting the cream of the crop when an adult applies for a minimum wage job. I have never been fired from a job, but when I was working minimum wage in grocery stores there were numerous adults that were fired around me for negligence or just fucking up.
For me, most kids dropped like flies while the adults having a second job, or retirees who wanted to help with the SS check (but not make too much to fuck it up) were there for years and years. Hell, I was the only one under 25 who stayed at the place for more than 3 years, and I was there for 6, though with less hours on top of my day job for the last one, who wasn't training for management.
So, my anectdotes beat your anectdotes. Besides, the point of minimum wage is to help those fuckups you were working with. Not to let teenagers fuck them over as well.
The point of minimum wage is to set a standard for the low rung of required labor on the ladder. It has nothing to do with teenagers working or fuck up parents working. We have social programs already in affect to help people that are unskilled labor or lacking the basic ability to perform labor. What you're advocating is a form of age discrimination.
How is ensuring that adults are competing with dependents on equal footing age discrimination? Kids should not be allowed to undercut adults' wages because they don't shoulder the same cost of living expense.
And if minimum wage is about guaranteeing a minimum quality of life or a minimum income, then why bother laundering that handout through the balance sheets of employers of unskilled labor? Why not just collect taxes and write everyone a check from the Treasury?
Without wading into this argument, it strikes me as inefficient to have the money move through the federal bureaucracy instead of just upping the amount to the employee from the employer.
That kind of speculation doesn't amount to much. Changing one number in the EIC calculation would accomplish pretty what I described without any additional bureaucracy. But of course that would be a one-time annual payment.
However, the "inefficiency of government bureaucracy" isn't a great argument as to why we should proceed to up the value of government interfere in the labor market.
Regarding the safety net, it is a safety net in the sense that it sets a minimum on how much an hour of your work will be worth, regardless of market conditions that might want to puch it down further, and also theoretically it keeps a worker at a certain level of wealth that will permit him more short-term stability in case of job loss. Jeff's argument as to why it isn't a safety net is really just another phrasing of the argument that minimum wages just aren't effective, and hence aren't very good at being safety nets they're supposed to be.
Regarding the safety net, it is a safety net in the sense that it sets a minimum on how much an hour of your work will be worth, regardless of market conditions that might want to puch it down further, and also theoretically it keeps a worker at a certain level of wealth that will permit him more short-term stability in case of job loss. Jeff's argument as to why it isn't a safety net is really just another phrasing of the argument that minimum wages just aren't effective, and hence aren't very good at being safety nets they're supposed to be.
Eh, not really. If you're making minimum wage, or even somewhere in the vicinity, you're very unlikely to have no savings of any sort. If you go from shitty pay to no pay with no savings, it doesn't much matter whether the pay was really shitty or just kinda shitty. You still have no income at all, and no savings from which to draw.
Beyond that, I guess I agree, mostly because we're now in Semanticsland, which is a dismal country populated by pedantry and _J_.
ElJeffe on
I submitted an entry to Lego Ideas, and if 10,000 people support me, it'll be turned into an actual Lego set!If you'd like to see and support my submission, follow this link.
Yeah I was sort saying that minwage is so ineffective at its goals that it seems to prompt semantic BS that only confuses further what the point of it even is to begin with.
Posts
You can take out your own damn trash and/or just have garbage chutes to dumpsters. Same with most flooring. Don't make a mess, and when you do fix it yourself. Janitors aren't your mommy, and most hallways don't need to be cleaned so often. In fact that tends to shorten their effective lifespan and require replacement more often. In the rare cases that it does require more than you picking up the crumpled piece of paper that didn't quite make it into the basket, well facilities managers get paid more than you think to ensure that the building is properly maintained.
As far as waiters and bussing tables, there are more than enough bad actors to fill them. :P
You're either misunderstanding the concept of "safety net" or using it in a manner dramatically different from how most people understand it.
The idea of a safety net is that if everything else goes to shit, you have something to rely on to get you back on your feet. Unemployment benefits, and so on. Minimum wage isn't currently premised on being a safety net, it's premised on providing for the long-term well-being of unskilled laborers. If you lose your minimum wage job, the minimum wage doesn't provide you with a safety net, because you're out of a job, and your next job will also probably be minimum wage. And if you're a skilled laborer making more than minimum wage, you won't likely be applying for minimum wage jobs, because you can probably make as much or more on unemployment benefits while you find a job that can actually pay the bills.
Surely the US has different minimum wage for adults and minors? That's an obvious thing to have.
Nope, and it's not an obvious thing to have - if you create a concession on a certain type of laboe, you will create an emphasis on that type of labor.
Only if you want to disadvantage everyone applying for minimum wage jobs who isn't also a minor.
Wha? Why should there be a different minimum wage for doing the same kind of job? The raw work that a person is able to do has value. Regardless of where the money gained from that job goes, the work itself has the same value.
If you're willing to assign a minimum wage, you're already throwing the idea of paying the proper value for work out the window. The whole point of minimum wage is that the "fair value" of labor for certain jobs isn't palatable. If you're screwing with the market anyway, there's no real reason not to screw with it relative to different demographics, at least in principle. It's just that in practice, having different minimum wages for different groups fucks things up.
Exactly.
Works just fine in other countries. Minors are already hired over adults, because they're easier to coerce etc.
They also have more drama and are less dependable. They're only preferred when you want a high turnover rate. Which isn't a lot of places. Now, if you can skim down the payroll costs having to yell at people for being late more often isn't a big deal.
I disagree with that logic. You're not exactly getting the cream of the crop when an adult applies for a minimum wage job. I have never been fired from a job, but when I was working minimum wage in grocery stores there were numerous adults that were fired around me for negligence or just fucking up.
Umm... you're aware that the point of this is to allow people who aren't kids to survive, and disincenting companies from hiring those people is counter-productive, right? I mean, "unskilled adults already get screwed, so screwing them even more is fine" is not the most compelling of arguments.
For me, most kids dropped like flies while the adults having a second job, or retirees who wanted to help with the SS check (but not make too much to fuck it up) were there for years and years. Hell, I was the only one under 25 who stayed at the place for more than 3 years, and I was there for 6, though with less hours on top of my day job for the last one, who wasn't training for management.
So, my anectdotes beat your anectdotes. Besides, the point of minimum wage is to help those fuckups you were working with. Not to let teenagers fuck them over as well.
The point of minimum wage is to set a standard for the low rung of required labor on the ladder. It has nothing to do with teenagers working or fuck up parents working. We have social programs already in affect to help people that are unskilled labor or lacking the basic ability to perform labor. What you're advocating is a form of age discrimination.
How is ensuring that adults are competing with dependents on equal footing age discrimination? Kids should not be allowed to undercut adults' wages because they don't shoulder the same cost of living expense.
However, the "inefficiency of government bureaucracy" isn't a great argument as to why we should proceed to up the value of government interfere in the labor market.
Regarding the safety net, it is a safety net in the sense that it sets a minimum on how much an hour of your work will be worth, regardless of market conditions that might want to puch it down further, and also theoretically it keeps a worker at a certain level of wealth that will permit him more short-term stability in case of job loss. Jeff's argument as to why it isn't a safety net is really just another phrasing of the argument that minimum wages just aren't effective, and hence aren't very good at being safety nets they're supposed to be.
Eh, not really. If you're making minimum wage, or even somewhere in the vicinity, you're very unlikely to have no savings of any sort. If you go from shitty pay to no pay with no savings, it doesn't much matter whether the pay was really shitty or just kinda shitty. You still have no income at all, and no savings from which to draw.
Beyond that, I guess I agree, mostly because we're now in Semanticsland, which is a dismal country populated by pedantry and _J_.