Raise The Minimum Wage!

Howey said:
I know someone who started working for a company over two years ago. At that time, minimum wage was, I believe $7.50 per hour. Today he makes $7.75 per hour.

New hires at the same company now start off at $8.00 per hour. He did not receive a commensurate raise when they were hired and won't so the argument that all employees get a raise along with a minimum wage increase is moot.

Can someone answer this question? With some companies setting record profits, why aren't they hiring more people?
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I haven't worked in the unskilled labor market for a while now.. about 35 years or so... but when I did, I remember minimum wage increases, and I recall it was customary to get a pay increase when they raised the minimum wage. It might not be as much as the minimum wage was increased, but sometimes it was. I can't ever recall it being raised, and not getting an increase. I think most decent companies give pay increases to their unskilled labor, whenever the minimum wage is increased. It makes sense, because if they didn't, they would eventually be paying minimum wage, and they want to pay slightly better, to attract better employees.

You see.... with minimum wage employees, you can't expect too much. They arrive late or call in sick... they don't want to wear a tie or smile at the customers... things that a business might really want them to do in the job, so the business pays a little more than minimum wage, because they expect more. Whenever the minimum wage increases, those jobs increase their pay rates as well. Once we get into the mid to upper level management positions, the pay increase is less frequent, because these people are already making much more, and it's insignificant. However, some companies will carry this all the way up, and everyone gets a pay increase. You've just bumped everything up a notch... things cost a few pennies more... people make a few pennies more... it hasn't changed anything or fixed any problem.
 
With some companies setting record profits, why aren't they hiring more people?
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Because business does not hire people based on profits.

Some companies do set records with profits every year. Some companies go bankrupt, every year.

We actually WANT companies to set record profits, it means people are spending money and paying sales taxes. If they are spending money, it is most likely because they have money, because they have a thing called a job, and a source of income. If they have a source of income, they probably pay income taxes. So, it is a GOOD thing when corporations are setting record profits, I wish they ALL could set record profits every day!

Businesses hire people based on several factors. We can go through those, if you like, but none of them have anything to do with how much profit they made. Of course, if they are LOSING money, which ALSO happens in the real world... they may decide to NOT hire people to replace people who are retiring or leaving... this is called downsizing. What happens is, they reduce the workforce and require remaining workers to take up the slack. This has been going on in many business around the country, as a means to keep their heads above water during this recession.
 
Yurt said:
every single time MW has gone up, so does the cost of food and other necessities.
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Total nonsense.

I can remember the 70's seeing as how I'm closing in on 50, and conservatives said BACK THEN that if we increased the minimum wage to $5.00 an hour, companies like McDonald's would be forced to charge $10 for a Big Mac...well, I don't see any McDonald's charging $10 for a Big Mac anywhere in this great nation.
 
Superfreak said:
It is the liberals that want to keep the poor in their place. It is the liberal that wants them stuck on welfare. It is the liberal that doesn't want them to have school choice. It is the liberal that constantly makes excuses for them to remain where they are.
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Yeah!

And those evil, GREEDY Liberals show the world HOW they want to keep the poor down, with their incessant clamoring for increases in the minimum wage for the poorest and all their fighting for unemployment benefits for the poorest...

While those wonderful champions of the poor, CONSERVATIVES shoot down one plan after another designed to help out the poorest in this nation.
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Total nonsense.

I can remember the 70's seeing as how I'm closing in on 50, and conservatives said BACK THEN that if we increased the minimum wage to $5.00 an hour, companies like McDonald's would be forced to charge $10 for a Big Mac...well, I don't see any McDonald's charging $10 for a Big Mac anywhere in this great nation.
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I remember back then as well... and this guy I know said that if we didn't increase minimum wage to $40 an hour that the world would end. Well, we didn't increase minimum wage to $40 and the world didn't end.
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Yeah!

And those evil, GREEDY Liberals show the world HOW they want to keep the poor down, with their incessant clamoring for increases in the minimum wage for the poorest and all their fighting for unemployment benefits for the poorest...
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an increase in minimum wage pushes prices for the poor UP, not down you dolt.

Liberals also fight for fewer jobs for teens who want to work...
Liberals also do fight for unemployment bene's that provide yet another disincentive for people to actually find work.

While those wonderful champions of the poor, CONSERVATIVES shoot down one plan after another designed to help out the poorest in this nation.
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Except your plans do not help the poor... unless by 'help' you mean forcing them to remain reliant upon government handouts.
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Total nonsense.

I can remember the 70's seeing as how I'm closing in on 50, and conservatives said BACK THEN that if we increased the minimum wage to $5.00 an hour, companies like McDonald's would be forced to charge $10 for a Big Mac...well, I don't see any McDonald's charging $10 for a Big Mac anywhere in this great nation.
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Haven't seen a .99 Big Mac in a while either, have ya?
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Yeah!

And those evil, GREEDY Liberals show the world HOW they want to keep the poor down, with their incessant clamoring for increases in the minimum wage for the poorest and all their fighting for unemployment benefits for the poorest...

While those wonderful champions of the poor, CONSERVATIVES shoot down one plan after another designed to help out the poorest in this nation.
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You just said we've been doing this since the 1970s... that's 40 years! For 40 years, we have been raising the minimum wage to "help out the poorest" and has it helped them out? OR... do you still want MORE? IF what you were doing had been working the past 40 years, you might have some kind of argument to make here, but the fact is, there has been nothing changed by it. We're still having the exact same argument over the exact same poorest we need to help.
 
Howey said:
Another question. How high do prices go up when middle and executive level employees get a raise?
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Right...we're supposed to buy into their lie that giving minimum wage earners a 50 cent an hour raise will destroy the economy, but CEO's pay increases every single year by double digit numbers and it supposedly does NOTHING to the economy?
 
Dixie said:
You just said we've been doing this since the 1970s... that's 40 years! For 40 years, we have been raising the minimum wage to "help out the poorest" and has it helped them out? OR... do you still want MORE? IF what you were doing had been working the past 40 years, you might have some kind of argument to make here, but the fact is, there has been nothing changed by it. We're still having the exact same argument over the exact same poorest we need to help.
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Do try to follow along.

Over the past 40 years the minimum wage, unless raised by Congressional Liberals, has not kept up with the cost of living increases which occur here every year...
 
Dixie said:
You just said we've been doing this since the 1970s... that's 40 years! For 40 years, we have been raising the minimum wage to "help out the poorest" and has it helped them out? OR... do you still want MORE? IF what you were doing had been working the past 40 years, you might have some kind of argument to make here, but the fact is, there has been nothing changed by it. We're still having the exact same argument over the exact same poorest we need to help.
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What's this "helping out the poorest" stuff? There's an exchange of services here. The lowly worker gets a pittance for the lowly job, that you or I wouldn't do because we have other skills. You think corporations would give two sh*ts about the workers if it weren't for laws like minimum wage?

We've been there, done that. We had child labor, unregulated steel mills and coal mines, atrocious conditions in sewing factories, etc. There was precious little regard for the worker; it was all about the bottom line and squeezing every last drop out of the peons to increase it.

Minimum wage in the US was enacted in 1938 yet I'm pretty sure there was a steady increase in the costs of goods and services for all the decades that led up to that law.
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Do try to follow along.

Over the past 40 years the minimum wage, unless raised by Congressional Liberals, has not kept up with the cost of living increases which occur here every year...
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and every time MW is increased, so does the COL

liberals like you just can't grasp basic economics.
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Total nonsense.

I can remember the 70's seeing as how I'm closing in on 50, and conservatives said BACK THEN that if we increased the minimum wage to $5.00 an hour, companies like McDonald's would be forced to charge $10 for a Big Mac...well, I don't see any McDonald's charging $10 for a Big Mac anywhere in this great nation.
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irrelevant to my post. my post is absolutely true. your alleged claims are highly suspect. even if true, there are doomsayers in every party, in every religion etc.....doesn't change the facts i posted about.
 
superspazz is a spazz....but he is right about one thing:

if you want lower wages to be worth more, we need a stronger dollar. the MW now is worth less than it was 30 years ago. fix the dollar and you fix the worth of MW.
 
ZappasGuitar said:
Right...we're supposed to buy into their lie that giving minimum wage earners a 50 cent an hour raise will destroy the economy, but CEO's pay increases every single year by double digit numbers and it supposedly does NOTHING to the economy?
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It has nothing to do with pay increases for CEOs or devastating the already devastated economy, it's about doing something that will cause prices to increase and kill jobs, at a time when that is the LAST thing we need to do. PLUS... it won't help the situation. I guarantee... as soon as they raise the minimum wage, you will begin lobbying for the next increase. You will spew the same emotive nonsense about the need and the poorest among us... and we'll eventually raise it again... and again...

Let's get something clear with you... CEOs are still going to make the same amount, or more, even when you increase the minimum wage. The company (hopefully) is still going to turn a profit. Those things are simply NOT going to change, and you can't change them. What will happen is, prices will increase across the board. And we are back at square one, with you whining for yet another increase in the minimum wage to help the poorest among us... it never ends, it's the same routine for the past 40 years, and this will go on for the next 40 years, there is no indication we are even close to solving the problem here.
 
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