Question for Minimum Wagers

[RR]

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that penny picking job is BAD for the economy, even assuming the pennies are a real good like produce.

it is bad for this reason...there are TONS of other jobs that are available that would profit by hiring an extra person at more than 5 dollars an hour. most low paid employees could be paid significantly more and the company would still be profitable. and if it isn't worth hiring people to pick produce at 5 dollars an hour, then it is obvious that consumers don't really want that produce. but companies would be profitable selling less produce at a higher price to the consumers willing to spend the dough, but of course that means less employment. and until the minimum wage law has a significant impact on employment in the aggregate, it is a GOOD thing for society, because it maximize the utility of labor.

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Hee Haw good is bad. bad is good. no money is better than money. up is down

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it is bad for the economy because it is a waste of labor.

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SO the people that would be doing this job are turning down other jobs to come take this job?

Is this what the min wage supporters believe: "You guys are too dumb to take a job that pays $7/hr over one that pays $5/hr, so we neeed a law to protect you from the greedy guys that will trick you into passing over a higher paying job."

[tehox]

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that penny picking job is BAD for the economy, even assuming the pennies are a real good like produce.

it is bad for this reason...there are TONS of other jobs that are available that would profit by hiring an extra person at more than 5 dollars an hour. most low paid employees could be paid significantly more and the company would still be profitable. and if it isn't worth hiring people to pick produce at 5 dollars an hour, then it is obvious that consumers don't really want that produce. but companies would be profitable selling less produce at a higher price to the consumers willing to spend the dough, but of course that means less employment. and until the minimum wage law has a significant impact on employment in the aggregate, it is a GOOD thing for society, because it maximize the utility of labor.

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Hee Haw good is bad. bad is good. no money is better than money. up is down

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it is bad for the economy because it is a waste of labor.

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SO the people that would be doing this job are turning down other jobs to come take this job?

Is this what the min wage supporters believe: "You guys are too dumb to take a job that pays $7/hr over one that pays $5/hr, so we neeed a law to protect you from the greedy guys that will trick you into passing over a higher paying job."

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It is pretty obvious that this is not what minimum wage advocates think. What they do think is composed of two things 1) It is a mode of wealth redistribution. Some would argue that negative tax credit would do the same thing, but I think moorobot has made some interesting posts lately that an increased minimum wage might incentivize people to work harder and better 2) Minimum wage workers now don't really have the bargaining power to increase their wage. Obviously in some circumstances market forces will fix this problem, but not always.

[DougShrapnel]

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Minimum wage workers are unable to negotiate a "fair" market value for thier labor in a "free" market.

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I think that this is a big part of whether minimum wage laws have merit or not. Propertarian stated sometime ago that most minimum wage workers add $20/hour of value to the businesses they work for. And even if not, in a lot of cases the cost will be shifted to the consumer (which I think most minimum wage advocates don't have a problem with, in fact I think that most people that advocate a miniumu wage would prefer earned income tax credits to those that need it than a raise in the minimum wage, which affects to a large part young people that don't reaaly need it, but see a minmum wage incrase as a second best alternative).

So I think that most proponents of minimum wage laws would have no problems with the letting workers work for OP if the situation was what was actually happening (i.e. lots of jobless people that want to work but can't get a job because businesses don't want to hire them for the minimum wage). There are 15 states or so that currently have higher minimum wages than the federal wage, to my knowledge there has been no study showing that this has had an adverse effect.

[/ QUOTE ]Hey tehox, I pretty much agree with what you posted. I can't verify propertarian's claim. And I can only venture to guess that the 15 or so states all have a higher average salery like california, or are very liberal(like the Pacific NW or some states in the New England area.)

[keith123]

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that penny picking job is BAD for the economy, even assuming the pennies are a real good like produce.

it is bad for this reason...there are TONS of other jobs that are available that would profit by hiring an extra person at more than 5 dollars an hour. most low paid employees could be paid significantly more and the company would still be profitable. and if it isn't worth hiring people to pick produce at 5 dollars an hour, then it is obvious that consumers don't really want that produce. but companies would be profitable selling less produce at a higher price to the consumers willing to spend the dough, but of course that means less employment. and until the minimum wage law has a significant impact on employment in the aggregate, it is a GOOD thing for society, because it maximize the utility of labor.

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Hee Haw good is bad. bad is good. no money is better than money. up is down

[/ QUOTE ]

it is bad for the economy because it is a waste of labor.

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SO the people that would be doing this job are turning down other jobs to come take this job?

Is this what the min wage supporters believe: "You guys are too dumb to take a job that pays $7/hr over one that pays $5/hr, so we neeed a law to protect you from the greedy guys that will trick you into passing over a higher paying job."

[/ QUOTE ]

It is pretty obvious that this is not what minimum wage advocates think. What they do think is composed of two things 1) It is a mode of wealth redistribution. Some would argue that negative tax credit would do the same thing, but I think moorobot has made some interesting posts lately that an increased minimum wage might incentivize people to work harder and better 2) Minimum wage workers now don't really have the bargaining power to increase their wage. Obviously in some circumstances market forces will fix this problem, but not always.

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2)

[pvn]

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It is pretty obvious that this is not what minimum wage advocates think. What they do think is composed of two things 1) It is a mode of wealth redistribution. Some would argue that negative tax credit would do the same thing, but I think moorobot has made some interesting posts lately that an increased minimum wage might incentivize people to work harder and better 2) Minimum wage workers now don't really have the bargaining power to increase their wage. Obviously in some circumstances market forces will fix this problem, but not always.

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2)

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I am not a minimum wage worker (not even close). I don't really have the bargaining power to increase my wage (If I did, I would use it!). Why shouldn't *I* get a legislated pay increase, too?

[keith123]

you do have bargaining power and you already used it.

[pvn]

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you do have bargaining power and you already used it.

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But I don't have any more. The people who have minimum wage jobs had some, and they used it, too.

[keith123]

well, a company would probably let you go before paying you more money. companies can take a risk with less qualified workers and pay them your current salary or even less than that. there are a lot of people below you on the pay scale that would love to take your job. however there is no one lower than the minimum wage worker on the pay scale waiting to move up and take that job. if all minimum wage workers decided to strike unless they were paid 1 dollar more per hour, almost every company would pay them the extra dollar. however it wouldn't go on forever as you suggest it might, because at some point the minimum wage workers would actually be paid what they are worth, and companies would not pay more than that.

a better question is what would you do if your company cut your salary by 20%? if all minimum wage jobs were cut by 20%, what would minimum wage workers do?

[xCptMorganx]

What if you just charge them 50 cents an hour to rummage around on your land taking whatever they can find?

[pvn]

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well, a company would probably let you go before paying you more money.

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But they wouldn't do that to a minimum wage-earner?

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companies can take a risk with less qualified workers and pay them your current salary or even less than that. there are a lot of people below you on the pay scale that would love to take your job. however there is no one lower than the minimum wage worker on the pay scale waiting to move up and take that job.

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Sure there is. There are people who make $0/hour.

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if all minimum wage workers decided to strike unless they were paid 1 dollar more per hour, almost every company would pay them the extra dollar.

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So why don't they do that, then? And, more importantly, what difference does it make? If the government forced me to pay twice as much for rubber bands, I would buy the same number of rubber bands, and rubber band manufacturers would be much better off. Does this justify a minimum rubber band price law?

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however it wouldn't go on forever as you suggest it might, because at some point the minimum wage workers would actually be paid what they are worth, and companies would not pay more than that.

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How do you determine what someone is worth?

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a better question is what would you do if your company cut your salary by 20%?

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Good question. This, in fact, actually happened to me less than six months ago. I had my pay cut by 15% (my employer phased out shift differentials). I now work for a different company (as do many of my former cow-orkers).

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if all minimum wage jobs were cut by 20%, what would minimum wage workers do?

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Well, some would probably do one thing, and some would probably do some other thing. I am pretty comfortable guessing that "they" wouldn't do one particular thing. Again, I'm not really sure what difference it makes, anyway.