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Folks raise that spectre when a living wage is mentioned. "So many service jobs lost!" I shake my head at that - folks who imagine themselves Free Market advoca

Folks raise that spectre when a living wage is mentioned. "So many service jobs lost!" I shake my head at that - folks who imagine themselves Free Market advocates, and here they are agreeing with Karl Marx that a capitalist system can't survive without a slave-wage class to prop it up. Paying everybody a living wage should be the minimum bar for any economy. If ours can't do it, we need a different one.

gruez 5y ago
> and here they are agreeing with Karl Marx that a capitalist system can't survive without a slave-wage class to prop it up. The employers aren't obligated to employ anyone. What do you think happens to the "slave-wage class" when the job disappears entirely?
- wonderwonder 5y ago
  Issue is that the only reason this slave wage class exists in food services is because of a coordinated lobbying campaign to influence politicians to keep it like that. Most people in this thread would be pretty upset if all tech companies got together tomorrow and decided to artificially cap salaries and bought politicians to enforce it.
  - gruez 5y ago
    >Most people in this thread would be pretty upset if all tech companies got together tomorrow and decided to artificially cap salaries and bought politicians to enforce it. Are you claiming that wages in the restaurant industry are kept artificially low because of companies artificially capping salaries, and that politicians are enforcing it? If so, is there a source for this? AFAIK the pay is bad purely because of market reasons (ie. there are more people willing to do it than there are positions).
    - abeyer 5y ago
      I don't think it's as common any more, but for many years a lot of states had "tip credit" laws (which were strongly supported/lobbied for by the restaurant industry) that allowed companies to pay tipped employees less than minimum wage with the assumption that they made up the difference in tips.
    - wonderwonder 5y ago
      Yes: https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/state/minimum-wage/tipped https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/state/minimum-wage/tipped Federal minimum wage is $7.25 for tipped employees its $2.13 Lobbying groups contribute to keeping wages low: https://www.politicalresearch.org/2015/04/14/chain-restaurants-post-record-profits-while-lobbying-pay-workers-less https://www.politicalresearch.org/2015/04/14/chain-restauran... Herman Cain former presidential candidate and CEO of godfather's pizza specifically built his lobbying career on this. Not claiming it, its a fact.
      - gruez 5y ago
        >Not claiming it, its a fact. The "facts" in this comment are similar, but not the same as the claims made in your original comment. Specifically, it only presents evidence of businesses removing government restrictions on the minimum price of labor. It does not present evidence of businesses keeping wages "artificially low" (ie. below the natural market clearing price). If anything, removing the restrictions stops restaurant wages from being artificially high. The closer analogy here would be if for whatever reason there was a law saying that "engineers" had to be paid $200k minimum, and tech companies lobbied for software engineers to be exempt. That's already very different than software companies suppressing wages (eg. by colluding with each other not to compete on wages). Another wrinkle to this is that tipped employees receive tips. If software engineers were receiving royalties in addition to their normal salaries, I would think it's fair for them to be paid lower minimum wage than other engineers that don't receive royalties.
- AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
  > The employers aren't obligated to employ anyone And we're not obligated to provide them with people desperate enough to work their shit jobs either.
- Frondo 5y ago
  No specific employer is obligated to employ a specific employee, but we as a society have an obligation not to allow a slave-wage class to exist. We can do this, but we choose not to.

gruez 5y ago

> and here they are agreeing with Karl Marx that a capitalist system can't survive without a slave-wage class to prop it up. The employers aren't obligated to employ anyone. What do you think happens to the "slave-wage class" when the job disappears entirely?

wonderwonder 5y ago
Issue is that the only reason this slave wage class exists in food services is because of a coordinated lobbying campaign to influence politicians to keep it like that. Most people in this thread would be pretty upset if all tech companies got together tomorrow and decided to artificially cap salaries and bought politicians to enforce it.
- gruez 5y ago
  >Most people in this thread would be pretty upset if all tech companies got together tomorrow and decided to artificially cap salaries and bought politicians to enforce it. Are you claiming that wages in the restaurant industry are kept artificially low because of companies artificially capping salaries, and that politicians are enforcing it? If so, is there a source for this? AFAIK the pay is bad purely because of market reasons (ie. there are more people willing to do it than there are positions).
  - abeyer 5y ago
    I don't think it's as common any more, but for many years a lot of states had "tip credit" laws (which were strongly supported/lobbied for by the restaurant industry) that allowed companies to pay tipped employees less than minimum wage with the assumption that they made up the difference in tips.
  - wonderwonder 5y ago
    Yes: https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/state/minimum-wage/tipped https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/state/minimum-wage/tipped Federal minimum wage is $7.25 for tipped employees its $2.13 Lobbying groups contribute to keeping wages low: https://www.politicalresearch.org/2015/04/14/chain-restaurants-post-record-profits-while-lobbying-pay-workers-less https://www.politicalresearch.org/2015/04/14/chain-restauran... Herman Cain former presidential candidate and CEO of godfather's pizza specifically built his lobbying career on this. Not claiming it, its a fact.
    - gruez 5y ago
      >Not claiming it, its a fact. The "facts" in this comment are similar, but not the same as the claims made in your original comment. Specifically, it only presents evidence of businesses removing government restrictions on the minimum price of labor. It does not present evidence of businesses keeping wages "artificially low" (ie. below the natural market clearing price). If anything, removing the restrictions stops restaurant wages from being artificially high. The closer analogy here would be if for whatever reason there was a law saying that "engineers" had to be paid $200k minimum, and tech companies lobbied for software engineers to be exempt. That's already very different than software companies suppressing wages (eg. by colluding with each other not to compete on wages). Another wrinkle to this is that tipped employees receive tips. If software engineers were receiving royalties in addition to their normal salaries, I would think it's fair for them to be paid lower minimum wage than other engineers that don't receive royalties.
AnIdiotOnTheNet 5y ago
> The employers aren't obligated to employ anyone And we're not obligated to provide them with people desperate enough to work their shit jobs either.
Frondo 5y ago
No specific employer is obligated to employ a specific employee, but we as a society have an obligation not to allow a slave-wage class to exist. We can do this, but we choose not to.