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Think about what you're doing. I am asking for specific ideas and numbers, and you're responding with homily. This is what I mean. You can't just critique and m

Think about what you're doing. I am asking for specific ideas and numbers, and you're responding with homily. This is what I mean. You can't just critique and moralize without offering specific workable solutions. The system we have is not great. Who wouldn't want a world where everybody could just have more or less whatever they want, live extremely comfortably, and for it to all be completely sustainable? But that's also not realistic. That's why I bring up the GDP and what it actually means. GDP is literally the market rate of every single good and service produced in this nation. And that only equals out to $50k per person. Our wealth really is in complete spite of our economy -- that's without even getting into the fact that the GDP is currently at record levels. Various areas have tried now increasing the minimum wage to a level approaching $15 with results that have been, at best, 'mixed'. The point is that you cannot simply ignore economic realities when trying to create a better life for people. This is specifically why social economic systems have been tried numerous times, yet they seem to invariably result in literal starvation. They're well intentioned, but out of touch with reality - and the consequences for putting homily above reality tend to be a brief period of feel good, followed by devastation.

Moodles 8y ago
Indeed some would argue that a minimum wage can be quite damaging: for those in society who are unproductive so as not to be worth $x an hour, a minimum wage of >= $x actually definitely excludes them from the workforce. They’re even more damned than before. Now I’m not sure either way if a minimum wage of 0 or $x is a good idea, but I would generally go with whatever the evidence suggestions (and I havn’t looked into it). What I find really bizarre is why yours and mine comments are being downvotes so much. Are we not contributing to the discussion? Bit of an echo chamber around here.
- krapp 8y ago
  > for those in society who are unproductive so as not to be worth $x an hour, a minimum wage of >= $x actually definitely excludes them from the workforce Wages are not objectively determined on the basis of worker productivity. If that were the case, wages would rise with productivity, but they tend not to. Wages are a cost that employers want to keep as low as possible in all cases - indeed, lower in cases of higher productivity, for a greater return on investment. A stower at Amazon can make their monthly salary for the company in minutes by stowing a couple of XBoxes, yet they'll make the same 12.00/hr over a ten hour shift regardless. The value that an employee brings to a company is always less than their compensation. Never more, and certainly never equal. I'm not certain the actual workforce bears out the premise that a minimum wage definitely prices workers out, since if it did, one would expect none of those jobs to be filled, since no employer should want to pay a minimum wage to fill them.
  - Moodles 8y ago
    I read your post several times and I still don't know what statement of mine you're contesting.
  - TangoTrotFox 8y ago
    I think your post is a clear example of why people seem to rage completely inappropriately. I'm sure your example was rhetorical, but do you realize how rhetorical it was? People seem to vastly overestimate how much companies make per item. Amazon's profit margin is currently at record breaking levels -- of 4.79%. It historically averages around 2%. That means on e.g. $300 of product (as a game console costs), they would show an average profit of $6-$14. They need to move hundreds of thousands of dollars of product to pay the yearly salary for a single blue-collar worker. A box mover is making nowhere near his monthly compensation for moving a couple of XBoxes, even we ignore the vast number of other expenses that go into the process and pretend that 100% of the profit from those boxes can go straight to him. As for minimum wage, businesses aren't identical -- even when they are. For instance a McDonald's franchise in one area of a mostly homogenous part of town can end up having a substantially different overall performance than one in a different area in our mostly homogenous town. There's a large number of variables that can be difficult to account for. And of course reality is different businesses operating in different areas in heterogeneous towns. So you don't eliminate all jobs of a given wage level - you just reduce the demand for them by removing all companies that can't afford to pay those wages.

Moodles 8y ago

Indeed some would argue that a minimum wage can be quite damaging: for those in society who are unproductive so as not to be worth $x an hour, a minimum wage of >= $x actually definitely excludes them from the workforce. They’re even more damned than before. Now I’m not sure either way if a minimum wage of 0 or $x is a good idea, but I would generally go with whatever the evidence suggestions (and I havn’t looked into it). What I find really bizarre is why yours and mine comments are being downvotes so much. Are we not contributing to the discussion? Bit of an echo chamber around here.

krapp 8y ago
> for those in society who are unproductive so as not to be worth $x an hour, a minimum wage of >= $x actually definitely excludes them from the workforce Wages are not objectively determined on the basis of worker productivity. If that were the case, wages would rise with productivity, but they tend not to. Wages are a cost that employers want to keep as low as possible in all cases - indeed, lower in cases of higher productivity, for a greater return on investment. A stower at Amazon can make their monthly salary for the company in minutes by stowing a couple of XBoxes, yet they'll make the same 12.00/hr over a ten hour shift regardless. The value that an employee brings to a company is always less than their compensation. Never more, and certainly never equal. I'm not certain the actual workforce bears out the premise that a minimum wage definitely prices workers out, since if it did, one would expect none of those jobs to be filled, since no employer should want to pay a minimum wage to fill them.
- Moodles 8y ago
  I read your post several times and I still don't know what statement of mine you're contesting.
- TangoTrotFox 8y ago
  I think your post is a clear example of why people seem to rage completely inappropriately. I'm sure your example was rhetorical, but do you realize how rhetorical it was? People seem to vastly overestimate how much companies make per item. Amazon's profit margin is currently at record breaking levels -- of 4.79%. It historically averages around 2%. That means on e.g. $300 of product (as a game console costs), they would show an average profit of $6-$14. They need to move hundreds of thousands of dollars of product to pay the yearly salary for a single blue-collar worker. A box mover is making nowhere near his monthly compensation for moving a couple of XBoxes, even we ignore the vast number of other expenses that go into the process and pretend that 100% of the profit from those boxes can go straight to him. As for minimum wage, businesses aren't identical -- even when they are. For instance a McDonald's franchise in one area of a mostly homogenous part of town can end up having a substantially different overall performance than one in a different area in our mostly homogenous town. There's a large number of variables that can be difficult to account for. And of course reality is different businesses operating in different areas in heterogeneous towns. So you don't eliminate all jobs of a given wage level - you just reduce the demand for them by removing all companies that can't afford to pay those wages.