Negative Fallout From Increased Wage Laws

[adios]

I'm sure not too many folks have much sympathy for businesses that suffer due to new minimum wage laws. I'm currently a resident of New Mexico. Chile farming isn't very big news other places but it's an important industry where I live. Anyway I was hearing some reports on local news stating how the chile farming industry in New Mexico is being hurt by an increase in the minimum wage. The industry is being threatened by foreign competition and the increase in the minimum wage adds to the threat as in the industry could die here. Here's a link to The New Mexico Chile Association! web page:

The New Mexico Chile Association


Challenges our industry faces:


· Cheap foreign industry that is taking our market share and putting companies out of business.

· Our industry lacks available automation because we are not a huge industry and have not attracted attention and money from machinery companies. We need automation to allow us to compete with foreign competition that has very low labor costs and little regulation.

· Burdensome and poorly thought out local and statewide minimum wage laws.

· Immigration policies that make it difficult to staff our companies cost effectively.

· Onerous labor laws and other regulations that increase our costs.

· Proposed grading laws that will cause our costs to increase.

· Additional free trade agreements that will add to the influx of cheap foreign product.

· Over the past decade, the number of acres of chile grown in New Mexico has been reduced by half.

· If our industry does not act aggressively, our industry will be decimated and little of it will remain in five years.

[Smasharoo]

I cry a silent bloody tear of rage for all the poor disenfranchised chile farmers of New Mexico. I imagine the national GDP will collapse if they're forced to increase wages for the first time in a decade. Oh, alas, alas!

[TomCollins]

[ QUOTE ]
I cry a silent bloody tear of rage for all the poor disenfranchised chile farmers of New Mexico. I imagine the national GDP will collapse if they're forced to increase wages for the first time in a decade. Oh, alas, alas!

[/ QUOTE ]

At first they came for the Jews...

[Smasharoo]

At first they came for the Jews...

You're right, it's a slippery slope to wild wage inflation left completely unchecked by any market adjustment causing the complete destruction of the economy. Yup. Slippery all right.

[TomCollins]

[ QUOTE ]
At first they came for the Jews...

You're right, it's a slippery slope to wild wage inflation left completely unchecked by any market adjustment causing the complete destruction of the economy. Yup. Slippery all right.

[/ QUOTE ]

Ugh, why do I bother responding to trolls.

[andyfox]

I note that among the aims of the organization are to:

-Work with state and federal officials to obtain funding to automate key manual processes prevalent in our industry including harvesting, cleaning, de-stemming, and peeling of chile.

-Research and lobby for additional support such as tax breaks or training funds specific to our industry to assist our members in competing with cheap foreign products.

-Lobby to oppose additional free trade agreements and to ensure any agreements will minimize the impact to our industry.

-Direct chile related research at NMSU and other public and private institutions to ensure our needs are being met.


So it's OK for the association to rely on government to give its members funding for automation, tax breaks and training funds as it sees fit, to set up protective tariffs to artificially raise prices, and to do research to make sure its needs are being met. But not to insure a decent wage for the 5,000 full-time or 10,000 part-time workers that contribute to it being a $400,000,000 industry.

[bisonbison]

Ugh, why do I bother responding to trolls.

Tom, it'd help if you guys would lay off the holocaust references. They do not help your case.

[TomCollins]

[ QUOTE ]
Ugh, why do I bother responding to trolls.

Tom, it'd help if you guys would lay off the holocaust references. They do not help your case.

[/ QUOTE ]

It would help if people understood references too. His argument consisted mostly of "so what if something bad is happening to them, its not happening to me. Pretty much exactly what the poem says. Unfortunately, its about the Halocaust, which causes people to act irrationally thinking I was comparing the horror of mass genocide to a minimum wage increase.

If your argument is there are not problems with minimum wage increases, say it, but Smasharoo is a 1st class troll.

Are there any other analogies that are reserved from being used?
Anything related to Nazism, the Halocaust seem to be covered so far.

[TomCollins]

[ QUOTE ]
I note that among the aims of the organization are to:

-Work with state and federal officials to obtain funding to automate key manual processes prevalent in our industry including harvesting, cleaning, de-stemming, and peeling of chile.

-Research and lobby for additional support such as tax breaks or training funds specific to our industry to assist our members in competing with cheap foreign products.

-Lobby to oppose additional free trade agreements and to ensure any agreements will minimize the impact to our industry.

-Direct chile related research at NMSU and other public and private institutions to ensure our needs are being met.


So it's OK for the association to rely on government to give its members funding for automation, tax breaks and training funds as it sees fit, to set up protective tariffs to artificially raise prices, and to do research to make sure its needs are being met. But not to insure a decent wage for the 5,000 full-time or 10,000 part-time workers that contribute to it being a $400,000,000 industry.

[/ QUOTE ]

Government is always great if you benefit from it, and evil if its limiting you (or not giving you enough). Isn't politics great?

Stop these restrictions on me (but give me some money!)!

[Smasharoo]

It would help if people understood references too.

Please don't confuse laughing out lout at the preposterousness of something for not understanding the reference. I'm fairly certain that when Niemoller wrote it, it wasn't with the intent that it be trivialized and used as wild hyperbole in a discussion about wages.


His argument consisted mostly of "so what if something bad is happening to them, its not happening to me.


No, my argument was that New Mexico chile farmers complaining about having to pay higher wages has virtually nothing at all to do with raising the Federal Minimum Wage.


Pretty much exactly what the poem says. Unfortunately, its about the Halocaust, which causes people to act irrationally thinking I was comparing the horror of mass genocide to a minimum wage increase.


I think, honestly, it's more that it just doesn't apply *at all* in even the widest interpretation thats bothersome. You know, that you're implying that there *really is* a slippery slope from chile farmers to...I don't know...totalitarian socialism? Honestly, what is the fear exactly?


If your argument is there are not problems with minimum wage increases, say it, but Smasharoo is a 1st class troll.


I have no idea when Troll came to be defined as "Someone more glib than me whose arguments I can't refute at all" but, ok. I guess there's a lot to be said for covering your ears and yelling "lalalalalala" when someone says something you'd rather not hear. I wouldn't know, really, but it seems very popular.


Are there any other analogies that are reserved from being used?
Anything related to Nazism, the Halocaust seem to be covered so far.


How about those that don't apply at all to the subject at hand? That'd be a good start.

When I was one and twenty, a wise man said to me...