Posted on 02/13/2013 11:42:21 AM PST by SeekAndFind
President Barack Obama proposed last night that the United States raise the minimum wage to $9.00 per hour.
While that may seem like a massive raise for low earners — the current minimum wage is $7.25 per hour — we learned that when accounting for the impact of inflation this would be far from the first time that the United States minimum wage exceeded $9.00 in 2012 dollars.
There's an even more comprehensive look at how the United States minimum wage stacks up, and that's by comparing it to other nations.
Take a look at how the minimum wage levels in member nations of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, the economic club for rich countries:
stats.oecd.org and en.wikipedia.org
Among OECD nations, every single country that pays a higher minimum wage than the U.S. pays upwards of $9.00 U.S. dollars per hour.
Australia, the nation with the best minimum compensation on the list, has a minimum wage equivalent to $15.75 in U.S. dollars.
(Excerpt) Read more at businessinsider.com ...
Raise the minimum wage, create more jobs for illegals... More companies will employ people “under the table.”
If people knew the whole truth behind the minimum wage, I'd surmise that the 20% number would increase substantially.
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Pictured above is Frances Perkins (note the look of evil in her shark-like, beady eyes and the haughty smirk as she merrily shreds the Constitution) who was part of Franklin Diablo [sic] Roosevelt's so-called "Brain" Trust. She, as much as anyone, is why we have the monstrosity called the minimum wage. This was an utterly wicked woman who headed the U.S. Secretary of Labor during FDR's reign of terror. Along with her follow communist colleagues, Harry Hopkins and Henry Wallace, tremendous damage was done to America by that trio.
In my opinion, the minimum wage is unconstitutional since it's nothing more than a modern form of slavery. Why? It prohibits a worker and employer from agreeing on the price for services. Personal liberty and freedom are destroyed because the minimum wage sets a false bottom. Philosophical and constitutional argument aside, everyone (even the 80% you alluded to) can't help but recognize that the minimum wage is a job-killing tool. Abolish the minimum wage and make Right to Work universal and watch the American economic engine come roaring back to life. Without these burdensome brakes on business, our manufacturing base and service sectors will be the envy of the world...yes even in Australia.
Tomorrow’s installment: US Ranks Far Behind Other Countries in Paid Vacation and Sick Time.
Yes, but it’s been essentially settled since the 1930’s. I doubt you could get more than 20% public support to repeal minimum wage laws.
Yeah, I know. It’s a principle thing for me. I have no delusions about who our government really is and my relationship with it.
and the point of this article is....?
And the unions don’t realize it but they are a powerful force behind the development of robots and machinery designed to replace their expensive workers.
If you want to build road and bridges like China, make minimum wages equivalent to China. Then Illegals will be running back to Mexico for job. Mexico minimum wage is higher than China.
“The real minimum wage is zero: unemployment.” — Thomas Sowell
The minimum wage is one of the most persistent and pernicious economic policies, probably only surpassed in ineptitude by rent controls and farm subsidies.
Economists have recognized for decades that minimum wage laws result primarily in increased unemployment among the most vulnerable sectors of society, specially poor unskilled teenagers of racial minorities.
The amount of evidence to back this is huge, but still people refuses to accept that just because it sounds like a good idea to magically give poor workers a raise it doesn’t mean that it actually works this way.
Ironically the main groups that consistently lobby to raise the minimum wage are unions of skilled workers that already earn much more than the minimum wage, and big business in the retail market who offer salaries slightly above the minimum wage.
This unholy union of unions and big business can be explained if one looks at the real consequences of raising the minimum wage: unskilled workers that might be able to compete with unionized workers thanks to their lower salary are put out of work safewarding the jobs of the well off unionized workers. At the same time small retail business that have very small margins are driven into bankruptcy by big corporations that take advantage of economies of scale and can afford to pay their workers salaries slightly above the minimum wage.
If our goals is to improve the economic situation of disadvantaged workers probably the best known strategy is a negative income tax, this doesn’t create negative incentives and preserves the existing positive incentives, it doesn’t directly increase unemployment or hurt small business.
“Reduced employment opportunities is one effect of minimum wage legislation. The minimum wage law has imposed incalculable harm on the disadvantaged members of our society. The only moral thing to do is to repeal it.” — Walter Williams
Yes. Not only that private sector unions use increases to base their demands for more pay. Union jobs do pay more than minimum wage but when it goes up, they count union wages as losing ground and demand that employers raise the bar to keep the differential.
[Geary is demanding a large bribe for a gaming license] Senator Pat Geary: I want your answer and the money by noon tomorrow. And one more thing. Don't you contact me again, ever. From now on, you deal with Turnbull. Michael Corleone: Senator? You can have my answer now, if you like. My final offer is this: nothing.
Here's another little item. There are a lot of contracts out there that require employers to pay their workers (A) specific multiples of the minimum wage, or (B) the negotiated hourly wage plus a cost of living adjustment, whichever is higher.
Here's a hypothetical example.
Suppose an employer is required to pay a "Machinist III" with five years of seniority $30.00 an hour plus COLA, or four times the minimum wage, whichever is higher. Usually COLA gives workers like our fictitious Machinist III an annual raise between 2% and 4%. But Obama wants to give him a raise to $36.00, which is a 20% raise.
Multiply that across the entire workforce at some of these unionized companies and you can see why it's a real disaster for the employers. As if Obamacare and all the other new laws and regulations weren't bad enough.
You beat me to it!
Stuck on stupid. Raising the min. wage will do nothing but make whatever small amount of savings anyone has left worth even less and will cause the price of everything else to rise. Sure, $9/hr. will go a long way when the price of a loaf of bread is $10.
There's the payola for the Union vote in 2012.
Aren’t public employee union wages indexed to the minimum wage?>
They may well be but I’m not familiar with their contracts. What I am familiar with are automotive (UAW) contracts that have a built in clause whereby a 25 cent raise in minimum wage makes a 75 cent UAW member raise an automatic. No negotiation necessary, it’s automatic. Little wonder unions support a push for higher minimum wages if this is the norm.
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