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If you give workers higher wages using the minimum wage most of the extra money they get comes from the place they work raising prices. Places that pay minimum

If you give workers higher wages using the minimum wage most of the extra money they get comes from the place they work raising prices. Places that pay minimum wage, like Walmart, disproportionately have customers that aren't very well off themselves. Giving money from a household that earns $40k per year to one that earns $20k per year does make the country more equal but we can do better. The money that goes into the EITC comes from income taxes and the top 10% of household pay more than half of the US income tax. If we want to give money to working Americans we have to pay for it somehow. We can either do that explicitly and in a progressive fashion or we can hide the price from voters and let the burden fall repressively.

lumberjack 11y ago
>If you give workers higher wages using the minimum wage most of the extra money they get comes from the place they work raising prices. Employers are bound by the market when they set their prices and don't get to choose their price at random on a whim. >The money that goes into the EITC comes from income taxes and the top 10% of household pay more than half of the US income tax. Yes but for the most part those are just the middle class. The plutocrats pay fuck all in taxes. I do not want an MD with a networth of $10M (sweat of his own brow) subsidizing a Walton (who inherited his fortune). I want the Walton to pay the actual cost of running his goddamn shop. Also frankly, I think minimum wage is besides the point. What should come back are strong sector wide unions like the ones that still exist in Scandinavia. The unions will take care to setup their own sector wide minimum wage and will be far more flexible in responding to the market and also the cost of living than the government can ever be.
copsarebastards 11y ago
> If you give workers higher wages using the minimum wage most of the extra money they get comes from the place they work raising prices. ...and then people will stop shopping there and go somewhere where they keep their prices lower by paying their executives more reasonably. If you're going to make naive pro-big-business arguments then don't stop, follow the naive logic to its full conclusion.
- URSpider94 11y ago
  Why couldn't that happen today? Presumably Wal-Mart could lower their executive pay and undercut Target in the current wage environment, and yet they don't. If you raise the minimum wage, it will raise the costs of all businesses in a market by the same amount, assuming that they all have the same cost structure (same basic wage and worker efficiency). Usually that causes prices to rise uniformly.
  - copsarebastards 11y ago
    > Why couldn't that happen today? Presumably Wal-Mart could lower their executive pay and undercut Target in the current wage environment, and yet they don't. You're really asking why executives don't cut their own pay? > If you raise the minimum wage, it will raise the costs of all businesses in a market by the same amount, assuming that they all have the same cost structure (same basic wage and worker efficiency). They don't all have the same cost structure, so it would be rather silly to assume that. There are many companies that are not gigantic corporations with overpaid CEOs. If you only care about Walmart and Target, then yes, prices will rise uniformly. But employee-owned cooperatives, for example, will be completely unaffected. Places that already pay their employees a living wage would also be unaffected.
    - dragonwriter 11y ago
      > But employee-owned cooperatives, for example, will be completely unaffected. Cooperatives (this will depend on details of structure, etc.) are often still subject to minimum wage laws, and of those that are, paying workers minimum wage as the only guaranteed payment with dividends/profit sharing/etc. on top is, as I understand, a not uncommon arrangement. So a minimum wage increase does increase the labor cost to the corporation (and, since wages are taxed differently than capital income, it has a net effect on the worker/owners, as well.) Now, obviously, the effect on a labor coop or its worker/owners will be different than the effect on a traditional corporation or its shareholders, but there will not necessarily be no effect on the former.
      - 11y ago

lumberjack 11y ago

>If you give workers higher wages using the minimum wage most of the extra money they get comes from the place they work raising prices. Employers are bound by the market when they set their prices and don't get to choose their price at random on a whim. >The money that goes into the EITC comes from income taxes and the top 10% of household pay more than half of the US income tax. Yes but for the most part those are just the middle class. The plutocrats pay fuck all in taxes. I do not want an MD with a networth of $10M (sweat of his own brow) subsidizing a Walton (who inherited his fortune). I want the Walton to pay the actual cost of running his goddamn shop. Also frankly, I think minimum wage is besides the point. What should come back are strong sector wide unions like the ones that still exist in Scandinavia. The unions will take care to setup their own sector wide minimum wage and will be far more flexible in responding to the market and also the cost of living than the government can ever be.

copsarebastards 11y ago

> If you give workers higher wages using the minimum wage most of the extra money they get comes from the place they work raising prices. ...and then people will stop shopping there and go somewhere where they keep their prices lower by paying their executives more reasonably. If you're going to make naive pro-big-business arguments then don't stop, follow the naive logic to its full conclusion.

URSpider94 11y ago
Why couldn't that happen today? Presumably Wal-Mart could lower their executive pay and undercut Target in the current wage environment, and yet they don't. If you raise the minimum wage, it will raise the costs of all businesses in a market by the same amount, assuming that they all have the same cost structure (same basic wage and worker efficiency). Usually that causes prices to rise uniformly.
- copsarebastards 11y ago
  > Why couldn't that happen today? Presumably Wal-Mart could lower their executive pay and undercut Target in the current wage environment, and yet they don't. You're really asking why executives don't cut their own pay? > If you raise the minimum wage, it will raise the costs of all businesses in a market by the same amount, assuming that they all have the same cost structure (same basic wage and worker efficiency). They don't all have the same cost structure, so it would be rather silly to assume that. There are many companies that are not gigantic corporations with overpaid CEOs. If you only care about Walmart and Target, then yes, prices will rise uniformly. But employee-owned cooperatives, for example, will be completely unaffected. Places that already pay their employees a living wage would also be unaffected.
  - dragonwriter 11y ago
    > But employee-owned cooperatives, for example, will be completely unaffected. Cooperatives (this will depend on details of structure, etc.) are often still subject to minimum wage laws, and of those that are, paying workers minimum wage as the only guaranteed payment with dividends/profit sharing/etc. on top is, as I understand, a not uncommon arrangement. So a minimum wage increase does increase the labor cost to the corporation (and, since wages are taxed differently than capital income, it has a net effect on the worker/owners, as well.) Now, obviously, the effect on a labor coop or its worker/owners will be different than the effect on a traditional corporation or its shareholders, but there will not necessarily be no effect on the former.
    - 11y ago