7 ms·

by that logic, minimum wage and child labor laws should be illegal. If a child wants to work...who are you to stop them?

by vaksel 16y ago

lionhearted 16y ago
> by that logic, minimum wage Minimum wage laws hurt people sometimes. They're not just benevolent laws that increase pay. It means that some low margin businesses won't be operated, and some low skilled people who aren't capable of doing work worth the minimum wage won't be able to find jobs. > and child labor laws should be illegal. If a child wants to work...who are you to stop them? What's a "child"? Is someone 14 years old and mature, disciplined, and learned a child? Should they be allowed to work if they want to? How about an extremely bright 12 year old? No dice, no matter what? I think people with a level of maturity and understanding should be allowed to make voluntary transactions, yes. I won't stop them. In fact, I think anyone who would stop two consenting adults from making a voluntary transaction, no matter how well intentioned, is doing a bad thing.
- alex_c 16y ago
  I think part of the problem is with that word, "voluntary" - and more specifically how it relates to another word, "desperate".
- vaksel 16y ago
  minimum wage laws mean you are making enough to live. If you are making the minimum wage, and work 40 hours a week, that's $1,160 a month/$2,320 if they work 80 hours a week. Can someone really survive if they are being paid even less than that? Let's say you pay someone $5 an hour because someone is desperate they'll take any job...and they work 80 hours a week, that's only $1,600 a month. Can you survive on that? Yes some law margin businesses won't be operated, but that just means people won't have to work like slaves just to pay rent. So you would be fine with a 12 year old working in the coal mines? By law, anyone under 18 is not considered an adult. I guess by your logic, you'd have no problem with pedophilia, after all big bad law is stopping a 30 year old from banging a 12 year old.
  - mrkurt 16y ago
    I find your pedophilia strawman to be completely and utterly distasteful.
  - paulgb 16y ago
    The person who is willing to take the $5/hour job is willing to do so because he isn't able to get a $10/hour job. $1,160/month might be hard to live on, but it's easier than living on $0, which is the alternative forced on him by minimum wage laws.
  - lionhearted 16y ago
    $13,900 per year ($1,160 per month) puts you in the top 15% of earners worldwide. You can absolutely live on that anywhere, including any city in the United States, including Tokyo, including Hong Kong, and so on. You'll be able to get a bed, a shared bathroom, and enough healthy food at that money. And of course, as soon as there's an opportunity to make more, you move on and do so. If you want to talk about high cost of living in the USA, I agree with you. Prices are artificially high in the USA for a number of reasons. If you removed just a few laws that aren't doing much good, a solid meal would probably cost around $1 to $2 - last time I was there, you could get a decent $2 meal in Taipei and a 2 euro meal in Berlin for instance. Prices in America are higher than they should be due to some corruption and stupidity, but even with the artificially high prices $14k is a heck of a lot of money by almost standard at almost any time in history. As for the rest of your comment, I don't think the practice of running immediately to extreme edge cases is the best way to have a discussion. I started with the point that a 20 year old should be able to intern at a company if they want to, and you want to move the discussion to coal mines and pedophilia? Edge cases are useful to discuss, but probably secondary in importance to general principles. If you agree that in general stopping mature, capable humans of doing voluntary transactions is a bad thing, then we can look at the edge cases and try to figure out some lines. But to answer your main point, absolutely $13,900 per year is a fantastically large amount of money that can be lived fairly well on. No Starbucks, no $12 movie tickets, but food, housing, and other necessities? Absolutely possible, that's a huge amount of money. I've lived on much less comfortably, and most of the world would kill to live on that $13,900 per year.
cmgarcia 16y ago
I thought it was pretty obvious he was referring to 2 sound-minded adults making a voluntary exchange.

by that logic, minimum wage and child labor laws should be illegal. If a child wants to work...who are you to stop them?

by vaksel 16y ago

by that logic, minimum wage and child labor laws should be illegal. If a child wants to work...who are you to stop them?

lionhearted 16y ago

> by that logic, minimum wage Minimum wage laws hurt people sometimes. They're not just benevolent laws that increase pay. It means that some low margin businesses won't be operated, and some low skilled people who aren't capable of doing work worth the minimum wage won't be able to find jobs. > and child labor laws should be illegal. If a child wants to work...who are you to stop them? What's a "child"? Is someone 14 years old and mature, disciplined, and learned a child? Should they be allowed to work if they want to? How about an extremely bright 12 year old? No dice, no matter what? I think people with a level of maturity and understanding should be allowed to make voluntary transactions, yes. I won't stop them. In fact, I think anyone who would stop two consenting adults from making a voluntary transaction, no matter how well intentioned, is doing a bad thing.

alex_c 16y ago
I think part of the problem is with that word, "voluntary" - and more specifically how it relates to another word, "desperate".
vaksel 16y ago
minimum wage laws mean you are making enough to live. If you are making the minimum wage, and work 40 hours a week, that's $1,160 a month/$2,320 if they work 80 hours a week. Can someone really survive if they are being paid even less than that? Let's say you pay someone $5 an hour because someone is desperate they'll take any job...and they work 80 hours a week, that's only $1,600 a month. Can you survive on that? Yes some law margin businesses won't be operated, but that just means people won't have to work like slaves just to pay rent. So you would be fine with a 12 year old working in the coal mines? By law, anyone under 18 is not considered an adult. I guess by your logic, you'd have no problem with pedophilia, after all big bad law is stopping a 30 year old from banging a 12 year old.
- mrkurt 16y ago
  I find your pedophilia strawman to be completely and utterly distasteful.
- paulgb 16y ago
  The person who is willing to take the $5/hour job is willing to do so because he isn't able to get a $10/hour job. $1,160/month might be hard to live on, but it's easier than living on $0, which is the alternative forced on him by minimum wage laws.
- lionhearted 16y ago
  $13,900 per year ($1,160 per month) puts you in the top 15% of earners worldwide. You can absolutely live on that anywhere, including any city in the United States, including Tokyo, including Hong Kong, and so on. You'll be able to get a bed, a shared bathroom, and enough healthy food at that money. And of course, as soon as there's an opportunity to make more, you move on and do so. If you want to talk about high cost of living in the USA, I agree with you. Prices are artificially high in the USA for a number of reasons. If you removed just a few laws that aren't doing much good, a solid meal would probably cost around $1 to $2 - last time I was there, you could get a decent $2 meal in Taipei and a 2 euro meal in Berlin for instance. Prices in America are higher than they should be due to some corruption and stupidity, but even with the artificially high prices $14k is a heck of a lot of money by almost standard at almost any time in history. As for the rest of your comment, I don't think the practice of running immediately to extreme edge cases is the best way to have a discussion. I started with the point that a 20 year old should be able to intern at a company if they want to, and you want to move the discussion to coal mines and pedophilia? Edge cases are useful to discuss, but probably secondary in importance to general principles. If you agree that in general stopping mature, capable humans of doing voluntary transactions is a bad thing, then we can look at the edge cases and try to figure out some lines. But to answer your main point, absolutely $13,900 per year is a fantastically large amount of money that can be lived fairly well on. No Starbucks, no $12 movie tickets, but food, housing, and other necessities? Absolutely possible, that's a huge amount of money. I've lived on much less comfortably, and most of the world would kill to live on that $13,900 per year.

cmgarcia 16y ago

I thought it was pretty obvious he was referring to 2 sound-minded adults making a voluntary exchange.