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"Should we have a minimum wage at all? Does a minimum wage increase productivity by artificially making labor more expensive?" The goal of minimum wage is not

"Should we have a minimum wage at all? Does a minimum wage increase productivity by artificially making labor more expensive?" The goal of minimum wage is not to increase productivity, but provide a "safety net" for people at the bottom of the pyramid salary-wise. Public education and healthcare also artificially reduce the price of these services, but the goal again is to provide a safety net to all those that otherwise would not be able to afford them.

hdiujjf 8y ago
Minimum wage ensures the most marginal at risk employee becomes unemployed. Economic illiterarcy on full display.
- jfoutz 8y ago
  > Economic illiterarcy on full display What’s your plan to fix that? The school of hard knocks? Public education? I mean, as long as it exists, people are going to be exploited. Specifically not paid fair market value.
- yongjik 8y ago
  > Minimum wage ensures the most marginal at risk employee becomes unemployed. Working as intended. Now they can look for jobs that treat them like human beings, instead of being forced to work ten hours while a toddler is waiting at home just because they physically can. It's the job of the government to keep these people from starving while they are unemployed.
  - friedman23 8y ago
    > forced Who is suggesting forcing people to do anything? You are so confident in what is the best interests of the poor. You are actually suggesting it is better for people to live in squalor feeding their children breadcrumbs than to work below minimum wage. How about letting people decide for themselves what jobs they want to work and at what wages instead of coming in here mandating what "should" be done without any evidence that it will actually benefit the people you claim to care about? You are the only person in this discussion interested in forcing and mandating people to do anything.
    - throwaway2048 8y ago
      Your post commits a common oversight, the fact that coercion beyond agreements perfectly a rational Homo Economicus would make is a reality. Picking a different job isnt an option when ALL of the jobs require that, the situation in SK really is that extreme, and thats why this law was brought in.
    - yongjik 8y ago
      In your libertarian model society, poor people can choose for themselves... between working 10 hours a day to earn less than minimum wage, with no time left for learning new skills or searching for a better job, or not working and starving. If you want give people the power to choose for themselves, they should be able to take a break. They should be able to take risks, without equating losing (or quitting) a job with financial doom. Otherwise the "choice" poor people have is only on paper, in the same way the old joke plays: in America people have the freedom to criticize the American government, and in Soviet Union people had the exact same freedom - to criticize the American government. What you derisively call "breadcrumbs" is the foundation of modern welfare society, a recognition of its duty to each individual in the society. (I'm not saying South Korea is a model society: clearly it isn't, when it has to tell business owners to stop overworking people. But we're moving in the right direction.)
      - swfsql 8y ago
        Without min wage laws, the most disadvantaged person (low skill etc) has more OPTIONS to choose from. Wanna "take a break"? Sure, she can try choosing that. Wanna work below min wage? Sure, its their choice. You are saying its "better for them" if we take options out of them. Now, how is that even possible..? ps. I won't point you at anything, but try looking for historical reasons behind min wage imposition. They simply wanted to exterminate those "disadvantaged persons" (because most of them were blacks, and those who imposed this law were racists).
- KirinDave 8y ago
  You're so confident in this opinion, it seems, that you won't attach it to a real account. Many accomplished economists have publicly put their marks down both in favor of and opposition to minimum wage, so why not at least have the decency to own your own words and engage in a genuine debate?
  - throwaway2048 8y ago
    Because they arent interested in an honest debate, they are interested in sniping ideological talking points even they dont really beleive in.
    - jfoutz 8y ago
      Fundamentally you have to choose. Does society serve the market, or does the market serve society? I realize that legislating that it not rain on Saturday is ridiculous. But it is certainly reasonable to influence the market. Save in the good times, spend in the bad. Ensure market participants are well equipped to make informed decisions, tax what you don’t want and subsidize what you do. I (think I) understand that the market is incredibly powerful, and should be harnessed for the advancement of society, like oil. But it requires careful thought. It’s not as simple as a u shaped harness for a horse. Of course, I’m just here for the points, so feel free to disregard, rather than having an actual conversation.
      - KirinDave 8y ago
        Okay, but tons of educated economists who's entire job is thinking about this stuff and peer reviewing other expert's work suggest that evidence doesn't back up the claim that minimum wage kills jobs at scale. They cite as evidence a full time labor demand thst does not seem to contract in anything but a temporary manner when minimum wages are altered. We've got lots of examples of this all over the world. But what do I know, I just listen to experts and read their papers and articles.
        jfoutz 8y ago
another-one-off 8y ago
The goal of a minimum wage is difficult to pin down, because laws are written by large groups of people with potentially differing motivations. That being said, I hope it isn't about a safety net. What a minimum wage really does is outlaw jobs that provide less value than the minimum wage (eg, if I have cleaning work that requires 1hr of labour and generates value of $10, it theoretically will not happen under a minimum wage regime of $11/hr). With this frame, there does seem to be much debate about the interaction between the market price for labour and the value-add of different work. People want to make decisions here and I suspect they don't consider have all the facts. Politics as usual :].
- tjr225 8y ago
  > I hope it isn't about a safety net. Why, exactly- assuming that the reason you hope minimum wages are enacted can be both for your reasons and to provide a safety net?
  - another-one-off 8y ago
    Well, I don't believe that corporations should be required to create a social safety net. I think the government should do it directly.
    - tejtm 8y ago
      they would need a non negative tax on noncorporal entities to afford that too
    - CJefferson 8y ago
      I would say society produces a social safety bet, corporations aren't completely separate. They would like to be, but they are heavily supported, between society educating their workers, providing them basic health care, the emergency services, allowing their owners limited liability, the odd massive bail out, etc. Etc.
- sonnyblarney 8y ago
  "The goal of a minimum wage is difficult to pin down" In the most general sense it's straightforward. Your salary is a function of your economic power vis-a-vis your employer - and nothing else. That power is usually derived as a function of the necessity (i.e. value creation) and scarcity of your skills, and possibly some other non-market forces. Skilled workers have some modicum of leverage and can get a decent salary. Or have powerful guilds (like doctors). 'Capital class' will use their status as major asset holders, and non-market things like class, relationships, political patronage, lobbying, direct control of political systems etc. to manage their careers. But unskilled workers have a problem. Basically, if there was no minimum wage (or other social intervention), workers would be paid the absolute minimum necessary to survive, and economies to support those very low levels would develop (i.e. 'Dollar Store' would be the '25 cent store) and there'd be favela like living conditions just as they already exist in advanced economies like Hong Kong and almost advanced economies like Brazil. (Obviously, if there is 'welfare' than the amount of welfare comp. would set the floor on this, i.e. 'work for the government and do nothing' would be the 'lowest alternative' to paid work.) But especially without welfare, or non-market interventions in general ... that floor would be very, very low. Just take a trip outside of the 'rich world', it's easy to find workers working for 'a bowl of rice a day' whilst owners make considerably more, and by that I mean, there are definitely surpluses in the system to allow for higher salaries, but pure market power doesn't provide any impetus at all for employers to provide it. So - 'minimum wage' is a non-market intervention, much like a 'union without membership' to establish a kind of meta collective bargaining. Non market interventions are basically essential and they exist in one way or another in all advanced nations (either social services, welfare, min. wage. etc..). Should note that some argue that social intervention is correlated but not causal to wealth creation, but I disagree with this ... but that's for another discussion.

hdiujjf 8y ago

Minimum wage ensures the most marginal at risk employee becomes unemployed. Economic illiterarcy on full display.

jfoutz 8y ago
> Economic illiterarcy on full display What’s your plan to fix that? The school of hard knocks? Public education? I mean, as long as it exists, people are going to be exploited. Specifically not paid fair market value.
yongjik 8y ago
> Minimum wage ensures the most marginal at risk employee becomes unemployed. Working as intended. Now they can look for jobs that treat them like human beings, instead of being forced to work ten hours while a toddler is waiting at home just because they physically can. It's the job of the government to keep these people from starving while they are unemployed.
- friedman23 8y ago
  > forced Who is suggesting forcing people to do anything? You are so confident in what is the best interests of the poor. You are actually suggesting it is better for people to live in squalor feeding their children breadcrumbs than to work below minimum wage. How about letting people decide for themselves what jobs they want to work and at what wages instead of coming in here mandating what "should" be done without any evidence that it will actually benefit the people you claim to care about? You are the only person in this discussion interested in forcing and mandating people to do anything.
  - throwaway2048 8y ago
    Your post commits a common oversight, the fact that coercion beyond agreements perfectly a rational Homo Economicus would make is a reality. Picking a different job isnt an option when ALL of the jobs require that, the situation in SK really is that extreme, and thats why this law was brought in.
  - yongjik 8y ago
    In your libertarian model society, poor people can choose for themselves... between working 10 hours a day to earn less than minimum wage, with no time left for learning new skills or searching for a better job, or not working and starving. If you want give people the power to choose for themselves, they should be able to take a break. They should be able to take risks, without equating losing (or quitting) a job with financial doom. Otherwise the "choice" poor people have is only on paper, in the same way the old joke plays: in America people have the freedom to criticize the American government, and in Soviet Union people had the exact same freedom - to criticize the American government. What you derisively call "breadcrumbs" is the foundation of modern welfare society, a recognition of its duty to each individual in the society. (I'm not saying South Korea is a model society: clearly it isn't, when it has to tell business owners to stop overworking people. But we're moving in the right direction.)
    - swfsql 8y ago
      Without min wage laws, the most disadvantaged person (low skill etc) has more OPTIONS to choose from. Wanna "take a break"? Sure, she can try choosing that. Wanna work below min wage? Sure, its their choice. You are saying its "better for them" if we take options out of them. Now, how is that even possible..? ps. I won't point you at anything, but try looking for historical reasons behind min wage imposition. They simply wanted to exterminate those "disadvantaged persons" (because most of them were blacks, and those who imposed this law were racists).
KirinDave 8y ago
You're so confident in this opinion, it seems, that you won't attach it to a real account. Many accomplished economists have publicly put their marks down both in favor of and opposition to minimum wage, so why not at least have the decency to own your own words and engage in a genuine debate?
- throwaway2048 8y ago
  Because they arent interested in an honest debate, they are interested in sniping ideological talking points even they dont really beleive in.
  - jfoutz 8y ago
    Fundamentally you have to choose. Does society serve the market, or does the market serve society? I realize that legislating that it not rain on Saturday is ridiculous. But it is certainly reasonable to influence the market. Save in the good times, spend in the bad. Ensure market participants are well equipped to make informed decisions, tax what you don’t want and subsidize what you do. I (think I) understand that the market is incredibly powerful, and should be harnessed for the advancement of society, like oil. But it requires careful thought. It’s not as simple as a u shaped harness for a horse. Of course, I’m just here for the points, so feel free to disregard, rather than having an actual conversation.
    - KirinDave 8y ago
      Okay, but tons of educated economists who's entire job is thinking about this stuff and peer reviewing other expert's work suggest that evidence doesn't back up the claim that minimum wage kills jobs at scale. They cite as evidence a full time labor demand thst does not seem to contract in anything but a temporary manner when minimum wages are altered. We've got lots of examples of this all over the world. But what do I know, I just listen to experts and read their papers and articles.
      - jfoutz 8y ago

another-one-off 8y ago

The goal of a minimum wage is difficult to pin down, because laws are written by large groups of people with potentially differing motivations. That being said, I hope it isn't about a safety net. What a minimum wage really does is outlaw jobs that provide less value than the minimum wage (eg, if I have cleaning work that requires 1hr of labour and generates value of $10, it theoretically will not happen under a minimum wage regime of $11/hr). With this frame, there does seem to be much debate about the interaction between the market price for labour and the value-add of different work. People want to make decisions here and I suspect they don't consider have all the facts. Politics as usual :].

tjr225 8y ago
> I hope it isn't about a safety net. Why, exactly- assuming that the reason you hope minimum wages are enacted can be both for your reasons and to provide a safety net?
- another-one-off 8y ago
  Well, I don't believe that corporations should be required to create a social safety net. I think the government should do it directly.
  - tejtm 8y ago
    they would need a non negative tax on noncorporal entities to afford that too
  - CJefferson 8y ago
    I would say society produces a social safety bet, corporations aren't completely separate. They would like to be, but they are heavily supported, between society educating their workers, providing them basic health care, the emergency services, allowing their owners limited liability, the odd massive bail out, etc. Etc.
sonnyblarney 8y ago
"The goal of a minimum wage is difficult to pin down" In the most general sense it's straightforward. Your salary is a function of your economic power vis-a-vis your employer - and nothing else. That power is usually derived as a function of the necessity (i.e. value creation) and scarcity of your skills, and possibly some other non-market forces. Skilled workers have some modicum of leverage and can get a decent salary. Or have powerful guilds (like doctors). 'Capital class' will use their status as major asset holders, and non-market things like class, relationships, political patronage, lobbying, direct control of political systems etc. to manage their careers. But unskilled workers have a problem. Basically, if there was no minimum wage (or other social intervention), workers would be paid the absolute minimum necessary to survive, and economies to support those very low levels would develop (i.e. 'Dollar Store' would be the '25 cent store) and there'd be favela like living conditions just as they already exist in advanced economies like Hong Kong and almost advanced economies like Brazil. (Obviously, if there is 'welfare' than the amount of welfare comp. would set the floor on this, i.e. 'work for the government and do nothing' would be the 'lowest alternative' to paid work.) But especially without welfare, or non-market interventions in general ... that floor would be very, very low. Just take a trip outside of the 'rich world', it's easy to find workers working for 'a bowl of rice a day' whilst owners make considerably more, and by that I mean, there are definitely surpluses in the system to allow for higher salaries, but pure market power doesn't provide any impetus at all for employers to provide it. So - 'minimum wage' is a non-market intervention, much like a 'union without membership' to establish a kind of meta collective bargaining. Non market interventions are basically essential and they exist in one way or another in all advanced nations (either social services, welfare, min. wage. etc..). Should note that some argue that social intervention is correlated but not causal to wealth creation, but I disagree with this ... but that's for another discussion.