A controversial subject debated in the U.S and Canada is the plan to increase the minimum wage up to 15 Dollar/hour. Several states passed their own minimum wage raise. The debate about the minimum wage involved employees and employers. The classical approach for this controversial matter can be found in the university business courses. It hurts the economy for many reasons: First, it will encourage people to drop out of education. Second, it will increase the number of unskilled workers, finally, it’s against free market principles that determine the wage level based on supply and demand. The opposite approach argument based on basic, and human rights of workers. Supporters claim that increasing the minimum wage will benefit the local and national economy. Personally, my opinion about the minimum wage is cloudy. I am not sure that I will answer by agreeing or disagree on that matter. I would like to discuss a few points briefly leaving for the members the change to fill between the lines by their comments. In a free market economy, the rise of the minimum wage will hurt the employers and employees. The reason is that without a mechanism to curb down the prices, and the inflation followed absorbed by the rise in the prices and won’t benefit the employees. The employers respond could be ranged from cut down employment, working hours and filling their job vacancies with part-time, and temporary workers. Employers will raise the prices on consumers, the result is a possible loss of sales. I was reading one time that increases in McDonald s Double Mac 15-17 cents can be enough to cover up to 15 Dollar minimum wage raise. However, I am not sure about the accuracy of such opinions and the supporting data available. Many employers provide health insurance and benefits for workers that ignored by legislators. Meanwhile, many others pay less than 3 Dollars without any benefits because workers collect tips. We can find this pattern very common in restaurants. Let us not forget that tips mostly in tax-free money. The increase in the minimum wage must be based on economics, not politics. It needs to be balanced, fair to employees, but not hurting employers. The planners should take the economy into consideration. The Global economy is still in recession since 2007 Subprime Mortgage crisis. End
IT WILL NOT ENCOURAGE PEOPLE TO DROP OUT OF EDUCATION. It will provoke just the opposite as it has here in Europe where postsecondary schooling is free, gratis and for nothing. (The typical fee is less than $1K a year in most of Europe today!) If you were earning a living below the Poverty Threshold ($25K for a family of four, and even less if you are single), then you might have a well defined opinion. That most jobs of most people do not make for a decent wage in a high-cost country that America has become. There is much less of a need (in this new Information Age) of ours of "industrial skilled workers"). That business has shipped out to China in the early 1990s when the Bamboo Curtain came crashing down. We are now 30 years later and the damage has been done. What is absolutely necessary is to bolster our ability to "educate people" to a higher level of skills that will enable them to work productively. Rather than calling upon India to provide the skilled people. And why does India provide such skilled/trained/educated individuals? Because postsecondary education there is free, gratis and for nothing! And were we in America to waste less on the DoD (which consumes more than half of the Discretionary Budget - see here) then we too would have more people with the higher-level skills that our NEW ECONOMY requires. (AKA, Federal government sponsored and paid-for Tertiary Education.) MORE AMERICANS HAVING THE EDUCATIONAL LEVEL THAT COMMERCE AND INDUSTRY PRESENTLY REQUIRE WOULD MEAN A BETTER LIFESTYLE FOR ALL ... !
Most importantly, it must be national in nature or the states will simply be competing with one another. And given that our representatives are highly dependent upon business donations to their campaign, DO NOT EXPECT THEM TO BE PASSING ANY LAW TO CHANGE THE MINIMUM WAGE in any state. That law has to be national in nature - and it is high time that Uncle Sam played "catch-up" to the European Union. Yes, the rules will make both goods and services more expensive in the US. Yes, it could stifle some exports. But, that is the price that must be paid in order to offer people a decent standard-of-living obtained from the salary they earn ...
EU lives at 50% of our GDP so whats to catch up with? France is a liberals wet dream but has income like Arkansas our poorest state. And France has had 18 weeks of rioting because the poor still cant make ends meet despite record tax and spend liberal insanity!!
So then present we continue to go the way of cutting rates, cutting wages and turning the billionaire into a trillionaire ? What we had from the 50s - 80s worked, you tax the hell out of the rich and cut on the poor. There is no argument that works against it. Only thing we have here now is a dissaster that is getting worse by the day. Inflation is at 10% and they call it 2%... blah blah... Powell is just a schmuck, huge wealth transfer going on and the people are losing. Amazingly my computer does not recognize the word Trillionaire.
yes, then liberals didn't ship our jobs to China and invite 30 million illegals to take the rest. Make liberalism illegal and problem goes away.
