Current Events > Is CE for or against $15 dollar minimum wage?

(+) Yeah! (+)

Vote and discuss.

I'm for

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Neither

Don't know all the pros and cons

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gradual increase to $15 after pandemic is over is better than not doing anything, but worse than local minimum wages with a federal mandate tying them to CoL

$15 abrupt min wage during a pandemic is a bad idea tho
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15 is much too low

Against, it should be much higher

I always find the arguments against it fascinating. Like currently you can spend an hour of your precious and limited time on this earth making someone else hundreds if not thousands of dollars, and in return you are rewarded with about enough money to buy a carton of milk. This is ok to people. Just lol.

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Thighon posted...

15 is much too low

fuming posted...

Against, it should be much higher

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I'm for it but I think it should be much more targeted instead of across the board like businesses with over 50 employees or more so it doesn't crush small businesses.

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Against because it should be higher.

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Minimum wage should reflect the state you live in. Should be higher than 15 in say Cali and lower in say Kentucky.

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I think it's a poor alternative to a GMI, but that isn't happening anytime soon.

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Definitely for it. Doesn't affect me personally, but Id be happy for everyone else. It's ridiculous how a few people hold the majority of wealth while people fight over the crumbs left over. These people work their asses off to make the world more convenient for themand they're not thankful in the least. In a perfect world, every minimum wage american would stop working simultaneously and fuck up their money flow, forcing them to reconsider how they treat their employees

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It needs to be higher than that, but it doesn't fix the income disparities if you don't also limit the amount of pay for executives.

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Against because then it devalues my current workforce that is making $16 an hr right now. I won't get a raise from my company, so I can't give my contract labor one, either... in which case, they'd quit me and go do something easier for a dollar an hour less. If I did continue to run/manage multiple routes, I could only do so with half the employees, and I seriously doubt they'd stay with that kind of workload even for $25 an hr.

Many others, like me, --- small business owners -- would go from being "middle class" to "lower class", inevitably creating an even bigger wealth gap between the rich and poor because I'd have to go back to being a regular employee.

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ssjevot posted...

I think it's a poor alternative to a GMI, but that isn't happening anytime soon.

What's a gmi? Google was of no help

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It doesn't at all "devalue" your current workers, it increases their value. Your issue is that they will expect more from you, the employer, because of their increased leverage on you.

fuming posted...

It doesn't at all "devalue" your current workers, it increases their value. Your issue is that they will expect more from you, the employer, because of their increased leverage on you.

Exactly, and I can't afford to pay more because I wouldn't get more from my company because it's commission base pay, and I'd have to let a couple of my current employees go to afford something like $25 an hour to match the minimum wage increase. Keeping them all, paying them at $25 an hour will lower my income, in turn making my job not profitable, so I either let people go our sell out entirely. It would make no sense to continue running my operations, as the owner, and making less than my employees.

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Zazabar posted...

What's a gmi? Google was of no help

Guaranteed Minimum Income. There are many ways to do it, but the key is that everyone is guaranteed enough money, regardless of work status, to live a life above the poverty line. Minimum wage is pointless if we have a GMI because people now have an alternative to wage labor for survival. Companies have to pay a decent wage or people just won't work. Currently there is no viable alternative to working for most people so they accept incredibly low wages as a means of survival. Raising the minimum wage leaves a lot of people in various situations struggling and hand waves the issue of what if there aren't enough jobs available. It seems people can accept the idea that a job should have to pay a living wage but any concern about people who cannot get a job is somehow overlooked.

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I agree with a gradual increase. Putting a $15 minimum in effect next week would fuck a lot of us over big time. Employers would drop us like flies and overload the folks left over.

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Thighon posted...

15 is much too low

This, it should be around $23 if it increased with inflation

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pinky0926 posted...

I always find the arguments against it fascinating. Like currently you can spend an hour of your precious and limited time on this earth making someone else hundreds if not thousands of dollars, and in return you are rewarded with about enough money to buy a carton of milk. This is ok to people. Just lol.

Why not spend your precious and limited hour on earth making hundreds of dollars for yourself?
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g980 posted...

Why not spend your precious and limited hour on earth making hundreds of dollars for yourself?

God damn, the delusions on this one.

"Just be rich already. Gawl"

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Lost_All_Senses posted...

God damn, the delusions on this one.

"Just be rich already. Gawl"

Thats not what im saying at all

I'm saying that the laborer is not solely responsible for all revenue associated with his labor, otherwise he wouldnt need to be employed
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It's great as is. Just find a cheap apartment to live in. $12 an hour 5 days a week is perfect for a 1 bedroom.

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I don't think there should be this big "once size fits all" leap. There are many states with a much lower cost of living. Someone making $15/hr minimum wage in Alabama when they were used to $7-$8 will be living on the hog compared to someone in a much more expensive state making $15/hr.

I think many smaller businesses would absolutely suffer, particularly in states with an already low minimum wage. Increase the federal minimum by a bit, okay, sure. Let the states decide, okay.

But you can bet there are going to be some adverse effects on some smaller businesses having to pay their employees almost twice as much overnight. Whether that gets passed on to the consumer or the business goes under is up for debate.

A blanket, $15/hr national min seems like a lot for some states.

We already live in a country largely controlled by big companies and big business. Maybe they can hold up and eat the costs without raising prices. But I'd hate to have an even smaller diversity in choices of business than we already have (i.e. small business, locally owned, etc)

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Dark_SilverX posted...

It's great as is. Just find a cheap apartment to live in. $12 an hour 5 days a week is perfect for a 1 bedroom.

The federal minimum wage is $7.25, not $12. And there isn't a single state where 40 hours at the minimum wage is a living wage.

Tennessee still has $7.25 per hour minimum wage.

If anything else applies, it is that increasing it to $20 an hour within the next 5 years would be the way to go.

What effect with a $15 m.w. have on small businesses?
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fuming posted...

The federal minimum wage is $7.25, not $12. And there isn't a single state where 40 hours at the minimum wage is a living wage.

gotta find a place that's affordable and with an affordable wage :(
there are some $600 apts out there waiting across the USA

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It's making daycare so expensive that one of us is gonna quit our job for the next year or two

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ssjevot posted...

Guaranteed Minimum Income. There are many ways to do it, but the key is that everyone is guaranteed enough money, regardless of work status, to live a life above the poverty line. Minimum wage is pointless if we have a GMI because people now have an alternative to wage labor for survival. Companies have to pay a decent wage or people just won't work. Currently there is no viable alternative to working for most people so they accept incredibly low wages as a means of survival. Raising the minimum wage leaves a lot of people in various situations struggling and hand waves the issue of what if there aren't enough jobs available. It seems people can accept the idea that a job should have to pay a living wage but any concern about people who cannot get a job is somehow overlooked.

Is GMI distinct from UBI in any way or just an alternate term for it?

The issue with a UBI (especially alongside automation) is that it continues the wage relation in a new form without addressing the inherent contradictions of class in capitalist society. Essentially, you would be continuing the working class' reliance on wages while also taking away the primary means they have to negotiate those wages and the meager concessions they have gained: their labor. The need for working class labor to make this entire economy run is the most important bargaining chip working people have. A UBI alongside the loss of most wage labor due to automation would only cement inequality, rather than lead to a more egalitarian outcome.

That said, its still obviously a good temporary solution that would improve the lives of many people. Im just saying its not a long-term one.

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Dark_SilverX posted...

gotta find a place that's affordable and with an affordable wage :(
there are some $600 apts out there waiting across the USA

Sure, if we had UBI or something. But the reason some places have cheap apartments is because they can't get away with charging more because of a lack of demand. Why the lack of demand? The place has no jobs, so nobody is moving there.

Against. Let the free market decide

Alexis_Heartly posted...

Against. Let the free market decide

uneducated opinion, the minimum wage exists because the "free market" fails to pay equitable wages to begin with.

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Shablagoo posted...

Is GMI distinct from UBI in any way or just an alternate term for it?

The issue with a UBI (especially alongside automation) is that it continues the wage relation in a new form without addressing the inherent contradictions of class in capitalist society. Essentially, you would be continuing the working class' reliance on wages while also taking away the primary means they have to negotiate those wages and the meager concessions they have gained: their labor. The need for working class labor to make this entire economy run is the most important bargaining chip working people have. A UBI alongside the loss of most wage labor due to automation would only cement inequality, rather than lead to a more egalitarian outcome.

That said, its still obviously a good temporary solution that would improve the lives of many people. Im just saying its not a long-term one.

I don't care about theory or idealism. There is no evidence or reason to believe the stuff you just said can actually happen or provide a superior quality of life for poor people so I honestly don't care. Especially since you worship capitalist countries with massive income inequality suggesting your words are meaningless platitudes.

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Naysaspace posted...

uneducated opinion, the minimum wage exists because the "free market" fails to pay equitable wages to begin with.

If the job wasn't worth the money, nobody would take it.

Alexis_Heartly posted...

If the job wasn't worth the money, nobody would take it.

This might be an argument if we had a guaranteed income, ubi, or some other social safety net, but since everyone has to work to survive, it isn't true. History shows that if jobs don't pay enough, people turn to crime, they starve, they have their kids get jobs to contribute, they turn to violence and organize into movements that will ultimately result in the implementation of a minimum wage and child labor laws exactly to prevent the market from ever deciding it because it doesn't fucking work.

how many jobs even pay minimum wage anyways? Like McDonald's doesn't even pay it and they are what people think if when they think of it.

Houston posted...

I don't think there should be this big "once size fits all" leap. There are many states with a much lower cost of living. Someone making $15/hr minimum wage in Alabama when they were used to $7-$8 will be living on the hog compared to someone in a much more expensive state making $15/hr.

So, I see nonsense like this and it makes me laugh. Absolutely makes me laugh my fucking ass off.

Your little theory here assumes that people making $7-8/hr are surviving on that. They're not! They're dependent on welfare just to scrape by! They're working multiple jobs that are destroying their mental and physical health. They wouldn't be "living on the hog" at $15/hr; they'd finally be a pretty bare bones level of comfortable. Maybe you feel differently, but I don't think an entire class of people should be stuck in a constant soul-destroying struggle just to survive.

fuming posted...

This might be an argument if we had a guaranteed income, ubi, or some other social safety net, but since everyone has to work to survive, it isn't true.

Exactly. The argument that it's an agreement between employer and employee ignores the difference in power. Every agreement has what is called a BATNA (best alternative to a negotiated agreement). The employer has hiring someone else, and the low skill employee has starving. Therefore a low skill employee will take the minimum wage job because they need to survive. And this is looking at it in America. A lot of people are working under worse conditions for longer hours for a dollar a day at most just to survive.

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I think 12 is probably the perfect minimum wage tbqh. It pays the bills but it isn't too much

g980 posted...

Why not spend your precious and limited hour on earth making hundreds of dollars for yourself?

Brilliant, who'd have thunk

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it should probably be higher than $15 by now. people were arguing for $15 years ago. It should be like $18-$20 at least.

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Why would i drop it to that?

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ssjevot posted...

I don't care about theory or idealism. There is no evidence or reason to believe the stuff you just said can actually happen or provide a superior quality of life for poor people so I honestly don't care. Especially since you worship capitalist countries with massive income inequality suggesting your words are meaningless platitudes.

I am confused by this post. It seems like you quoted the wrong person or something.

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Shablagoo posted...

I am confused by this post. It seems like you quoted the wrong person or something.

"Man I can't believe someone would suggest I am a tanky! Did you know China has a socialist economy characterized by the most billionaires and millionaires in the world, striking being illegal, forming your own labor union being illegal, renters forcing tenants to pay massive upfront nonrefundable payments and being able to kick out tenants at any time without recourse, and having to prepay for healthcare to receive treatment?"

Stop pretending to be socialist. Your shtick is getting old. It's the same tired tankie bullshit talking points over and over again. You give zero fucks about workers or equality, you just like the aesthetic and feeling like you belong to something powerful.

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Alexis_Heartly posted...

Against. Let the free market decide

WHUT.Alexis_Heartly posted...

If the job wasn't worth the money, nobody would take it.

Come to Chattanooga, see who works at our Chick-fil-A, the McDonalds, the Wendys and Burger Kings.
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It should be lower.
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I'm for the idea, but the minimum wage is not necessarily a good thing.

I would prefer a more progressive tax system and UBI over a minimum wage.

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