@flan

I would argue that nobody can answer your first question as it encompasses an entire country with different kinds of people, different standards of living, different jobs, skills, ages, etc... I can't imagine you could come up with an answer to this... and we don't have to, it's the magic of the market

stocking shelves? if there is a demand for this and a surplus of supply based on the skills required... I would imagine a job like that would pay very little, but if it paid too little, nobody would do it and the wage would increase ~ isn't that beautiful?

how valuable are skills? the market decides... the only fair way... and by market i mean competition

should people who choose low skilled jobs be able to make a living? that's a broad and leading question.  if I choose a job that is so low skilled that a machine can do it... should I be able to make a living? should that machine be illegal? should we sacrifice innovation for security?  should we all walk as fast as the slowest person?  do we live by the lowest common denominator? does providing a minimum living wage encourage being low skilled? 

are we forced to take care of and worry about everyone? well yes we are... taxes.

when we are forced to love everyone... love becomes meaningless.

is it my job to plan the lives of those who refuse to plan for themselves? is it anybodies? should it be? i want plans by the many, not by the few.

these questions all lead to education... you tell people you can make a living with no skills, they get no skills and expect a living.  then when society moves forward, their no skill jobs are replaced by machines... who do we blame? do we drag those along who refused to take care of themselves? who refused to better themselves? to what extent? to what extent are people responsible for themselves?

don't legislate, educate!

and I'll argue that the best way to help people is to lead by example! you can't help someone who isn't willing to accept it! think about it this way... you walk around telling people they should be like you because you are successful.  most people will give you the finger.... but if you act confident in yourself and just let people see how successful you are, they might look at you and be like 'damn, she has her stuff together, I want to be like her' and they might get off their butt and help themselves! what message are we sending people when we reward them for not talking responsibility for their own lives? 

this reminds me.. anybody see the movie idiocracy?

Quote from: kkut on February 14, 2013, 09:01:02 PM
This is very good...

he's so dreamy!

Quote from: Zumbagirl on February 14, 2013, 10:05:13 AM
I had 2 open job postings at my company for software architects. Both jobs paid between $100-$120k per year based on experience. Do you want to know how many people applied for the jobs? Zero. The jobs went unfilled for over a year...

What do I need to learn? I have a bachelor's degree in information technology, and no professional software experience. I've dabbled in c and java. I pick up new skills quickly, I like solving puzzles, am willing to relocate and wouldn't mind tripling my paycheck.

Just why does any one listen what Fox News says about the minimum wage.   The Right wing which Fox News is a mouth piece for has been against the idea of a government imposed minimum wage since the days of Adam and Eve.   

Minimum wage today should be today be $20.00 and hour to have the same buying power as it did when it was $2.00 an hour in the 1970s.

The only thing that would make the a Federal minimum wage of $10.00 irrelevant would be if every one who worked for an hourly wage was paid $15.00 an hour or more.   Nobody was being paid less than $15.00 per hour at any job.

The point being that the only reason anyone would be against a Federal or State minimum wage would be that they wanted to pay less which a lot of restaurant and food service businesses and any other business where customers were expected to pay tips for their service and in illegal sweat shops.

Fox News and 16th century minded businesses would be happy to re-institute slave labor or indentured servants and pay workers $1.00 per day.   

Yes, when I was in elementary school in the 1950's I delivered news papers seven days a week working about 8 hours a week 365 days a year for about $1.80 dollars a week.  When I went to college I worked busing dishes in the student union cafe for about 80 cents per hour in 1965.  The full time workers made about $1.15 per hour.  I remember working construction in Minneapolis two summers in the late 1960s for  an high union wage of $2.00 per hour which was way above the minimum wage.  In 1970 I worked full time as a  physical therapy aide in North Dakota for $235 per month.   The attitude then by my employers was that they knew that I would rather work for free, but the law said they had to pay me.

In 1939 my father made $770 for the year fixing phonographs in South Dakota.   If minimum wage was still $1.00 per hour today would eggs still be 10 cents a dozen, gas ten cents per gallon and apartments renting for $25.00 per month.  I don't think so. 

Keeping minimum wage at about $7.75 per hour has not kept gas at  $2.00 per gallon or apartment rents at $150 a month or monthly health insurance payments at $125 a month,  or eggs at 1.00 a dozen.   Why has the price of almost every thing risen exponentially the past 5 years when minimum wage has barely budged?   

Fox News has based their argument on false premises.   

Quote from: michelle on February 14, 2013, 10:51:02 PM
Just why does any one listen what Fox News says about the minimum wage.   The Right wing which Fox News is a mouth piece for has been against the idea of a government imposed minimum wage since the days of Adam and Eve.   

Fox News has based their argument on false premises.   

Stossel is NOT right wing... I personally am disgusted as much with the right wing as with the left.  please inform yourself before you just see the FOX icon and start ranting...  you sound silly jumping to conclusions like that...

you say FOX new bases their arguments on false premises... your argument about FOX and the clips we showed being RIGHT WING are a false premise

and your OPINION about minimum wage is arbitrary... slave labor?  really?  good one...

i mean to say, lets have a conversation... like adults instead of children pouting and throwing around ad hominems about something as arbitrary as the network that aired these shows

why are you for the minimum wage, why do you think it should be raised?  please, i would love to know... and where do you get the $20 figure from?  again, lets have a conversation, not a debate, not an argument... i want to understand your perspective and i want to offer mine to you  

and if you are interested in having a conversation, i would advise watching those videos because they sum up some of the points i have!

My thoughts on the thread... (and for what it's worth I haven't watched the youtube thing yet on Stossel, since it's 40 minutes long)

The overall effect of raising (or maintaining) a minimum wage has not shown to correlate with a reduction in low-skilled work. The reason that this myth continues is because it is highly intuitive. Research by Princeton professors of economics David Card & Alan Krueger have indicated that if anything, raising the minimum wage has a slightly beneficial (albeit still significant) effect on the hiring of unskilled workers. A very good explanation for this is that the more you raise the minimum wage, the more money you give to the poorest of peoples who will spend their entire paycheck (instead of saving/hoarding) and will stimulate their local economies.

The next thing I've noticed about the thread is the $20 limit that Michelle mentions. Not that I agree with this, but I think it's worth mentioning, if the minimum wage were tied to productivity then it would actually be closer to $22.

I also think that Michelle addressed a big issue, and that is that businesses aren't paying their employees a sustainable wage. As Michelle mentioned, inflation continued while minimum wage stayed stagnant throughout the 1980's and the 2000's. More so, this has lead to government having to step in and help people out via SNAP & low income housing. I think it's egregious that Wal-mart made almost $450 billion in gross revenue last year, but their employees (even some managers) are on food stamps and get no health insurance. Whether we like it or not, somebody has to pick up the scraps, and if this (radically) libertarian ideal were possible, then it wouldn't need to be the government.

I would also like to address why the myth of minimum wage and low-skill work continues. A few years back I took an econ 101 course. The professor got to the part of the course that dealt with minimum wage, price controls, economic floors and stated that "instituting minimum wages actually hurts low skilled employment." Being aware of the studies I mentioned earlier (Card & Krueger) I asked "why have recent studies shown a positive effect on hiring low skilled worker with minimum wage increases." I feel his answer explained a lot, he said "because this is econ 101. In this course we teach basic principles and then later on we teach the exceptions to the rules." It's true, and even Card & Krueger admit, that at some point raising minimum wages would hurt low-skilled workers. However, economics is a very complex study, rarely is anything so easily and so linearly graphed out as to be prima facie to all. For what it's worth, I would actually be more in favor of a guaranteed minimum income, in which the government subsidizes low incomes up to a certain point, than I would be for raising the minimum wage. But that's (real) socialism and we can't have that.

Quote from: Kayla on February 15, 2013, 01:47:58 AM
My thoughts on the thread...

For what it's worth, I would actually be more in favor of a guaranteed minimum income, in which the government subsidizes low incomes up to a certain point, than I would be for raising the minimum wage. But that's (real) socialism and we can't have that.

so these studies compare average productivity to the minimum wage.  looking at here shows that the average wage correlates with the average productivity you cited... unless i'm missing something?

i guess what my question is... how do you look at the AVERAGE of something and insinuate it should be the MINIMUM? not to sound condescending, but you know what an average is right?  if workers on average are getting paid the average of their productivity, doesn't that make sense?  and i'm not certain why we need government to give us a bottom?  if the average hour wage of Jan 2013 was $23.78 and people are getting paid for their productivity accordingly, what's wrong?  seems as if the min wage is just legislating out jobs that produce less than the minimum wage?  people are getting paid what they are worth... why not let people who are worth less than minimum wage get paid what they are worth and get experience faster so they can get higher paid jobs?

and for your socialist point... if there was a guaranteed income... what's the point of working hard?  i guess that's an argument between whats more important... security or productivity?  but without productivity, there isn't any creation of wealth and without the creation of wealth, you can't provide jobs.  there is a balance somewhere here? ahhh yes, it's competition having guarantees can stifle competition.  and a guaranteed income... does that mean you can't fire bad employees?  because it's guaranteed?

and i took out the link to the full episode.. it didn't seem relevant since i really just wanted to talk about minimum wage and people were writing about their first jobs which i really didn't care to know.  the section just about the minimum wage is still up and i changed the name of the topic

Quote from: oZma on February 15, 2013, 02:19:28 AM
so these studies compare average productivity to the minimum wage.  looking at here shows that the average wage correlates with the average productivity you cited... unless i'm missing something?

i guess what my question is... how do you look at the AVERAGE of something and insinuate it should be the MINIMUM? not to sound condescending, but you know what an average is right?  if workers on average are getting paid the average of their productivity, doesn't that make sense?  and i'm not certain why we need government to give us a bottom?  if the average hour wage of Jan 2013 was $23.78 and people are getting paid for their productivity accordingly, what's wrong?  seems as if the min wage is just legislating out jobs that produce less than the minimum wage?  people are getting paid what they are worth... why not let people who are worth less than minimum wage get paid what they are worth and get experience faster so they can get higher paid jobs?

I think you're confusing the two a bit. The link I gave stated that if minimum wage were pegged to productivity of the nation (I believe in 1965 wages) then the minimum wage today would be about $20. The fact that that is the average wage now a days helps point out this disparity. The point is, the ultra well-off could live just as well off as they did in the mid-60's (relative to everyone else) and the masses of people could enjoy the same purchasing power they had then. The fact that the people at the top (which your BLS stat did not include as it's only payroll employees) make something like 300-400 times what their employee makes helps explain why even though productivity is at an all time high, the amount of people needing government subsidies to get by is increasing.

Quoteand for your socialist point... if there was a guaranteed income... what's the point of working hard?  i guess that's an argument between whats more important... security or productivity?  but without productivity, there isn't any creation of wealth and without the creation of wealth, you can't provide jobs.  there is a balance somewhere here? ahhh yes, it's competition having guarantees can stifle competition.  and a guaranteed income... does that mean you can't fire bad employees?  because it's guaranteed?

Well, this basic income guarantee would be (theoretically speaking since I'm offering this as my ideal) tied to work. Thus if Walmart wants to screw over their employees on wages, the employees would get a sum of money from the government, up to a certain point, as compensation. Another study on the productivity of basic income guarantees in Manitoba found that the decline in productivity was "negligble" with most people working as productively as normal. The exceptions were teenagers who were working to support their families (who then spent more time on school) and new mothers (who spent more time tending to their children). Considering what the two groups spent their time on, I don't consider the loss in productivity an issue.

I really have no idea what raising the minimum wage to $10 an hour would do. I will go downstairs at work tomorrow to the employment department and ask their economist what his thoughts are. I did at one point work for an agency that provided on the job training funds to employers. In my experience, an employer is far more likely to give somebody they otherwise would not have hired a job, if somebody else pays a portion of their new employees wages for the first 6 months. I believe a drastic jump in minimum wage could take away some opportunities for unskilled workers to prove themselves.

I guess I don't support a $10 an hour minimum wage. I feel it would take away jobs. In my state the minimum wage is $8.95 so it wouldn't really be much of an jump. A while back the state voted to increase minimum wage at the same rate as inflation. I'm guessing a lot of people currently being paid around $10 an hour, would be expecting a raise. I know I'd want at least an equivalent bump in pay.

Quote from: kkut on February 15, 2013, 06:42:29 AM
Kayla, watch the video, more people need to get 'Stosseled'... BOOM!

I watched the first 20 minutes before realizing that I hadn't heard a thing about minimum wage. I then became distracted by a kitten.... Regardless of how you cut it, kittens>politics.

Is there any part of the video in particular I should watch?

Quote from: michelle on February 14, 2013, 10:51:02 PM
Just why does any one listen what Fox News says about the minimum wage.   

I don't watch Fox News, except to laugh. And I actually have studied economics, and price-related issues in considerable depth, so if I had watched that, whatever device I might have watched it on might now be broken.

I have yet to figure out why Stossel's head is so large when it's so empty.

As to relevance, there is a time tag you can use with YouTube if there is something in there that you believe would change my mind.

Example: If it comes at 16 minutes, 25 seconds, add ?t=16m25s as I've done with the Stossel video URL below: 

http://youtu.be/2NcydJQVFa4?t=16m25s

Quote from: Kayla on February 15, 2013, 07:05:11 AM
I watched the first 20 minutes before realizing that I hadn't heard a thing about minimum wage. I then became distracted by a kitten.... Regardless of how you cut it, kittens>politics.

Is there any part of the video in particular I should watch?

I removed the full episode and left there segment about minimum wage which is I think 10 mins.  kkut is referring to the episode entitled 'Battle for the Future' which is a full 40 mins but is a very good episode!

Quote from: Elspeth on February 15, 2013, 07:10:13 AM
I don't watch Fox News, except to laugh.

I have yet to figure out why Stossel's head is so large when it's so empty.

I think there is an important point to be made. it's important to understand many perspectives on different issues.  the best way to learn is to challenge yourself... another competition reference! these threads I make about politics are my attempts NOT to argue with people but to provide my current perspective and get responses.  if I wanted smoke blown up my butt, id go to a liberty blog.  I'm trying to find people to challenge my opinions in attempt to learn!

I find it silly people refuse to listen to something based on the source... there are somethings I could say about what this means, but ill just say ALL mass media have a bias.  to single out fox news for something EVERY network does? ugh... lets be consistent people! respond to the ideas, not the network!

OK I don't think I've made my point yet... I think any reasonable intelligent person who is interested in learning, interested in gaining perspective, won't completely write off a an idea purely based on the network that commissioned it.  I didn't take Kayla's article, which it seems I still need to do a little research on because I misunderstood, and say 'I can't believe anybody reads that left wing Huffington Post garbage!' I read it,  tried to understand her perspective and responded. 

and please lets stop with the ad hominems... every person has a valid predictive and valid ideas... lets concentrate on the ideas these people are presenting, not the people or the network :-)

but I guess I can't assume people on these forums are interested in gaining insight, learning, or expanding their political awareness?

and by no means am I trying to convince anybody to change their minds, but to get them to understand the perspective :-) I work to understand yours, do the same for me? its hard to have a meaningful conversion unless we both understand what the other is saying ;-)

Quote from: kkut on February 15, 2013, 10:37:13 AM
Try this, it's only about four minutes and it's not John Stossel or evil Fox news 

good video, we need more freedom in this country... not less :-)

The point you make ^^ is valid.  People who dismiss information based solely on the source, without testing the validity, are intellectually short-changing themselves.

That can be very frustrating.

I have read all your comments about minimum wage in the USA and find it interesting.

Personally I think there should be a minimum wage for people.

In Australia we have a minimum wage system that the government has put in place to help the low income earners, this is $15.96 per hour or $606.40 per 38 hour week, casuals get 22% casual loading on top, seeing the casuals don't get holidays and paid sick leave.  If the person has children then the government gives them money towards raising their kids, this is around a $180.00 per fortnight depending on the age of the children. My family has 1 main income earner(my wife)and she earns around $35k at mo, and the government still gives us money towards raising our children, plus free health care and reduced costs with medications( most doctor scrips cost $5.90 for most medications).

We don't pay tips in this country as it's not part of our culture. So people do not work for a business for free, they have to pay their employee's minimum wage depending on the type of work they do, but there is a minimum.

The part that gets confussing, we have working awards that list pays rates for different jobs/industry's and are very confusing to read and understand for most people (personally I don't have any issues with reading and understanding the awards, but my education is at uni level, plus I was a manager in the disability industry.)

So I think there should be a minimum wage!

It works in Australia, I'm not saying that our system is the best or that it works correctly, but at lest we try to help the people that work the low wage jobs!

Quote from: Pleasingly Plump Jamie D on February 15, 2013, 12:44:04 PM
The point you make ^^ is valid.  People who dismiss information based solely on the source, without testing the validity, are intellectually short-changing themselves.

That can be very frustrating.

Time is an inelastic commodity of which I have a finite and unknown quantity. I had listened to Stossel in the past and found his insights unimpressive. I also remarked in passing that I avoid this kind of discussion as it usually leads nowhere productive. You're assuming quite a lot, with no objective basis if you imagine I'm being closed minded. It has much more to do with the inherent limitations and political biases that exist and are probably beyond remedy when it comes to economic theories in general.  I spent decades studying the subject in detail and in depth. I'd estimate there is a 0.1% probability that Stossel, even if he were far more brilliant than is my impression of him, would be likely to say, in a general audience TV program, anything that I hadn't read and considered before.

I'm out of this thread. My impulse to enter it was a moment of weakness and bad judgement.

Please don't read this as an affront or anything personal.

Quote from: Elspeth on February 15, 2013, 06:03:16 PM

I'm out of this thread. My impulse to enter it was a moment of weakness and bad judgement.

Please don't read this as an affront or anything personal.

nothing taken personally :-) lets just remember that your opinions on life, economics, politics are not the only valid ones.  I find Stossel a very  smart guy, I've read his book 'No, They Can't' and I agree with his libertarian politics and philosophy towards life.  I'm here to share these same ideas and maybe learn something along the way.  it's entirely possible you do know 99.9% of the things he talks about and don't agree... in that case it would be nice to have a conversation because I would love to know why you don't. 

if that isn't something you're interested in... thats fine too, but lets remember to respect the perspectives of others and to keep discussions about the ideas - as easy as it is, we need to refrain from ad hominem :-) no hard feelings!

What should minimum wage be now?   Well when minimum wage was about $2.00 dollars per hour, gas was about 25 cents a gallon.    When gasoline was $2.50 per gallon, minimum wage to have the same buying power should be $25.00 per hour.    You could get family Blue Cross/blue shield for $30.00 per month from a credit union.   Ten times $30.00 would mean full family insurance should only be about $300.00.    In 1973 I rented a house for $80.00 per month which was the same as my parents rented one for in the 1950s.  They were small.  It costs over $1000 to rent a house like this today.    You can also compare the costs of hamburger per pound in 1974,  eggs, milk, car insurance, and many other items.   Having been born in 1946 and starting my own family in 1973, I have worked for minimum wage and raised a family from the time minimum wage was around $2.00 per hour.   I worked construction at $2.00 at this time and had to work 60 hours a week to make ends meet.    I paid rents then and now.   I bought food then and now.   I have seen eggs go up from 15 cents a dozen in the 1950s.   I paid 25 cents for a cup of coffee and a piece of pie in the 1960s.

If you consider just the price of gas, rent, health insurance, car insurance, car payments.   There are no more $600 dollar cars,  you can do the math and take $2.00 per hour times ten to get $20.00 dollars per hour.   Then take ten time 25 cents per gallon for gas to get $2.50.   Gas is now over $3.50 per gallon now.    Take ten times a cheap $600.00 car and you get $6,000 for a good running used car today.   $30.00 a month for full family Blue Cross/Blue Shield and get $300.00 a month for the same insurance today from a credit union.   You can't do it.  And you can see that I am under estimating  the buying power of $20.00 per hour today, compared to the $2.00 per hour minimum wage in the 1970s.   

I have also listen to the conservative Republican position on minimum wage from the time I was in high school in the 1960s.    Every thing in your video from Fox News was the same old conservative line.   I have a Social Science major in college with many hours in history.   I have studied and read the political history of the United States for almost 40 years.  Even more if you count high school.    Conservatives in the Republican party have been trying to get rid of the minimum wage from the day the wage became law.   They have used the same arguments to prevent raising the minimum wage ever since it became law.   

So if it walks like a duck, talks like a duck, it must be a duck.   If you are on Fox News which is a mouth piece for the Conservative Republican line and you present the same points that conservative Republicans have been making since the beginning of minimum wage against there being a minimum wage,  What does that make you?

I know the value of having a minimum wage,  I worked at minimum wage jobs until I went back to college and got my teaching credentials.   My first year of teaching I made $6,000 per year and lived in a mobile home in the country which was used for migrant labor housing in the summer.   I worked summer jobs to support my family.   

Life's experiences have taught me the value of the minimum wage.   It has also taught me that it has not kept up with inflation and the rising price of a barrel of oil which rose dramatically during the administration of Jimmy Carter because the developed countries had been ripping the oil producing countries off for years with a barrel of oil selling for around $5.00 per barrel.  OPEC embargoed oil and the price of a barrel of oil increased dramatically.    Minimum wage did not keep up.    Now oil can sell from anything from $80.00 dollars per barrel to $140 per barrel and up.

Many employers, especially in rural areas only raised their starting wages when the minimum wage was increased.    If the minimum wage was not necessary then no employer would pay less than $15.00 per hour today because modern technology has made workers that much more productive.   No one would fight raising the minimum wage to $10.00 per hour because everyone would be working at wages more than this after they gained experience.   Minimum wage would only be a workers starting wage for their first six months of work.

Stossel was only presenting the traditional Republican objects to minimum wage, which based upon my life's experience are invalid.   And if one argues that employers should be free from government interference in the free market,  then government should not be used to limit worker's economic rights to organize and bargain for wages.   There should be no right to work laws because they interfere with the worker's right to form labor unions and negotiate for their wages and protect their jobs by striking and causing work stoppages.   The point being is that you cannot have a free market without government regulation and the government determining the rules by which labor and management interact with each other.

If people are against government laws regulating business practices why should government pass laws that interfere with worker's  rights to organize.   Why must businesses be free to run their businesses in any way they choose and worker's not have the same freedoms from government control over their labor.

Arguing from the libertines point of view,  if businesses are free to form corporations free from government interference,  why shouldn't workers have the same rights to form corporations to bargain with labor free from government interference.    Right to work laws are government interference in the free market system.    From the libertine's point of view worker's should have the same freedoms from government as capitalists do.

Of course using the libertine's line of argument the conflicts between the capitalists and the laborers would bring the free market to a stand still which the government would be powerless to regulate and to settle the disputes between capitalists and labor because the government has no business taking sides according to their philosophy.  If  Ayn Rand's philosophy  is good for the capitalist, it is good for the laborer.    Ayn Rand's philosophy in its strict form would bring about the breakdown of any economy.   It's totally unrealistic.   

@michelle

ok, so lets make sure i understand your position.

1. minimum wage should be attached to inflation
2. right to work laws interfere with the worker's right to form labor unions

i have to do some research on the first one still since i'm not all that familiar with that argument... i'll get back to you

as for the right to work laws... doesn't a right to work law give the employee an option to opt out? to say thanks, but no thanks?  it doesn't change the worker's right to form or take part in a union does it?  i think forcing someone to take part in something they don't want to is wrong.  if employees don't want unions, they don't want unions... why force them?