MrEd Loc: Georgia

Well, if a berger is $6.00 with the min wage at $7.25 an hour, then if it goes to $15.00 an hour, our bergers will cost about $12.00. Personally, I think $6.00 for a berger is out of sight, but $12.00 for that same berger is going to really do a number on the amount of customers they see. Why should I go pay ANYONE $15.00 an hour to turn bergers when I can do it myself for free and save a bundle to boot. I can remember when the bergers went to $.95 and I thought that was really high, but when they go to $12.00, how many people do you really think will be willing to pay for them?

The only reason the government (Obama) wants to go to $15.00 an hour is to wreck our economy even more then it already is. It is not the governments place to tell any employer what to pay his employee and it is also against the constitution. Since there is nothing in there about giving them this power, then they simply don't have it.

Ve'hoe

Excellent point,,, Ed,,,,

Augustus Greatorex Loc: NE

Unlike 1973, you can now go to RedBox and rent a movie for $1.00. At $7.25 an hour you can rent and watch at least 7 hours of movies. A personal computer, with more computing power than the super computers of the 1980s, can be purchased at WalMart for $500.00 at $7.25 an hour for 42 hours of work. So with just 43 hours of labor you can enjoy 7+ hours of movies.

With ten dollars you can buy a twenty-five pound bag of rice. If you want to, you can live very well on minimum wage, and not get any government subsidies.

How do I know? Because I have done so. Admittedly I live in Nebraska, where the cost of living is very cheap. But rice doesn't grow in Nebraska...

stan3186

MarvinSussman

Rules of the game: To win the argument, you must disprove at least one of the 50 or so statements below. To simply deny the logical conclusion is to be like a child claiming victory after losing the game 50 – 0. Adults only!

Instead of a minimum wage, we should have an ELR (Employer of Last Resort) program in which the federal government hires any adult who is unemployed at (say) $10.00 per hour for a 40 hour week with full healthcare and other fringe benefits. These employees can then be put to work at zero cost by any federal, state, or local government office or by certified NGOs.

This establishes a minimum wage level that private enterprise must exceed. The result will be an increase in price and/or decrease of profit. But will it bring on inflation?

Before inflation rears its ugly head, many millions of Americans will be getting more income, spending it, decreasing inventory, increasing production, and getting hired away from ELR ranks by private enterprise. The question then becomes: will there be a shortage of goods or will the increased production level create enough goods to prevent harmful inflation?

The answer lies in productivity, which brings us to the question of infrastructure. If we spend on infrastructure like we spent on World War II, we will have the world's best infrastructure and the world's highest productivity and there will be no harmful inflation and very low unemployment and the ELR ranks will thin out.

So the answer to the minimum wage question is federal spending: ELR and infrastructure. That brings up the last question: the budget.

Q1: For the taxpayers, is our “national debt” really a burden that must be repaid?
A1: No. For the taxpayers, it lacks those two qualities of a real debt. It’s a “Debt In Name Only”, a “DINO”-**

1. THE DINO IS NOT NOW AND NEVER WILL BE A TAXPAYER BURDEN.

The DINO is the total value of all maturing treasuries. By calling the DINO “unsustainable”, Wall Street con artists, plotting to privatize Social Security and make a fortune in commissions, have panicked the public, politicians, and journalists. But actually, it is not the taxpayers but the buyers of newly-issued treasuries who, in a virtual bond rollover, pay for redemption of the mature treasuries. In every auction, more bonds are demanded than are available. Auction winners get the safest, most liquid US dollar instruments; the losers are stuck with bank risk. If it were ever necessary, the Fed, with cost-free keystrokes, could create a demand for treasuries by buying large quantities in the open market. The taxpayer is NEVER burdened but almost all US voters are swallowing whole the Wall Street hoax!

Our Treasury is like a bank accepting money offered for certificates of deposit. While a bank with too many bad loans can certainly have too many maturing CDs, our non-lending Treasury cannot have too many maturing bonds unless its deficit spending is causing harmful inflation. And that happens ONLY in a war or emergency requiring rationing. It NEVER happens during a recession. During prosperity, banks are ALWAYS the main cause of inflation, creating over $6 of credit for every $1 of deficit spending. To curb inflation, regulate banks before cutting infrastructure projects.

2. THE DINO WILL NEVER BE REPAID AND SHOULD NEVER BE REPAID.

Only a budget surplus can reduce the DINO. Since Truman, no President has reduced the DINO and no annual budget surplus is now in sight. Indeed, to supply enough treasuries, the ONLY risk-free instruments used for trade collateral, insurance, pensions, bank reserves, etc., THE DINO MUST GROW WITH OUR ECONOMY. In fact, deflation and then depression will hit us hard unless large budget deficits replace the cash that we are now exporting.

Q2: Could savers make a “run” on US Treasury bonds?
A2: Only when savers can get risk-free returns from the Wall Street casino or from GM bonds, Illinois bonds, or Detroit bonds. Safety is not everything. Safety is the ONLY thing! That’s why the whole world relies on US bonds.

Q3. Could savers stop buying US Treasury bonds?
A3. Only when nobody needs risk-free interest for trade collateral, insurance, pensions, bank reserves, etc., etc.

Q4: Could savers prefer foreign sovereign bonds?
A4: Yes, indeed! Now, almost two thirds of the world’s reserve currencies are in US dollars and about half of all US Treasury bonds are held by foreigners. But if China’s infrastructure and productivity become better than ours, its sovereign bonds could become safer than ours. And that could happen only if US voters let their DINO concerns stop the renewal of falling bridges, failing schools, leaking sewers, creaking railroads, aging power grids, etc., etc.

Q5: Won’t we need higher tax rates to pay for infrastructure?
A5: The federal government needs taxes but not for spending. Just as you would destroy your redeemed IOUs, the IRS destroys its receipts, actually shredding bills and melting coins for scrap. Since Congress cannot touch a cent of tax revenue, it creates new money out of thin air (just like your bank creates loans), deposits it in the Treasury, and spends it with checks. The Treasury auctions bonds to finance deficits that are limited ONLY by the will of Congress.

The ONLY rational reason to restrict deficit spending is the onset of harmful inflation. Until then, Congress can finance both the DINO’s annual debt interest and our much-needed infrastructure. Every day, you fill your kitchen sink with water AND you prevent it from overflowing. Why can’t Congress fill our economy with money building infrastructure AND prevent harmful inflation? China builds 24/7 without harmful inflation. Why can’t we do that?

Q6: How can increasing the DINO be good for the economy?
A6: Every federal dollar spent and not taxed is saved by the private sector. Yes! DEFICITS = SAVINGS! The bad “Debt Clock” is also the good “Assets Clock”. Since we are exporting cash, deficit spending is our economy’s SOLE source of savings! Well, our (DINO + total bank deposits) / GDP ratio is less than half of China’s comparable figure and our M2 (money supply) / GDP ratio is half of Switzerland’s ratio and one fourth of Hong Kong’s ratio. To become and stay prosperous, we need to DOUBLE the DINO / GDP ratio to return it to the World War II level that was followed by 35 years of prosperity without harmful inflation. Ask Grandma how it was in the good old days!

Q7: How much should Congress tax and spend?
A7: Ideally, Congress should tax just enough to prevent harmful inflation and should spend almost enough to cause full employment (and harmful inflation). Result: low unemployment and low inflation.

Instead, bribed by Wall Street, Congress taxes as little as possible, enriching the rich, and spends as little as possible, impoverishing the rest of us by restricting deficits / savings. Just as quacks killed George Washington by bleeding his “bad blood”, Congress is destroying our younger generations by reducing (possibly to zero!) our annual budget deficits / private sector savings increase / consumer demand. And, by bribing Congress to pass austerity budgets, the Wall Street charlatans are deliberately nursing a huge army of unemployed labor to suppress the wages and working conditions of the shrinking middle class.

Result: recessions, high unemployment, an army of unemployed labor, a growing under-class, a scared work force, declining wages and consumer demand: a downward spiral of despair threatening deflation and depression. Growing inequality will create a land of slums and gated communities: Hell on Earth!

Austerity today deprives our grandchildren of infrastructure that would surely enrich and possibly save their lives. We must educate all of them now and employ all of our resources to build the infrastructure that they will need when they become parents. Let’s follow Presidents Lincoln (railways, telegraph, land-grant colleges), Theodore Roosevelt (National Parks, Panama Canal), and FDR (TVA, PWA, WPA, etc.)

Q8: How should one vote?
A8: Vote only for someone who NEVER EVER worries about the DINO and who ALWAYS worries about Americans looking for work and reluctantly drawing benefits forever instead of building infrastructure.


Q9: “I have to balance my budget. Why doesn’t Congress balance its budget?”
A9: If you could legally print money in your attic, why would you balance your budget? Congress only needs to balance full employment against harmful inflation. Why is something so simple so hard to see?

To stay ahead of China, please help me convince voters that Congress, limited ONLY by the onset of harmful inflation, must build infrastructure”…to promote the general Welfare and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity…” Please copy and distribute this message wherever you can.

ibKelly

Most people working in fast food are normally high school students who still live at home... if not a student, they're probably 'living' with their lover so no rent to pay there. If she has a baby, she's already getting support from the Govt for the child, as well as food stamps. Anyone working at a fast food as a permanent job, either didn't finish school, and not capable of doing anything else. Who's fault is that????? Certainly not mine.... school was there and it was FREE !!!

MarvinSussman

Rules of the game: To win, you must disprove at least one of the 50 or so statements below. To simply deny the logical conclusion is to be like a child claiming victory after losing the game 50 – 0. Adults only!

Instead of a minimum wage, we should have an ELR (Employer of Last Resort) program in which the federal government hires any adult who is unemployed at (say) $10.00 per hour for a 40 hour week with full healthcare and other fringe benefits. These employees can then be put to work at zero cost by any federal, state, or local government office or by certified NGOs.

This establishes a minimum wage level that private enterprise must exceed. The result will be an increase in price and/or decrease of profit. But will it bring on inflation?

Before inflation rears its ugly head, many millions of Americans will be getting more income, spending it, decreasing inventory, increasing production, and getting hired away from ELR ranks by private enterprise. The question then becomes: will there be a shortage of goods or will the increased production level create enough goods to prevent harmful inflation?

The answer lies in productivity, which brings us to the question of infrastructure. If we spend on infrastructure like we spent on World War II, we will have the world's best infrastructure and the world's highest productivity and there will be no harmful inflation and very low unemployment and the ELR ranks will thin out.

So the answer to the minimum wage question is federal spending: ELR and infrastructure. That brings up the last question: the budget.

Rules of the game: To win, you must disprove at least one of the 50 or so statements below. To simply deny the logical conclusion is to be like a child claiming victory after losing the game 50 – 0. Adults only!

Q1: For the taxpayers, is our “national debt” really a burden that must be repaid?
A1: No. For the taxpayers, it lacks those two qualities of a real debt. It’s a “Debt In Name Only”, a “DINO”-**

1. THE DINO IS NOT NOW AND NEVER WILL BE A TAXPAYER BURDEN.

The DINO is the total value of all maturing treasuries. By calling the DINO “unsustainable”, Wall Street con artists, plotting to privatize Social Security and make a fortune in commissions, have panicked the public, politicians, and journalists. But actually, it is not the taxpayers but the buyers of newly-issued treasuries who, in a virtual bond rollover, pay for redemption of the mature treasuries. In every auction, more bonds are demanded than are available. Auction winners get the safest, most liquid US dollar instruments; the losers are stuck with bank risk. If it were ever necessary, the Fed, with cost-free keystrokes, could create a demand for treasuries by buying large quantities in the open market. The taxpayer is NEVER burdened but almost all US voters are swallowing whole the Wall Street hoax!

Our Treasury is like a bank accepting money offered for certificates of deposit. While a bank with too many bad loans can certainly have too many maturing CDs, our non-lending Treasury cannot have too many maturing bonds unless its deficit spending is causing harmful inflation. And that happens ONLY in a war or emergency requiring rationing. It NEVER happens during a recession. During prosperity, banks are ALWAYS the main cause of inflation, creating over $6 of credit for every $1 of deficit spending. To curb inflation, regulate banks before cutting infrastructure projects.

2. THE DINO WILL NEVER BE REPAID AND SHOULD NEVER BE REPAID.

Only a budget surplus can reduce the DINO. Since Truman, no President has reduced the DINO and no annual budget surplus is now in sight. Indeed, to supply enough treasuries, the ONLY risk-free instruments used for trade collateral, insurance, pensions, bank reserves, etc., THE DINO MUST GROW WITH OUR ECONOMY. In fact, deflation and then depression will hit us hard unless large budget deficits replace the cash that we are now exporting.

Q2: Could savers make a “run” on US Treasury bonds?
A2: Only when savers can get risk-free returns from the Wall Street casino or from GM bonds, Illinois bonds, or Detroit bonds. Safety is not everything. Safety is the ONLY thing! That’s why the whole world relies on US bonds.

Q3. Could savers stop buying US Treasury bonds?
A3. Only when nobody needs risk-free interest for trade collateral, insurance, pensions, bank reserves, etc., etc.

Q4: Could savers prefer foreign sovereign bonds?
A4: Yes, indeed! Now, almost two thirds of the world’s reserve currencies are in US dollars and about half of all US Treasury bonds are held by foreigners. But if China’s infrastructure and productivity become better than ours, its sovereign bonds could become safer than ours. And that could happen only if US voters let their DINO concerns stop the renewal of falling bridges, failing schools, leaking sewers, creaking railroads, aging power grids, etc., etc.

Q5: Won’t we need higher tax rates to pay for infrastructure?
A5: The federal government needs taxes but not for spending. Just as you would destroy your redeemed IOUs, the IRS destroys its receipts, actually shredding bills and melting coins for scrap. Since Congress cannot touch a cent of tax revenue, it creates new money out of thin air (just like your bank creates loans), deposits it in the Treasury, and spends it with checks. The Treasury auctions bonds to finance deficits that are limited ONLY by the will of Congress.

The ONLY rational reason to restrict deficit spending is the onset of harmful inflation. Until then, Congress can finance both the DINO’s annual debt interest and our much-needed infrastructure. Every day, you fill your kitchen sink with water AND you prevent it from overflowing. Why can’t Congress fill our economy with money building infrastructure AND prevent harmful inflation? China builds 24/7 without harmful inflation. Why can’t we do that?

Q6: How can increasing the DINO be good for the economy?
A6: Every federal dollar spent and not taxed is saved by the private sector. Yes! DEFICITS = SAVINGS! The bad “Debt Clock” is also the good “Assets Clock”. Since we are exporting cash, deficit spending is our economy’s SOLE source of savings! Well, our (DINO + total bank deposits) / GDP ratio is less than half of China’s comparable figure and our M2 (money supply) / GDP ratio is half of Switzerland’s ratio and one fourth of Hong Kong’s ratio. To become and stay prosperous, we need to DOUBLE the DINO / GDP ratio to return it to the World War II level that was followed by 35 years of prosperity without harmful inflation. Ask Grandma how it was in the good old days!

Q7: How much should Congress tax and spend?
A7: Ideally, Congress should tax just enough to prevent harmful inflation and should spend almost enough to cause full employment (and harmful inflation). Result: low unemployment and low inflation.

Instead, bribed by Wall Street, Congress taxes as little as possible, enriching the rich, and spends as little as possible, impoverishing the rest of us by restricting deficits / savings. Just as quacks killed George Washington by bleeding his “bad blood”, Congress is destroying our younger generations by reducing (possibly to zero!) our annual budget deficits / private sector savings increase / consumer demand. And, by bribing Congress to pass austerity budgets, the Wall Street charlatans are deliberately nursing a huge army of unemployed labor to suppress the wages and working conditions of the shrinking middle class.

Result: recessions, high unemployment, an army of unemployed labor, a growing under-class, a scared work force, declining wages and consumer demand: a downward spiral of despair threatening deflation and depression. Growing inequality will create a land of slums and gated communities: Hell on Earth!

Austerity today deprives our grandchildren of infrastructure that would surely enrich and possibly save their lives. We must educate all of them now and employ all of our resources to build the infrastructure that they will need when they become parents. Let’s follow Presidents Lincoln (railways, telegraph, land-grant colleges), Theodore Roosevelt (National Parks, Panama Canal), and FDR (TVA, PWA, WPA, etc.)

Q8: How should one vote?
A8: Vote only for someone who NEVER EVER worries about the DINO and who ALWAYS worries about Americans looking for work and reluctantly drawing benefits forever instead of building infrastructure.

Q9: “I have to balance my budget. Why doesn’t Congress balance its budget?”
A9: If you could legally print money in your attic, why would you balance your budget? Congress only needs to balance full employment against harmful inflation. Why is something so simple so hard to see?

To stay ahead of China, please help me convince voters that Congress, limited ONLY by the onset of harmful inflation, must build infrastructure”…to promote the general Welfare and secure the Blessings of Liberty to ourselves and our Posterity…” Please copy and distribute this message wherever you can.

snowbear37 Loc: MA.

Andrew Wilkow has a good show. The Wilkow Majority. Not for liberals!

Loki Loc: Georgia

Curiousity: What is your opinion of a return to the gold standard, and why?

Kenneth Biggs Loc: Nashville,Tennessee

YES, THIS PERSON, AND OTHERS LIKE HER, HAVE THE WRONG ATTITUDE,AND VIEWPOINT,SHE IS RIGHT ,TO WANT, AND NEED, A WAGE RAISE, NO ONE CAN, AND OR ,SHOULD HAVE TO TRY AND LIVE ON$7.25 PER HR. ,AND THERE ARE SENIOR CITIZENS, SUCH AS MYSELF, THAT NEED TO SUPPLIMENT THIER MEGER SSI,AND OR ,SOCIAL SECURITY , MINE IS ONLY,$730 PER MONTH, WITH MY ''RAISE IT WILL ONLY BE,$721 PER MONTH, I FORE ONE CAN'T SEE HOW WITH A RAISE, I AM GETTING LESS PER MONTH1? KENNETH BIGGS IN NASH.TN. TOEVERYONE ON THIS WEBPAGE!

Winter Solstice Loc: Salt Lake City

I agree. Obama wants to wreck out economy. Otherwise why is the cost of healthcare (and Burgers) going out of sight. We are forced to pay far more for healthcare now than just last year all because of ACA.

Ve'hoe

Q5

The federal government raises trillions of dollars in tax revenue each year, though there are many different kinds of taxes. Some taxes fund specific government programs, while other taxes fund the government in general. When all taxes for a given year are insufficient to cover all of the government’s expenses—which is often the case

1— the U.S. Treasury borrows money to make up the difference. Total federal tax revenues in fiscal year 2014 are projected to be $3 trillion.

2 These revenues come from three major sources: income taxes paid by individuals, accounting for 46 percent of all tax revenues; payroll taxes paid jointly by workers and employers, accounting for 34 percent; and corporate income taxes paid by businesses, making up 11 percent. There are also a handful of other types of taxes like customs duties and excise taxes that make up much smaller portions of federal revenue. Customs duties are taxes on imports, paid by the importer, while excise taxes are taxes levied on specific goods, like gasoline. This pie chart below shows how much each of these revenue sources are expected to bring in during fiscal year 2014.

Source:
http://nationalpriorities.org/budget-basics/federal-budget-101/revenues/

MarvinSussman

The money supply must grow with population and progress. We don't have an infinite supply of gold. That's one reason it never worked and never will work. There are a dozen other reasons.

Ve'hoe

Did you vote for Obama??? Cause that is the reason.....

Artemis

My post was on a comparison, not on what you can buy cheaply. BTW a 25lb bag of rice leaves you virtually malnourish. You missed my point completely.

I don't agree in the wage going up to 15.00 dollars an hour, but it also should have a cost of living adjustment. Otherwise a person would be earning less money than he actually had in 2009.
The problem is that companies who hire help at minimum wage will only DO the minimum even though their prices do increase, because they will reap those added benefits as long as they can.
We left businesses to their own discretion and they were unconscionable in their practices, which is why Roosevelt created the minimum wage act.

The premise that people who work for minimum wage hardly work for their money is not true for most workers and extremely biased of a social class.