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Guess those companies should not exist then. No company should exist if their workers end up in poverty or need help in the form of food stamps or any other kin

Guess those companies should not exist then. No company should exist if their workers end up in poverty or need help in the form of food stamps or any other kind of help. Any job should pay enough for a decent life.

bayesian_horse 8y ago
Many small business owners are probably not quite so eager to close up shop because they lack a few employees. The industries or professions where "living wages" is an issue are usually not the ones desperate for labor.
logicchains 8y ago
>Guess those companies should not exist then. No company should exist if their workers end up in poverty or need help in the form of food stamps or any other kind of help. Any job should pay enough for a decent life. Killing such such companies doesn't magically create new companies able to pay more, it just converts their low-paid workers to unemployed workers. The minimum wage is always zero (no job).
- bayesian_horse 8y ago
  That's only the case when profit margins are so low that the minimum wage extinguishes the marginal benefit of a worker. At the bottom of the wage spectrum that's mostly not true. Profits would allow for higher wages, but the negotiating power of the employers is such that they can hold wages down. In these cases minimum wages do make sense and don't result in higher unemployment. And implementing minimum wage laws has shown that it does not affect unemployment in a big manner.
scarface74 8y ago
So how much do you think the local pizza shop should pay my 16 year old son? Should they be giving him a “livable wage” or should they keep offering $7.25/ hour for him and his high school friends who are staying at home with thier parents?
- throwaway2048 8y ago
  Lets open up a vast class of exploited workers who are adults with families because your son wants to work for pocket money in highschool.
  - scarface74 8y ago
    How much do you think unskilled work is worth? How much should he and his teenage friends get paid to flip burgers and make pizza? And honestly, if you are competing with a 16 year old for a job, there are larger issues than the minimum wage. Maybe the real answer is to make it easier for adults to get training for jobs that can’t be done by a 16 year old.
    - throwaway2048 8y ago
      The problem is that one (keeping wages low) gets pushed, and the other does not. Something tells me you would be perfectly happy if wages were kept super low, and the other things you said did not happen. That is not a solution.
      - scarface74 8y ago
        There was just an article yesterday about the owners of 7-11 making a net income of $37K a year. Small business owners aren’t getting rich. If you don’t think that businesses don’t “deserve” to exist if there business model can’t be profitable at “livable wages” that seems hypocritical to me since a lot of techies work for companies that only exist because of VC funding and if their company had to exist based solely on profitability they wouldn’t be working either.
      - bayesian_horse 8y ago
        Whether a minimum wage in a certain situation makes sense or not depends on who is out of work and who is employed at below livable wages. In an economy with high unemployment, a minimum wage should be lower. With low unemployment, it can be higher in order to put a lower limit on the employers' negotiating power.
zjaffee 8y ago
If only this were a practical view point for those living in developing countries too no? The entire modern economy as we know it is based on workers making what would be poverty level wages in the places the goods get ultimately sold in.
bayesian_horse 8y ago
I'm talking about companies with difficulty hiring enough employees. Almost never are these the jobs close to a reasonable poverty standard. So minimum wage is an entirely different topic. Increasing minimum wage will not solve any hiring problems, it only bolsters negotiation power for those at the bottom. Which is a good thing, but no solution to the stated problem.

bayesian_horse 8y ago

Many small business owners are probably not quite so eager to close up shop because they lack a few employees. The industries or professions where "living wages" is an issue are usually not the ones desperate for labor.

logicchains 8y ago

>Guess those companies should not exist then. No company should exist if their workers end up in poverty or need help in the form of food stamps or any other kind of help. Any job should pay enough for a decent life. Killing such such companies doesn't magically create new companies able to pay more, it just converts their low-paid workers to unemployed workers. The minimum wage is always zero (no job).

bayesian_horse 8y ago
That's only the case when profit margins are so low that the minimum wage extinguishes the marginal benefit of a worker. At the bottom of the wage spectrum that's mostly not true. Profits would allow for higher wages, but the negotiating power of the employers is such that they can hold wages down. In these cases minimum wages do make sense and don't result in higher unemployment. And implementing minimum wage laws has shown that it does not affect unemployment in a big manner.

scarface74 8y ago

So how much do you think the local pizza shop should pay my 16 year old son? Should they be giving him a “livable wage” or should they keep offering $7.25/ hour for him and his high school friends who are staying at home with thier parents?

throwaway2048 8y ago
Lets open up a vast class of exploited workers who are adults with families because your son wants to work for pocket money in highschool.
- scarface74 8y ago
  How much do you think unskilled work is worth? How much should he and his teenage friends get paid to flip burgers and make pizza? And honestly, if you are competing with a 16 year old for a job, there are larger issues than the minimum wage. Maybe the real answer is to make it easier for adults to get training for jobs that can’t be done by a 16 year old.
  - throwaway2048 8y ago
    The problem is that one (keeping wages low) gets pushed, and the other does not. Something tells me you would be perfectly happy if wages were kept super low, and the other things you said did not happen. That is not a solution.
    - scarface74 8y ago
      There was just an article yesterday about the owners of 7-11 making a net income of $37K a year. Small business owners aren’t getting rich. If you don’t think that businesses don’t “deserve” to exist if there business model can’t be profitable at “livable wages” that seems hypocritical to me since a lot of techies work for companies that only exist because of VC funding and if their company had to exist based solely on profitability they wouldn’t be working either.
    - bayesian_horse 8y ago
      Whether a minimum wage in a certain situation makes sense or not depends on who is out of work and who is employed at below livable wages. In an economy with high unemployment, a minimum wage should be lower. With low unemployment, it can be higher in order to put a lower limit on the employers' negotiating power.

zjaffee 8y ago

If only this were a practical view point for those living in developing countries too no? The entire modern economy as we know it is based on workers making what would be poverty level wages in the places the goods get ultimately sold in.

bayesian_horse 8y ago

I'm talking about companies with difficulty hiring enough employees. Almost never are these the jobs close to a reasonable poverty standard. So minimum wage is an entirely different topic. Increasing minimum wage will not solve any hiring problems, it only bolsters negotiation power for those at the bottom. Which is a good thing, but no solution to the stated problem.