This sentiment is fully understood, but it is also important to fully grasp what this means.
When a credit card company increases your rates it costs one money and the first thing 99% of people do is research, find a lower rate card, and switch to get back to the previous rate or better. This makes sense given the increased rate took more money from you and reduces one’s usable income. People automatically adjust to get their income back.
Imagine now if credit card companies legally could raise your interest rates and in the same breathe were given the legal power to stop you from finding a better rate card and switching, all under the guise they “think” you can afford the rate increase? How many would people go for that? None, as that is the same as forcing you to make less money even though you can easily make more.
It follows then that to artificially raise a business’ costs to something we “think” they can afford and they legally cannot switch and change from (there is a limit to what is needed employment-wise before one just closes, so there is a point where businesses are stuck) is the same as telling businesses’ they must work for less and take home less money. As an individual, we would not accept that with our credit cards or other financial insruments, so it it is interesting that people think they should be able to dictate the same to the people who own the businesses? In reality, this does not does fly in business either.
The effect of the vanishing job is one of the invisible man and is real.
It is interesting to note that fast food restaurants in Seattle and other localities with increasing minimum wage (think it is $11 now going to $15 in 2 years), the same size and traffic store has 10 to 15% fewer employees than in another area with no such mandate. People do not see this, but the result is already reduced opportunities for low-skilled workers trying to enter the job market AND the increase in duties of the workers on staff.
Therefore, your concern of reduced opportunities is well-founded.
Maybe it’s compassion to tell people in minimum wage jobs to leave these jobs and go search for better paying jobs. These jobs are for teenagers. Raising minimum wage jobs mean more teenagers will not be hired and have lots of free time and that’s not good. Heck if they raise to $50 I might come out of retirement and applying for these jobs even after I retire.
Just visited local Panera - they are installing ordering terminals but they are not functioning yet. They are now bringing food to the customer’s table - is it to not count as fast food?
Mcdonalds (one of the most profitable restaurant chains) made a 5.5 billion dollar profit last year. With 1.7 million employees worldwide, that equates to $2941 per employee (~$226/month before taxes). Assuming a minimum wage of $8/hr (for example), an extra $226/month raises the effective minimum wage by $1.4/hr, for a total of $9.4/hr (nowhere near $15/hr). That’s also assuming Mcdonalds used 100% of their profit to pay employees more, which is also highly unrealistic…
Granted, this is a simplistic scenario. In actuality, the profit would be spread unevenly, varying from country to country.
Even though not stated, this means then that the single parent should have a different job than the 16-year old, since it is the job that makes the money, not the person; however, it is the person who gets paid. A 16 year-old at a minimum wage job is worth the exact same as a single parent in the same job.
[/QUOTE]
Exactly! that is why:
a single parent’s goal would be to work hard and move up the ladder. That’s not the same goal as many 16 year olds who just want pocket money. If needed, there could be a 2-3 year program that gives a larger tax credit for the minimum wage single income parent while he/she moves up to a higher paid position.
we have assistance programs (daycare, food stamps, free lunch, utilities discounts, income credits) for those who have low incomes but also have dependents.
you’re right, we wouldn’t pay a 16 year old new-hire $8 an hour for taking orders at McDonalds, but pay a 30 year old new-hire $15 an hour for the same job. But a low-income family can qualify for many different assistance programs that can essentially “boost” their incomes. Hopefully the single parent can bring maturity and discipline to the minimum wage job which would make them more attractive to promote.
We’ve actually seen this here on CC. Some families are supposedly living on $15k per year, but they’re really not. They qualify for a variety of programs that a 16 year old or 18 year old single person would not.
If a low-income family has 2 kids getting free breakfast and free lunch for 40 weeks out of the year, what’s that worth? I’m guessing at least $50 aftertax income per week. That’s $2000 a year in AFTERtax income. That by itself is more than a $1 an hour raise for a full time worker.
That’s just one area that can make a difference.
That said, there shouldn’t be a pressure to raise the salary for the adult who is just supplementing a good family income. That’s why targeted aid thru gov’t programs can address these issues better than across the board increases which include 16 year olds who are largely supported already.
<<<
To ever make not the case would be the equivalent to giving of different SAT scores for the exact same right and wrong answers on the same test between different students, one being favored and the other not. Same work means same worth and same score.
<<< @awcntdb
I wasn’t making that case. I don’t think they should earn different hourly amounts based on age. I think that there should be (and there are) targeted programs for the older person with dependent children to receive entitlements and other benefits that are like a hidden income.
Read my post again. I said the score that was given, not expected. Given score is raw data; expectation is speculative and subjective based on the reviewer. Two different things.
Simply, if two different students from different SESs took the same test and both get the same right and wrong answers, then they both get the same score. Now, the expectations of the colleges may be different based on SES, but score given is the same.
Regardless of age and SES, the analogy is:
Same job: Same test answers = Same pay: Same score
Expectations are another deal entirely and outside the scope of my analogy.
I get what you are saying, but this statement acts like the $5.5B belongs to some inanimate object that can do with the $$ what it pleases. The flaw in this argument is the money does not belong to an inanimate object. Where in the world do you think McDonalds gets its money from to open stores and operate?
More specifically, that $5.5B is other people’s money (lots of other people), i.e., the people who took a risk and invested in McDonalds. So, it does beg the question, how would you like someone to be able to come and tell you what you must do with your after-tax discretionary income? They could say no vacation for you and that new car, forget about it. I am thinking you would not like that very much and would tell them that your after-tax discretionary income, after your hard work, is your business (no pun intended) to decide what to do with.
Have you ever thought that is is exactly what the investors in McDonalds are thinking as well, as they are no different than any other workers in terms of expecting return on their money (their money is their work), and that they, like you, also expect the requisite freedom to spend their after-tax income how they choose?
We are doing a poor job in teaching economics if people do not understand / know the basic fact that a company’s money is just another term for other people’s (the risk-takers’) money.
I think they were demonstrating that McDonald’s cannot possibly be profitable at a nationwide $15/hr minimum wage. Not that McDonald’s should pay out all that profit in the form of employee wages.
I’ve often wondered why the same pitchfork waving mob that wants to string up Ronald McDonald, is so embracing of Apple. Apple has greater profitability and at least 6X the net profit of McDonald’s. Plus Apple offshores jobs to sweatshops in china.
The argument is that low minimum wages (profit to the investors) is subsidized by welfare (food stamps for the working poor) which is a cost to all taxpayers. Why should the taxpayers be helping owners of McDonalds (or Walmart)?
Good question: GMT. The elites who criticize McDonalds can feel self-righteous because they don’t patronize McDonalds. (Only the little people eat at McDonalds). They can hardly condemn Apple’s practices when holding an Iphone, IPad, etc. etc. Even they would see the hypocrisy.
The same question can be – and should be – raised as to ‘why taxpayers help support any and all businesses that offer minimum or below a so-called living wage? Of course, that would include all of the independent pizza joints and sandwich shops in NYC, not to mention most folks’ gardeners.
Again, many/most McD restaurants are local franchisees.
What is your definition of a ‘living wage’? A wage at which one working person can singularly support an entire family?
When I was a grad student, I was earning peanuts, too. Should it be incumbent upon universities to pay their grad students enough to solely support a family?
Well said… People are indeed strange when it comes to brand loyalty!
Trader Joes fans are funny as well. 99% of the products that Trader Joes sells are literally relabeled versions of other products. If any other store did this type of thing, they would mocked to no end.