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I don’t want to subsidize Walmart with my taxes. That’s exactly what you’re proposing, and in fact what happens. Companies underpay their workers, who end up ne

• cltby 6y ago
  You’re not subsidizing Walmart. You’ve decided that workers should enjoy some standard of living but are unwilling to shoulder the costs of providing it (e.g. through taxes). Instead, you’ve kicked those costs to Walmart. Walmart is subsidizing you.
  • stetrain 6y ago
    Walmart isn't going to run at a loss. They'll raise prices appropriately, or decide that expanding the same exact store into every small town in America is no longer a profitable growth strategy.
    • TheOtherHobbes 6y ago
      Amazon did exactly this recently. The costs of the new digital services tax were immediately passed on to suppliers. Amazon won't be paying a cent of it. Of course legislation could - and should - go after Amazon in other ways. But it makes the point that you don't want lawyers trying to define corporate taxation policy, because too few lawyers have the first clue how to define policy with no loopholes and real teeth.
      • tathougies 6y ago
        What is to be gained by reducing Amazon's profits? Less stuff able to be bought online?
        • stetrain 6y ago
          Increase competition by allowing local businesses without megacorp productivity leverage to compete on price.
    • take_a_breath 6y ago
      That sounds ideal.
      • jschwartzi 6y ago
        This is actually what I'm asking for. Raise peoples' wages, make it illegal to offer health insurance as a benefit, and provide a single-payer option for everyone. Make sure there's a universal basic income rather than something means-tested. Or, barring that, raise the minimum wage so most people who are working don't need the safety net. Means-testing causes huge bureaucracies in the US. The rules around the means-testing make it very difficult for the social programs to actually provide anything in a reasonable amount of time. Or if they do they have byzantine requirements like you have to make X number of job-seeking contacts during the week, you have to interview, and you have to take classes from people who haven't searched for a job outside of the public sector in 20 years. Or for food stamps you're limited to only a few sections of the store.
        • sukilot 6y ago
          Why illegal?
          • stetrain 6y ago
            It would force insurance companies to compete on healthcare plans for everyone, and give employees the ability to choose their plan. Right now employers get a discount for pooling their employees together for insurance, and as an employee you either take that discounted plan (which your employer pays part of) or go out on your own which is almost always significantly more expensive. Getting rid of the bundling and pooling would actually make the insurance market competitive and give people a choice. It would also mean that having good health care is no longer something your employer holds over you, increasing your ability to change jobs, walk out of a bad employment situation, or go out on your own as a freelancer/contractor. Getting rid of the employer health insurance advantage this way, or via a more radical single-payer system, would actually boost self-employment and very-small business, who currently have disadvantages in getting or providing these benefits.
    • MattGaiser 6y ago
      > They'll raise prices appropriately, or decide that expanding the same exact store into every small town in America is no longer a profitable growth strategy. Or redesign those stores to not depend on as much human labour.
      • stetrain 6y ago
        Sure, and there's a secondary point where if the need for labor no longer makes wages the primary mechanism by which a corporation pays its way in society, we may need to compensate with other forms of tax or cost of doing business. I don't directly begrudge a company or CEO their profits and paycheck, but if corporate profits are at all time highs while investment in infrastructure, education, healthcare, etc. are inadequate, that points to an imbalance that isn't being solved by the labor market.
      • sukilot 6y ago
        Good. Less wasted human time.
        • geodel 6y ago
          And more wasted humans. Wait, but all the labor in the world can become machine learning experts and earn $500K pa by working for Google while circle-jerking here on how tech companies are evil.
  • jschwartzi 6y ago
    So what you're saying, if I'm understanding you correctly, is that instead of me exchanging money for goods and services from specific companies or exercising my freedom of choice, it's much better for me to be making up the hidden costs of chronically underpaid workers for businesses that I don't like. And somehow Walmart is subsidizing me because I'm exercising my freedom of choice. As opposed to about 5% of my paycheck going to subsidize companies like Walmart who choose not to pay a living wage. So why not just remove all the money from the economy? I personally find Walmart's business model of chronically underpaying people then making them dependent on a huge bureaucracy to make up the living wage pretty repugnant. Whereas paying them an extra $6.00/hr means they no longer have to spend time waiting in line and on the phone during their off hours. They don't have to look specifically for landlords who accept section 8 vouchers. The living wage removes a huge amount of hidden labor involved in living off of minimum wage and that's what you're missing here.
    • cltby 6y ago
      In the absence of legislation, Walmart would pay their workers some wage $x. You have decided that, as a matter of decency, they should actually pay $z > $x. However, you and like-minded voters have only compelled Walmart to pay some intermediate sum $y. Now, you're upset about the residual $z-$y coming out of your pocket. But you might instead be grateful that Walmart is kicking in $y-$x to support your extravagant political demands. That's the subsidy. > it's much better for me to be making up the hidden costs of chronically underpaid workers Those workers are only underpaid according to your notions of fairness. You think _Walmart_ should be tasked with implementing _your_ moral vision at _their_ expense. I think _you_ should be tasked with implementing _your_ moral vision at _your_ expense.
      • michaelmrose 6y ago
        Voting provides us the opportunity to set the ground rules for living in a society. If they can thrive in a market with lower taxes or fewer rules let them.
      • SantalBlush 6y ago
        It doesn’t suddenly become about moral vision and fairness only when it’s something progressives want. The notions of private property and free markets are about moral vision and fairness. They are enforced with the threat of violence, and they benefit members of society unequally. Some people like to pretend that they’re natural, that they’re a given, and that challenging any component of them is imposing one’s own morality on some God-given system. That is false. No economic system is more or less about morality and fairness than any other. You believe in letting the capital retain more of the earnings than the labor because you think that is moral. It has nothing to do with some supposed position of neutrality.
  • michaelmrose 6y ago
    In the grand scheme of things society needs things like bridges, electricity, water, roads as necessary prerequisite for Walmart to have shoppers and therefore an income. In the same fashion society needs people that make enough money to meet their basic needs like food and medicine so that they may spend their additional funds on higher margin items that actually keep Walmart afloat. Businesses and the wealthy people that own them are vastly the beneficiaries of such policies as maintain a healthy functional society in the same way as they benefit from roads but for any given business if they can shirk their share they can keep the difference so they are incentivized to forget. It is strange that you consider paying their share a gift rather than a due. It seems worshiping economics is a barrier to understanding it.
    • cltby 6y ago
      For many people, economic history appears to begin with the New Deal, when FDR willed the middle class into existence with a chicken in every pot. A moment's thought should convince you that commerce antedates redistribution, wage floors, etc. Prosperity doesn't require a collectivist thumb on the scales.
      • michaelmrose 6y ago
        Can you point out the capitalist paradise where prosperity for the many doesn't require such a thumb on the scale? It certainly isn't the US where in fact said thumb is presently pressed firmly on that scale via social security, food stamps, medicare, medicaid, tanif, section 8 and so forth.
        • cltby 6y ago
          You are right to point out that such places don't exist. But it's worth remembering that the US was wealthy (and increasingly so) long before Keynes dressed up playground fairness as an academic discipline. Rich societies enable the existence of big government, not the other way around.
          • 6y ago
• sumtechguy 6y ago
  I agree. If we give say everyone 5 dollars an hour for no work. Livable wage is say 10. Then companies only have to pay 5. They can pocket the other 5 or lower their prices. Which is more likely? This also has other knock on effects. It is only possible in the very short term. In the long term inflation will wipe out the extra 5 and things will go back to steady state. It sounds nice, heck I would not mind it personally, but the knock-on effects for something like that could be a terrible creation that would take years to fix. Just first order effects do not seem great.
  • neilwilson 6y ago
    Why not pay them 10 and use the labour in the community? Then if Uber et al wants labour they have to bid it away from the "common good". Once everybody has an alternative job to go to outside the private sector, it no longer matters if Uber decides not to pay people and instead automates all the vehicles. Then everybody wins due to improved productivity - Uber and the people with community jobs.
    • sumtechguy 6y ago
      So uber would 'buy' from some central org? Why not just cut out the middle man then and deal directly with their employees? Why create a middle man? Middle man in any economic system tend to destroy wealth. Uber is in itself a middle man between people who want a ride and people who pay for it. They upended a middle man who was less efficient.
      • mvc 6y ago
        Don't see where parent is saying anything about Labor from a central org. He's just saying Uber has to up their bid in order to win the services of said Labor.
    • sukilot 6y ago
      Because of the problem of how to decide how they labor is used. Central planning communism has never worked. Free market with regulation and taxation has a much better record.
• untog 6y ago
  I imagine part of this would be ensuring that companies do not underpay their workers by enforcing strict standards on minimum wage and changing corporate tax obligations. Having employers provide benefits like healthcare is crazy. The US really needs to move beyond it. I’m surprised there isn’t more agreement politically, the benefit obligation is a huge drain on small companies and solo entrepreneurs.
  • take_a_breath 6y ago
    ==Having employers provide benefits like healthcare is crazy. The US really needs to move beyond it.== Not to mention the cost of staff needed negotiate, maintain, and explain the options to employees.
• bo1024 6y ago
  This reply comes from completely internalizing the perspective the above post describes. It only makes sense if you accept that the employer is supposed to completely care for their employees. But if you view it as society’s job, then everything changes. For one thing, small mom n pop stores can compete with Walmart a lot easier if healthcare is provided by the state. Also employees can quit if they’re not treated well, etc.
  • griffinkelly 6y ago
    From a startup perspective, I've always thought it interesting that more people in Europe/rest of the world don't take chances to create companies because of the great safety net there--at least its not as highly publicized. For whatever reason, the US is still the place to be and everyone wants to come to the US to start a company--my current company included (We have Canadian founders). I quit my job and thanks to the insurance changes in the US a few years ago, I was able to stay on my parents health insurance for a meaningful amount of time. It allowed me to take the chance of starting my own company. Unsure if I would have done the same, had circumstances been different.
    • pbiggar 6y ago
      Startups are in the US because of a long chain of decisions and network effects that ultimately come from US military spending in the 60s. > I quit my job and thanks to the insurance changes in the US a few years ago So you're saying that you were able to take the chance to build a startup because of the safety net?
      • griffinkelly 6y ago
        Yeah, had President Obama not made that change and extended health insurance to 26, I would have thought harder about quitting my job.
      • refurb 6y ago
        Sure, a safety net paid for by employers, not the gov’t.
• bhupy 6y ago
  Yes, that's how welfare works. When you pay taxes for a single payer healthcare system, you're absolving the company the responsibility to provide health insurance to their employees (read: "underpay their workers"). Many societies are okay with this because the end result is actually better/more efficient for everyone.
• EForEndeavour 6y ago
  Do you just oppose the use of tax dollars to support anyone or anything other than what you personally happen to use and like? What do you think about Medicaid, food stamps, the child tax credit (especially if you don't have children)? Assuming you aren't a student, do you oppose tax dollars going toward financial support for students? Do you oppose UBI? Do you vehemently oppose the US federal electric-vehicle tax credit of up to $7500 until the day you decide you'll buy a Tesla, when you'll switch to staunchly demanding that it be radically increased? (https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/taxevb.shtml https://www.fueleconomy.gov/feg/taxevb.shtml) These all represent your taxes going to support things that you are unlikely to benefit from personally, after all. If you remove the impact to other people from the calculus of where you'd want tax dollars to go, then I think most people would opt to enrich themselves rather than not. But that's just not how the world works. The reality is that any given person's tax dollars are used on all kinds of things that will never directly benefit them, or even their families or even socioeconomic class.
  • jb775 6y ago
    I don't think anyone is against your examples. The issue is WHERE the tax money is coming from and the PROPORTIONS of tax paid in relation to overall income. Unfortunately right now the middle class is being stuck with most of the bill on a PER-CAPITA income basis. And considering the wealth gap between the rich and the middle class is SUBSTANTIAL, it means we're essentially having relatively poor people (middle class) pay the bills of very poor people (lower class). When you zoom out a little (and remove irrational emotions about the topic clouding your perception), it's easier to see the disconnect.
    • justchilly 6y ago
      This is incorrect. On a per-capita basis the middle class is not being stuck with most of the bill. The bottom 50% pays less than 3% of federal income taxes (which are the largest source of federal income). That same amount of income tax is paid by the top 1,400 tax-payers. Also no need for the line about irrational emotions - lets have some proper discourse please.
• cactus2093 6y ago
  I agree with other replies that this is just a matter of perspective. Here’s an alternate one - if you hate Walmart and/or you hate the idea of unskilled workers in lower paying jobs, why do want to make them solely reliant on big employers like Walmart? A better safety net, in addition to achieving the same immediate outcome of workers living with better conditions, also means workers have more options. It might lower the supply of potential Walmart employees and actually also increase their wages or working conditions. But more importantly it would mean they could leave Walmart and still get by. Or they could work fewer hours without worrying about things like losing their employer sponsored health insurance. More people could live more fulfilling lives rather than being so reliant on their job at Walmart.
• sukilot 6y ago
  If people had more social welfare they wouldn't bother to waste their life at Walmart for tiny incremental wages. So Walmart would pay more.
• refurb 6y ago
  By that logic you’re subsidizing any company that takes a risk, fails and employees go on unemployment.
• mrnobody_67 6y ago
  THIS x 1000. Walmart used to have a page for employees telling them how to apply for food stamps. Those costs should be charged back to the company.
• bodono 6y ago
  Yes, the ideal thing would be for Walmart to go out of business and all those people who currently need partial government assistance instead requiring full government assistance. Think of the tax savings!