Why does anyone want the minimum wage to be increased?

[Tipsy]

I've heard a lot of people on both sides of the political spectrum advocate raising the minimum wage and I simply ask you, do you understand what raising the minimum does?

Labor is like every other commodity, it follows supply and demand. If you raise the price of something it inevitably creates a surplus. In terms of labor, it will increase unemployment and the people who are going to lose their jobs are the ones who the people in our government are saying we're trying to help by raising minimum wage.

No amount of law can change the flow of capitalism - it is the market that decides what is worth what.

[TrongaMonga]

Doesn't make any sense, really, because places like factories, who've got hundreds of workers at the minimum wage will fire some employees, truly.

Now if the government comparticipated in that, it would be different.

[Lizardbreath]

Of course statistically when we have raised miminum wage it has done NOTHING TO THE UNEMPLOYMENT RATE. Tipsy have you heard of INFLATION? Why don't you work 40hrs. a week at minimum wage and see how well you survive.

[Tipsy]

The concept of raising it doesn't even make sense. The increased costs either go against the employees or consumers. If it goes against the employee then there is increase unemployment. If it goes against the consumer, the cost of the standard of living goes up and the raise has really no effect. The only other place it can go is cutting a business' profit margin and how many businesses can you name that have a practice of doing that?

Minimum wage is a completely ineffective way of fighting poverty. It either causes unemployment or raises the cost of standard of living meaning there virtually is no raise in the minimum wage. Or do you plan to argue the idea of supply and demand is false?

[Laharl]

Tipsy has a point. At least in Canada every time the minimum wage is raised stores/companies/etc raise the prices of all goods purchased.

If the government is going to raise minimum wage they should make sure nobody raises prices because of it.

[Emperor Pan I]

Minimum wage goes up, demand for labour decreases.

It doesn't do much, excpet help the few people who weren't laid off to get a few extra dollars, and those who are expendible end up without a job and no money at all. Capitalism blows.

[mdawgmike]

Well, I do understand the arguement made by many in this post. The whole idea behind a minumum wage, is a wage that people can live off of. The current minumum wage, while working full time, puts you well below the poverty line.

Inflation will still keep going up regardless (unless the world population magically levels off), demand will for the most part outweigh supply. We need to maintain a reasonalbe minumum wage so that we don't see a giant separation of classes and a completely market driven economy (we saw such a situation right before the last great depression).

The cost of living wage is about $9/hr. If I'm not mistaken the proposed bill was for $7.25/hr, not even coming close. Perhaps the CEOs could just eat the extra costs of running their wage slave companies instead of giving themselfs multimillion dollar raises and screwing over everyone else.

Thinking about all this makes me glad I don't work for minumum wage.

[Forged]

Originally Posted by tipsy

Why does anyone want the minimum wage to be increased?

They didn't pay attention in High School Economics I would imagine...

The whole idea behind a minumum wage, is a wage that people can live off of. The current minumum wage, while working full time, puts you well below the poverty line.

And rightfuly so, minum wage jobs are all unskilled labour. They require no real training, an intelligent monkey could just about pull it off.

As soon as you aquire the most minimal of skills you jump up in pay grade, survival of the fittest at its best...

Thinking about all this makes me glad I don't work for minumum wage.

yeah, me too.

[Snagg]

Err... no minimum wage... remember back in the early Industrial Revolution? Of course it's different now with the rise of the middle class, but you cannot exploit the lower class like that. A minimum wage or else people will be exploited quite badly for the sake of money. And the fact that raising minimum wage increases unemployment is dumb logic. Companies I am sure are already running at a capacity of the smallest labour force as possible to keep their operations running. It would simply be smart to do so. Raising minimum wage cannot force them to fire because they will not have enough labour to run the operation.

[Forged]

Assuming you are right, and you aren't most companys are bloated as ****, a raise in minimum wage would require a price increase, not a high one but still enough to further inflate our currency.

Assuming that a minimum wage increase to $7.15/hour raised the living wage up to $10/hour those previously around the living wage would be more uncomfortable and less likely to buy things, and those making minimum wage still couldn't make ends meat. Passing bills and instituting changes like this would also cost the goverment quite a bit of money, money that would come out of your paycheck.

[c9h13no3]

The minimum wage is a price floor. As long as the price floor is below the market equilibrium price for unskilled labor, it won't have any effect on unemployment. This is generally the case with most areas.

The purpose of the minimum wage is not to "raise the standard of living". The minimum wage exists to prevent people from taking advantage of workers. The concept of a "living wage" is totally bull****.

C9 has run out of energy to keep posting. Take an economics course to learn more.