xlindsaydurham

We've been discussing the minimum wage. There are real good reasons for raising it. In particularly, if everyone has more money to spend it will grow the economy. Right now there is a growing disparity between the rich and the rest of us that is only getting worse. I think a raise in the minimum wage would be the easiest, simplest way to increase the benefits for everyone. It would even help the rich by giving them more customers with money to spend. This could easily be financed with a tax increase on those who declare themselves conservative.

DuaneHartline

You flunk economics 101. Raising the minimum wage does not give people more money to spend, it gives the same amount of money to less people and raises prices. If someone is not worth paying $5 an hour, they are certainly not worth $10 an hour, increasing unemployment.

Loki Loc: Georgia

Good News: Your new computerator appears to work just fine.
Bad News: Raising the minimum wage will not work just fine. I don't know if you have noticed, but every time the minimum wage goes up, within a few months, consumer prices have risen enough to cancel out the raise, while the majority of Americans who make more than minimum and got no raise end up with less discretionary income. All it does is give a temporary boost to people who have no job sk**ls, and in many cases, no desire to acquire any. Who was it who said that if you redistributed income to the point where everyone had the same amount, before long, the same people would be wealthy, and the same people would be poor once more? You stated that you paid people more than the minimum to get better help. So did I. If you want more than minimum wage, do something to make yourself worth more than minimum. Learn new sk**ls, something that makes you more valuable to your employer or your customer.

xlindsaydurham

It may surprise you but I agree in part with what you say. I thought everyone would want to increase their job sk**ls, learn more and be worth more to society. But then my brother in law came along, he's about as useless as corn cob toilet paper. The last job he had he got fired from and I suggested to my sister (in his presence) that he avail himself of state educational benefits for the unemployed. He wouldn't hear of it. He retired early and hasn't hit a lick since. I'm older than him at 71 and still doing things to make money. BTW, he's very resentful toward me. You've made some valid points. But still, if you put more money in people's hands it will grow the economy (my brother in law excluded).

roger bowen

bull s**t

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

I ordinarily do not say this after reading just one post, but I sure do like you. I do not agree with your plan, but I think you are very smart and an excellent communicator!

There are reasons that you plan can not work; plans such as yours has been tried in the past and to the orchestrator's chagrin, well the only thing that happened is prices went up on everything, ergo the increase in salary only left the people in a worse bind than they started. Because now they are paying more taxes. Equaling less money in the pocket.

But, I do admire your effort!

Merry Christmas and please keep posting!

roger bowen

:) :) :)

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

Roger, My dear friend would you be so kind as to use the quote reply button so we can know to whom you are replying. Thank you!

Merry Christmas

roger bowen

thank you I shall

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

Very much appreciated!!!

rumitoid

I have given endless links showing that this standard line we get from Big Business loving Republicans that raising the minimum wage would be self-defeating because of inflation is totally false and, taking all factors into consideration, has a redemptive effect on the economy. Henry Ford, out of perhaps pure self-interest (that his workers could buy his cars), set an unparalleled wage and benefit hike for his employees, which other companies, to keep pace, had to follow. The result? The inflation rate dropped and the economy saw a big resurgence.
http://work.chron.com/minimum-wage-vs-inflation-rates-19252.html
The assault on the working class has steadily gained momentum. Previous gains thanks to unions are gradually being undone. Thanks to Republican concessions to the elite oligarchy, the American middle class and the poor of this country are given this motto: "You're damn lucky to have a job; stop you're whining about work conditions, lack of benefits, low pay, no representation, long hours without overtime, or forced into part-time, or no paid vacation, or threats by my management that there are more where you came from, or longer hours with pay reductions getting the same salary for 60 hours that you did for forty. Freaking c****e. You're rule is over. This is America."

Searching Loc: Rural Southwest VA

How articulate. Care to expound?

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

Interesting that you would raise up Henry Ford. It is common knowledge that Ford revolutionized the world of t***sportation and mass production with his Ford automobile plants that started in the United States and expanded into other parts of the world. What is not as well known is his fervent hatred towards Jewish people (a hatred shared by fellow super-financier J.P. Morgan) and Ford's f**grant financial and political backing of Adolf Hitler.

Ford's big wages was a sham, about half of the money paid was profit sharing, and the employees had to prove they were living upstanding and moral lives to get that extra pay. The automaker, with his anti-Semitism and intrusive social engineering, was deeply kooky.

But according to Stephen Meyer, a labor historian and professor emeritus at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee, "Ford didn't pay so much because of beliefs about enriching workers. He had no choice."

According to Meyer, "in 1913, the year before Ford doubled wages, the turnover rate at his plants was 370 percent. In contrast, Walmart's turnover rate today is said to be 100 percent annually, still a very high number by today's standards."

"They wouldn't stay," Meyer said "they h**ed the work and they would just walk off the job or not show up." That meant that to maintain a workforce of 13,000 to 14,000 employees, the company had to hire 52,000 workers in a year.

It is also important to point out that car manufacturing was seasonal, most automobiles were sold in the spring. Therefore, there was a season for building and then prolonged lay offs. Ford's ability to pay ensured that when fall came, there would be ample people looking for work.

Henry Ford was not a C*******t, he h**ed Jews; was financial backer and friend to Adolf Hitler.

Companies pay what they must. When you hear that a large employer, whether it be Henry Ford or Costco, pays more than necessary, it generally doesn't mean that company is good-hearted. It means that company is good at public relations.

I do recommend that you read Meyer's book and some of his papers on economics. They are very educational.

bmac32 Loc: West Florida

If democrats are so in favor of raises then why do the short change the workers?
http://personalliberty.com/2013/12/19/minorities-paid-less-to-work-for-democrats-than-for-republicans-on-national-campaign-trail/

Boo_Boo Loc: Jellystone

One has to understand Small Business is largely responsible for providing jobs to those American workers who consider themselves to be “The Average American”. This is significant, because the same people who v**e for Obama are also v****g against small business.

Democrats would have you believe that all Republicans are rich people who made their money off the backs of the less fortunate. But the t***h is that most Republicans are small business owners and their non union employees. These people, employers and employees, “keep their noses to the grindstone”, have next to no political voice, and have no desire to be singled out. They simply want to be allowed to work and allowed to achieve. Small business owners do not seek subsidies. Instead, they claim that over-regulation is strangling their businesses, and this a major factor in the creation of, or lack of, small business. For example small medical practices are struggling with Health Information Systems. The regulation demands that all private medical practices utilize “health information systems” by 2015. This regulation is just one more financial hurdle required in order to set up a private medical practice. The result is that small, private practices are no longer being created. This is one of many examples of regulation strangling small business.

A Democrat generally believes that to stimulate the economy, more capital must be put in the hands of the consumer. The belief is that the consumer will go out and spend more, which is supposed to increase retail sales. Increased retail sales, in turn, increases orders going to factories. The factories will then hire more people, and so on. Hence, any program that puts money in the hands of the unemployed and low income citizens is, in the opinion of the Democrats, good for the economy.

Putting money into the hands of the unemployed can be good if the purpose is to sustain that person between jobs. However, what if the unemployed do not mind being unemployed? What if an unemployed person views this unemployment money received as a convenient, paid vacation?

Manufacturing, home builders, retailers, and such claim that they do not have enough qualified applicants to fill jobs. So, has the Democrat's ideas worked for the past 5 years? Or have some people grown so accustomed to being paid for doing nothing that they would rather tax payers support them, their habits, and their ever increasing broods of children?