You seem to have plenty of time to profess the stupidity of all who disagree with you. I figured you'd also have plenty of time to humor me here.

Tom, does YOUR version of self employment require a business license? How many employees (besides yourself ) does your business have?

Tony, I wasn't here all day.  Second, sorry if you feel like you felt like I was picking on you.  I get tired of people who collect a couple of anecdotes and try to pretend it's data.

As for the rest of it, let's just skip all the details where I answer your questions and you talk about how much more experience you have or how your little brush with experience is so much more relevant than the experience I have and get to the end of your drama show and you can just storm off now because no one understands just how much in depth unchallengable knowledge of the subject matter you and only you possess.

That's perfect.  Thanks.

I guess gas is headed to $4 a gallon because of the minimum-wage hike. And prices on corn, wheat, and other crops are skyrocketing for the same reason (people earning minimum wage harvest those crops, right?). And health care costs are out of control for the same reason (because doctors earn minimum wage too, right?).

Yup. Makes total and perfect sense, Ms. Shrider.

The only way to offset wage increase is to also increase productivity. Of courst gasoling prices heading to $4 a gallon isn't wage related, I'll  take a chance and say that we all agree on that.

U.S. factory produced goods will go up. Services will go up a lot. The deal is that when minimum wage is increased, all pay and wages go up too. Yes, the saleries of the people who work for the HPO or PPO will go up and the salery of your Doctor will go up too. It pushes the cost of everything up, so where's the benefit to the minimum wage earner (if there are any who aren't teenagers living with Mom & Dad)?

Before Tom decided to roll over and play dead, I was trying to show him what I ain't seeing. I'm not seeing this described population of Americans trying to raise and support a family on minimum wage. I'm not.

Around where I live, even the local High School Football players who work as day labor in the Summer make at least a dollar more than minimum wage. The adult day laborers tend to make at least a couple of bucks more than that. I used this as an example because it's the lowest paying job that I could ask around about on short notice.

The local McDonald's pays minimum wage for the first 90 days of employment. Then, you either get a pay raise, of fired for being a no load.

Every time this topic comes up people deny the price of goods goes up when minimum wages go up, or any wage goes up.  I'm always amazed that some believe that it doesn't happen.  It might not be as noticible with large companies but with mom and pops for instance, if they have to pay that teenager more money they WILL increase the price of their goods.  Probably not by a large amount, but it will increase.  For those who don't increase their prices, they will cut back on hours.  But somewhere, somehow, they will pass the cost of that wage increase on to the consumer

When the county was forced to raise pay recently, they immediately began to cut programs, training, consolidated teams, and put a lid on hiring.  When jobs were vacated they weren't always filled again.  And that benefits potential workers in what way?

In the early 60's we were paying 25 cents for a loaf of bread and my ex was making $50 a week.  You could buy a new Volkswagon for $1200.  What do we pay now?  Do you believe that those increases didn't go hand in hand?

How naive can people be to think that companies are going to just absorb higher wages and take it out of their bottom line?

I support an honest wage for a honest day's work. Employers must pay their employees a livable wage!

Tony, it's easily found on the Internet.  "Rep" is short for "repertory."

.

The increase in the minimum wage is a good thing.  And MaryLee wants to pretend the increase in prices we've seen have nothing to do with increased costs for fuel, corn, wheat, etc? 

Price inflation has lots of causes including fuel costs, material costs, the falling dollar.  Do you think prices woud be lower today if we cut the minimum wage?

To address the issue of who makes the minimum wage, about a quarter of the people who make minimum wage are teenagers and over 50% are over 25.

Further, studies show that increasing the minimum wage actually increase employment across the economy because forcing money to the bottom of the economy whick increases churn.  In a macro sense, the economy is hlped by passing money through as many hands as possibe before it returns to the government where it was made.

Tony, your question about anyone here knowing anyone raising someone raising a family on the minimum wage is silly.  I don't know anyone who lives in Alabama, but I also know that people actually live there.

Tony~ I was paid for 20 hours a week by the agency of Adult Protective Services as a in home health care aid. My son Kelsey took 24/7 care,he could not sit,stand,crawl,walk,grasp or articulate~ in short he needed help to do virtually everything. I was a single parent,no child support,he received $500 or so a month SSI,and I was really lucky as my mother had bought a house. On that income I saved for my property taxes,paid my utilities,we ate, and that was about it. I can make a buck go far,but after 15 years of living that close to the bone,as it were,I can tell you optimism is hard to dig up.

Tony, people who raise a family on minimum wage typically can't afford computers and internet access.

No one addreessed the part about rising wages eating into the bottom line of a business.  Who is going to absorb that?

Or did I miss that part?

Sage,

You wrote exactly what I was thinking about Taco Bell's new 79 cent  menu. The bean and cheese burritos did increase  about  seven cents, but that  is not going to stop me from going thru the drive thru when I am in a hurry.

People who raise a family on minimum wage typically can't afford computers and internet access.

Which makes it a shame they won't read this: If your making minimum wage, now is not the time to raise a family.

The facts argue that increased productivity has not increased wages at all. Here is a snap shot from the Economic Policy Institute. I guess my earlier link that showed the minimum wage depreciating against the overall economy since 1981didn't make much impact on people who think raising the bottom wages hurts the economy and businesses employing these workers.

With all due respect to the charts and graphs let me dumb this down a bit.  I own a small mom and pop grocery store where I employ 2 people part time.  Bear in mind that these stores aren't big profit business.  If the gov't comes along and tells me that I must pay each of these employees an extra dollar per hour, also bearing in mind that my overhead has not gone down, nor has my business increased, are you saying that my economy is going to be benefitted by this?

Or are you saying that I must take more money out of my pocket to pay for this extra cost in wages paid?  You do realize that I will have less money (profit) to support my own family don't you?  When that happens I can do one of two things..maybe both.  I can cut the hours of my employees or I can raise the price of goods to my customers.

Sales - overhead = profit.  Increase overhead and profit decreases.

I'm sorry, I'm not an economist or a deep thinker here but in my simple math a minus is a minus and all the charts and graphs won't change that. 

If your making minimum wage, now is not the time to raise a family.

yup.

It seems to me that the best thing that people working minimum wage can do to improve their station is not to rely upon the government to increase minimum wage but rather to take advantage of training and educational opportunities that improve their ability to attain higher paying work.  In Kern, we have an extremely inexpensive community college that offers classes all day and in the evenings in addition to the multiple online programs.  Federal school loans are available to just about anyone; low percentage rates and repayment doesn't typically start until a year after the classes are completed.  Learn a trade, get a degree, and move into a position that requires specialized knowledge and compensates accordingly.

Ironically, the move toward increased education would likely cause an increase in lower wages anyway.  Wages are largely based upon supply and demand - if Walmart or Taco Bell or wherever offers minimum wage with no benefits, it's b/c they know that they have a huge unskilled workforce willing to work for that paltry amount.  If less workers were interested in working at those places, then these companies would have a smaller labor pool to draw their workers from, forcing them to improve their compensation to attract from the limited availability of talent.

If your making minimum wage, now is not the time to raise a family.

True,but to raise a point,when we began our family were self employed.  After our son was born the economic stress,the stress of having a child like mine ended the marriage. At the time child care was impossible to find,much less afford to attend any type of school or training program.Not to mention time:our day was none stop,from food,to therapy to helping in school..to the 3am check to see if all is well. Finding an employer so understanding to that, would have been a neat trick..what I am saying I suppose is that not all minimum wage earners start out like that,not all of them can pull themselves up so easily.How being dirt poor drags one down is very hard to understand unless one has been there.

For Robb and FreeCognate, say you have a family, lose your job and you take a minimum wage job to keep some money coming in.  Is that also not the time to raise a family?

BTW, FreeCognate, you're dangerously close in that last bit to advocating that they die and decrease the surplus population.

Nancy, let's take the supermarket example.  Now you have a market in a town where everyone is making slightly more money.  Maybe they come in and buy a few of your higher margin goods or some extra beer or soda or cookies.  You're right that the immediate impact of the new wage may sting.  A buck an hour per full time employee for 2 employees will end up costing the employer about 500 dollars a month.  You might raise your prices a bit and cut out some of the people who would otherwise have bought more; you can cut employee hours and save a bit in the short term and either make it up by doing more work yourself or let the service and/or cleanliness of the store slide decreasing the value of your product; or you can bite the bullet for a month or two while that money works it's way through the economy and boosts business.

I'm all for helping out a family that has fallen on hard times. But for "John" and "Mary" that are working for minimum wage and are thinking about reproducing, if they are thinking at all while they're making whoopie like crazed weasels: now is not the time to raise a family. In the Willis Utopia, there would be no reproducing without a license which would be handed out after the completion of Parenting 101. A prerequisite would be proof that your child would not have to live on a parent's minimum wage. 

Hope that clears things up.
 

Sage, thanks for saying what I was trying to.

Thank you Tom,for the back up. I agree Robb about the concept,but I must point out I could have taken your class,passed and still found myself at exactly the same place.

You could have merely shown your diploma and the Willis administration would have seen to it you were taken care of. Tough luck for the crazed weasel family, though. 

Sage, I don't know the circumstances of your past and I can't possibly comment on your life.  I do know what it's like to grow up dirt poor and I have also been literally dirt poor as an adult.  And I know that working a minimum wage job drains the life from a person as much as living in poverty.  Minimum wage jobs involve repetition, manual labor, little intellectual stimulus and little compensation, whether they pay $7 b/c that is the minimum wage or $8.  The government's increase of the minimum wage doesn't change the essential problem, which is too many people believe that they can have good lives working for the minimum wage b/c the government will keep employers honest. 

I am not against programs that are designed to help families and others who have fallen on hard times.  Safety net programs like unemployment and food stamps are very important for helping families and individuals get through the roughest periods of their lives. 

I also think that the government can provide "traps" or "openings."  The traps are actions like increasing minimum wage, which makes minimum wage jobs appear more attractive.  We have kids dropping out of school in Kern County b/c they think that a minimum wage job will be sufficient to support themselves and their families into the future.  The openings are things like government supported job-training programs and opportunities for school loans that help an individual develop skills to improve their job options.  I think that those actions by the government are far more effective at helping people to improve their lives for the long term, which I think should be the goal of this discussion. 

Tomw:  I think that sometimes folks do fall into hard times b/c of circumstances out of their control.  Hence my answer above.  If you honestly think that I would advocate death to decrease the surplus population, then I don't know what to say.  Do you want to have a rational discussion or do you want to demagogue me and anyone else that disagrees with you? 

Good one~ the crazed weasel families do need to figure out why and how babies keep happening,and the benefits of proper birth control.

FreeCognate, I'll give you a pass on the demagoguing if you let me do it to everyone else.  As for the dropout rate, that argument has been used and disproven for the last 20 years: http://aspe.hhs.gov/hsp/lwl...

Do Minimum Wages Reduce Educational Attainment?  Economic theory predicts that the effect of minimum wages on school enrollment is ambiguous.⁽¹⁹⁾ That is, a higher minimum wage makes employment more attractive and school less attractive, causing some teens to seek employment and/or drop out of school. A number of empirical studies have advanced the literature by examining the effects of minimum wages on the school enrollment status of teenagers.⁽²⁰⁾ Minimum wage opponents contend that it decreases teen employment and prompts at-risk teens to drop out of school. For example, Neumark and Wascher's estimates suggest that President Clinton's proposed minimum wage hike would lower school enrollment by 2.8 percentage points. However, their study used an inaccurate measure of school enrollment, misclassifying some students as nonstudents. As a result, Neumark and Wascher overestimated the adverse effects minimum wages have on school enrollment.⁽²¹⁾ Evans and Turner (1995), using an accurate measure of school enrollment but otherwise identical specifications, found that the minimum wage does not affect school enrollment.

Tom, I can see where you're going with your explanation but it doesn't always work that way.  In small businesses the extra few dollare the employees make probably isn't going to find it's way into your store.

As for people on minimum wages having children, that's just ignorance gone to seed.  If a couple is struggling with both making min. wage for instance, what makes them think they can afford a child?

My first job was in the students store at BHS for less than min wage and my second was in my boyfriends aunts dress shop where I never made more than min. wage.  The jobs I had in feed and beverage service were all min. wage and I depended on tips to live.  I had no problem with that as I had the potential to make a lot more depending on my service.   I considered myself self employed during those years.  I sort of felt like people who availed themselves of the service appreciated it and the ones who did not avail themselves of the service, didn't subsidize my pay.

Nancy, I agree that it doesn't always work that way.  Certainly you wouldn't think that your own employee's would spend their additional money in their own store.  As I mentioned earlier, minimum wage raises have discernable effects on the wages of the lowest 50% of wage earners.  Overall, small businesses will do better and more sma businesses can start when the money in the system is more spread out.

Not to seem flip about the hardworking people who don't benefit, but there are winners and losers in every market shift. 

Nancy: "Sales - overhead = profit.  Increase overhead and profit decreases.

I'm sorry, I'm not an economist or a deep thinker here but in my simple math a minus is a minus and all the charts and graphs won't change that. "

And when everyone has more money, wouldn't that = more profits?

Way back when, weren't minimum wage jobs for high schoolers to earn extra money & get some job training?  During the summer many of my friends worked the sheds.  I never thought minimum wage was supposed to be an "income" for a family of four!

I was considering looking into starting a business but I have now decided to not do that.

I owned a couple of businesses in Shafter in the past and I paid our part time help minimum wage only because I had to. The employees that had brains and could help me make more money  or make my job easier were paid more. I think their should be a training wage available for a short period especially for workers that fall under the child labor laws and work only a few hours a week.  I agree the minimum wage for adults with children is to low, so don't go to work some place that only pays minimum wage if it's not enough. I also know for a fact and from personal experience that lay offs and a reduction in hours and an increase in prices are the reality.  The small independent business are the ones that suffer the most, the ones most on these blogs praise over the corporations, because they don't have the buying power or the central kitchens to prepare foods for their franchises etc.  Skills and education are the key.  You must make yourself more valuable to employers.  I know there are circumstances [layoffs and downsizing ] that make that a non issue but that is not norm.  I have flip flopped on the min. wage issue before and still really don't know what it should be defined as.

My thanks to the ones who see the reality and not just the ideal.

  TomW, Thanks for conceding that I'm not advocating "eat the poor."

I honestly don't understand why you linked to that site.  It doesn't support your argument.  Your study lists two of its key findings as:

So much “wisdom” from our “resident handyman cum economist”  has been passed along here while I was gone (earning that evil lucre BTW) I’ll have to answer them point by point. This will make it easier for said “economist” to follow as well as for the general edification of others.

TomW: Yup, every time we pass the minimum wage, all the businesses say they won't survive. Then all the businesses gripe about how hard it's made things. Then they all do fine. Look at the areas of the country that have the highest minimum wage. How are those places doing?

There are a lot of assumptions here, not the least of which is that ALL businesses say they won’t survive. A bit of hyperbole perhaps but he also says that ALL gripe about how hard its made things. No way to verify this but I don’t see this happening to that extent or even close. Businesses that hire a lot of lower level employees may express disdain for by fiat increases in minimum wage, that’s about all I hear and I deal with a lot of businesses. He further allows, however that they all “do fine”. I don’t know what the measurement for this this particular “economist” utilizes but I suspect it is anecdotal or worse yet from the “Liberal Economists” he avails himself of. Most of them may still do business and even prosper but they (and the economy in general) may have done a whole lot better were they not required to pay some govt set minimal amount to entry level employees. I believe there is a minimum wage and the market place will determine that based upon one’s skill level, knowledge, etc. However, there ARE economists I respect who maintain there is some calculable `”minimum wage” its just difficult to “calculate”. So how are they doing? (last question above) Who knows? TomW seems to. I posit that they would be doing better (as would the entire macro economy were there no Govt set minimum wage. He is free to refute.

And yeah TomW, California is doin soooo well economically! LOL!
 

TomW: Tony, I am self-employed so I guess whatever I think is the classic attitude of a small business person. By the way, I'm not sure if you caught it, but this hike also raised the minimum wage for people who provide their own tools to 16/hr. That bumps my hourly charge as well.

Now, THERE’S an assumption! Whatever TomW thinks is the “classic attitude” of a small business person. That’s like saying whatever Al Sharpton thinks is the “classic attitude” of the black preacher. Most true “small business people” I know don’t feel the way TomW thinks. In point of fact they are quite the opposite. Instead of his macro “prime the pump at the lowest level” ethic they are much more likely to think on a micro level and yes, utilize anecdotal evidence as it relates to their particular position (if they didn’t they very likely wouldn’t make it as a small business person).

But the absolute priceless part of this person’s “macro” arguments are his own I suspect most deeply held belief system – WHAT AFFECTS THE MINIMUM WAGE PERSON WILL ULTIMATELY FILTER UP TO THE “PROVIDE YOUR OWN TOOLS” PERSON WHICH WILL IN TURN ALLOW ME TO CHARGE MORE FOR MY “HANDYMAN WORK”! Beautimous! The REAL truth will out.

TomW: Chico, there's no such thing as "liberal economics" or "conservative economics". Of course, if you understood economics, you'd know that too. I think a follow up piece should clear all this up for you though

I waited for you to avail us of your teachings in a simplistic fashion. What I got is what I am dealing with now I guess. I guess I expected too much. It obviously goes without saying that politics and economics are so closely related (one utilizing the other to support policy decisions) that to say economics is merely economics without regard to the political and other exogenous influences transcends sophistry to the point of…….. well, TomW!

TomW: Can you go back and ask those business owners how their sales are year over year? With inflation up, I wouldn't be surprised if business was off.

It now appears Tom is arguing with himself. He is the one after all, who has maintained that, taken in the macro sense, minimum wage increases are not inflationary, merely stimulative and at the appropriate level to boot. Savings and investment arguments be damned! One would require a program to keep up with his economic “positions” I guess.

TomW: ………..studies show that increasing the minimum wage actually increase employment across the economy because forcing money to the bottom of the economy whick increases churn. In a macro sense, the economy is helped by passing money through as many hands as possible before it returns to the government where it was made.

Assuming the whick is just a typo and not some reference to a Samuelson “economic candle theory”, and the chum is as in fishing, this is merely a rehash of TomW's dried up previous hash regarding the “macro” efficacy of priming the economic pump from the lowest levels ostensibly as this is where it will be most likely immediately spent and thus help the economy. Of course if he really knew anything about macro economics he’d know that a healthy economy requires consumption at an appropriate level as well as savings and investment. When you do glue lams you can save on nails right TomW? (a little handyman lingo to make it relevant to my favorite economics teach). But you gotta invest in a gun as well as refills of glue (nail equivalents).

TomW: Tony, your question about anyone here knowing anyone raising someone raising a family on the minimum wage is silly. I don't know anyone who lives in Alabama, but I also know that people actually live there.

Actually this one could have been written by WondefulBlue. Albeit out of context, this one is about as soundly grounded in economic principle and logical analysis as the rest of our “Resident Economists” are. And FTR, I think TonyH’s experiences ARE probably more salient than 99% of the “liberal” economic theory you trot out, macro or micro. At least the micro examples you can “pin down” and are illustrative. Your macro examples are about as easy to “pin down” as putting your thumb on a watermelon seed on a wet plate!

Or nailing jello to drywall even utilizing your newly aquired glue gun!........ 
 

Likely TomW will wish to nail gun my punkin to a wooden corral gate sometime soon. Perhaps just utilizing his own tortured "economic" nostrums and in print form as opposed to the utilziation of a real nail gun esse!

But yassee, he won't git the chance ta work fer me. I don't pay his "up the min-wage food chain" exorbitant per hour handy man to white collar knuckleheads that never learned to do their own sh*t  wages!

Hell, if I'm gonna pay thet kinda wages I'll get me someone with a dba, bus lic, and cleans up good ta boot!

I even know one I kin place bets wif on the side. He's givin long odds on HRC right now BTW!

BTW Saberhagen, why not just make the minimum wage $100?

Bet that'd make our "handyman" happy as a clam with a shell on "Cribs"!

(or a Duroc rootin' around in moistened heifer dust!)