Stupid California!

[Hammster]

@rambot posed the following question in post 121.

Oh! So you don't want to help just anyone who needs help. You only want to help the people that God obliges you to help.

You responded on post #127 Exactly. Your position is clear.

@BCP1928 presented another in post #153 and asked:

Are you going to turn down Medicare when you get to be of that age?

And you replied Probably not on post #154.

In light of your example, I posited the same towards a different benefit. One which you've acknowledged you'll probably use in the future. That's also the subject of controversy and a growing demographic of citizens who don't wish to participate.

I went in a direction you didn't anticipate that wasn't speculative. Which begs the question once more. Are we obligated to support social security social and medicare by God?

You've shown us the way through your position on student loans and mentioned food stamps earlier. Why stop there? We could recover a lot by following suit.

~bella

Still at it. I guess it would have killed you to ask because you would find out my actual position.

 

[Bradskii]

Actually, I'd argue that business is about making money satisfying a want or need, it's the competition factor that would dictate wages. For instance, if I wanted to beat the other company in my same sector, I'd want the better employees, which means I'd have to offer a better compensation package to get them so the other company didn't.

Paying workers a certain wage is secondary.

Paying workers a living wage is primary. If you can't do that then you shouldn't be in business. Everything else follows from that.

 

[bèlla]

Still at it. I guess it would have killed you to ask because you would find out my actual position.

There's no mystery to unravel. Selectivity has a price. That's the point. I don't need to know your feelings on the subject to recognize the harm that could occur. It's a matter of deduction.

As you indicated in post #95:

The idea of student loan forgiveness, food stamps, jacking up minimum wage, etc., always costs someone else something. If you want to give away your money, that’s your business. But taking it from someone to give to someone else is theft, no matter how pretty a bow you put on it.

That would include medicare and social security too.

~bella

 

[Servus]

Still at it. I guess it would have killed you to ask because you would find out my actual position.

What's your actual position on this please?

 

[Hammster]

There's no mystery to unravel. Selectivity has a price. That's the point. I don't need to know your feelings on the subject to recognize the harm that could occur. It's a matter of deduction.

As you indicated in post #95:

The idea of student loan forgiveness, food stamps, jacking up minimum wage, etc., always costs someone else something. If you want to give away your money, that’s your business. But taking it from someone to give to someone else is theft, no matter how pretty a bow you put on it.

That would include medicare and social security too.

~bella

Your gnostic abilities aren’t working.

 

[Hammster]

What's your actual position on this please?

I think most government programs need to go. However, it’s what we have right now. Hopefully in the future, they can be reduced to nothing and something better can take their place.

 

[Servus]

I think most government programs need to go. However, it’s what we have right now. Hopefully in the future, they can be reduced to nothing and something better can take their place.

Do you know of any systems currently in place elsewhere that are better?

 

[Pommer]

Are you going to turn down Medicare when you get to be of that age?

Probably not.

Definitely “not”.
You have to take Medicare when you turn 65.
One doesn’t have an “option”; one can still pay thousands for a double-platinum-diamond-coated Part B (and yea, verily Part D) plan, but you’ll be required to get Medicare.

 

[Hammster]

Do you know of any systems currently in place elsewhere that are better?

Not off the top of my head. But the point is that we need to get government out of our lives as much as possible. Because of decisions made by others in the past, we are more and more dependent on government agencies.

 

[Hammster]

Definitely “not”.
You have to take Medicare when you turn 65.
One doesn’t have an “option”; one can still pay thousands for a double-platinum-diamond-coated Part B (and yea, verily Part D) plan, but you’ll be required to get Medicare.

It isn’t mandatory.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

Paying workers a living wage is primary. If you can't do that then you shouldn't be in business. Everything else follows from that.

On that, I think we still disagree... The purpose of a company isn't to create jobs. The purpose is to satisfy a market demand. Job creation is an auxiliary benefit.

That aside...

Operating on the premise that every task, with no regard for complexity, rarity of the skill, or physical effort required, should have to pay enough to cover a house & car (or whatever is being defined as living wage) distorts the value of labor in the opposite direction... An "overcorrection" as it were.

It also creates an environment in which the government has no choice but to dabble in the market even further in the form of price controls on a large scale.

If I were a hypothetical landlord, and I know that the government is mandating that everyone gets paid enough to afford an apartment, what's to stop me and all the other landlords from getting together and increasing our prices to, in essence, whatever we want and milking the system? After all, we'd all rest comfortably knowing that whatever we set the price to, the government would simply force every other company to pay workers just enough to be able to afford it.

The only answer would price controls, which would mean the government is now mandating in both the supply and demand sides of the market.

If we're going to have an intervention of some sort, even a UBI would be preferable to "mandating that the guy who tares tickets at the movie theater should have to make $40k/year"

...as a UBI at least wouldn't have the same sweeping impacts on pricing and smaller businesses.

 

[BCP1928]

On that, I think we still disagree... The purpose of a company isn't to create jobs. The purpose is to satisfy a market demand. Job creation is an auxiliary benefit.

That aside...

Operating on the premise that every task, with no regard for complexity, rarity of the skill, or physical effort required, should have to pay enough to cover a house & car (or whatever is being defined as living wage) distorts the value of labor in the opposite direction... An "overcorrection" as it were.

I think you are exaggerating that premise, but who decides what the value of labor is? In classical economics that would be a free labor market. There is not much of a free market in labor. It has even been asserted by conservatives (in this forum, even) that corporations have the right to set wages unilaterally.

It also creates an environment in which the government has no choice but to dabble in the market even further in the form of price controls on a large scale.

If I were a hypothetical landlord, and I know that the government is mandating that everyone gets paid enough to afford an apartment, what's to stop me and all the other landlords from getting together and increasing our prices to, in essence, whatever we want and milking the system? After all, we'd all rest comfortably knowing that whatever we set the price to, the government would simply force every other company to pay workers just enough to be able to afford it.

There is no free market in housing, either, according to your scenario.

The only answer would price controls, which would mean the government is now mandating in both the supply and demand sides of the market.

Better to let corporations do the mandating themselves, right?

If we're going to have an intervention of some sort, even a UBI would be preferable to "mandating that the guy who tares tickets at the movie theater should have to make $40k/year"

...as a UBI at least wouldn't have the same sweeping impacts on pricing and smaller businesses.

But that would be "socialism," too, wouldn't it?

 

[ThatRobGuy]

I think you are exaggerating that premise, but who decides what the value of labor is? In classical economics that would be a free labor market.

There is no free market in housing, either, according to your scenario.

In the scenario I'm describing there couldn't be... As soon as the government is guaranteeing that everyone has "intrinsic right to make enough money to afford an apartment", housing no longer is subject to market forces at that point.

Not to mention, minimum wage laws are a very ineffective way of approaching the issue of people not being able to afford housing.

If someone makes the conscience decision to live in the more expensive part of a city or state, should they be paid more (for the exact same task) than a person who decides to live in a cheaper part of the city or state?

For instance, there are places in my state where $14/hour would be enough to get by... There are other places where that wouldn't be close to covering an apartment, car, and utilities, and those places are sometimes only 20 minutes away from each other.

If a person decides they want to live in the trendy part of town "where the action is", for social reasons, does their boss have to give them a raise?

Better to let corporations do the mandating themselves, right?

No, it's better to have a healthy robust power struggle between the company owner(s), and a collective bargaining entity resembling a "works council", similar to what's common in Scandinavia
(Not to be confused with the kinds of labor unions we have here)

Switzerland has a business sector where works councils are somewhat ubiquitous, and they don't need to have a minimum wage or massive labor unions to guarantee fair pay for employees

But that would be "socialism," too, wouldn't it?

No, because cash in hand payments isn't the same as government increasing control over the means of production.

It is a feature of a "welfare state", but as I've explained to conservatives on here numerous times before, socialism and a welfare state, despite having a few points of overlap, are not synonymous interchangeable terms.

 

[BCP1928]

In the scenario I'm describing there couldn't be... As soon as the government is guaranteeing that everyone has "intrinsic right to make enough money to afford an apartment", housing no longer is subject to market forces at that point.

Not to mention, minimum wage laws are a very ineffective way of approaching the issue of people not being able to afford housing.

If someone makes the conscience decision to live in the more expensive part of a city or state, should they be paid more (for the exact same task) than a person who decides to live in a cheaper part of the city or state?

For instance, there are places in my state where $14/hour would be enough to get by... There are other places where that wouldn't be close to covering an apartment, car, and utilities, and those places are sometimes only 20 minutes away from each other.

If a person decides they want to live in the trendy part of town "where the action is", for social reasons, does their boss have to give them a raise?

No, it's better to have a healthy robust power struggle between the company owner(s), and a collective bargaining entity resembling a "works council", similar to what's common in Scandinavia
(Not to be confused with the kinds of labor unions we have here)

Switzerland has a business sector where works councils are somewhat ubiquitous, and they don't need to have a minimum wage or massive labor unions to guarantee fair pay for employees

No, because cash in hand payments isn't the same as government increasing control over the means of production.

It is a feature of a "welfare state", but as I've explained to conservatives on here numerous times before, socialism and a welfare state, despite having a few points of overlap, are not synonymous interchangeable terms.

I see that we are pretty much on the same page about this. One of the critical factors in a classical free market is that the buyer and the seller should have approximately equal market power. One way for labor to achieve this is by unionizing, but in the case of fast food there is the additional problem is that the employers are not in a free market, either. A hot dog stand, for instance, faced with higher wages, might move to cheaper premises, change suppliers... in other words, more free market action. But a franchisee must use a company building for which he must pay a non-negotiable rent and purchase his supplies from the company at a non-negotiable price. I think that the franchise fast food restaurant as a business model may not survive. Headquarters takes too big a cut from the franchisee, he can't afford higher wages. So now what? Well, housing. If housing was cheaper the workers wouldn't need a raise. But there's no free market there, either. Real estate interests, and the planners and zoners, Also, the pattern of living we are used to will need to change. Boarding houses used to be a thing, even for higher paid workers and single-occupancy hotels once within the reach of the many now homeless who are actually employed. In many places these kinds of accommodations have been zoned out of existence.

 

[Bradskii]

On that, I think we still disagree... The purpose of a company isn't to create jobs. The purpose is to satisfy a market demand. Job creation is an auxiliary benefit.

We're not talking about job creation. We're talking about minimum wages. They are two separate subjects. Let's not conflate them.

Operating on the premise that every task, with no regard for complexity, rarity of the skill, or physical effort required, should have to pay enough to cover a house & car (or whatever is being defined as living wage) distorts the value of labor in the opposite direction... An "overcorrection" as it were.

Nobody has mentioned buying a house or getting a car. A minimum wage should cover your basics. A roof over your head, enough food, enough to cover basic services - gas water, electricity, transport and health and a little extra so that you're not sitting on a box, eating Cheerios staring at the wall. How much that should be depends on many factors. It's an open question. That there must be a minimum wage is not.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

We're not talking about job creation. We're talking about minimum wages. They are two separate subjects. Let's not conflate them.

Nobody has mentioned buying a house or getting a car. A minimum wage should cover your basics. A roof over your head, enough food, enough to cover basic services - gas water, electricity, transport and health and a little extra so that you're not sitting on a box, eating Cheerios staring at the wall. How much that should be depends on many factors. It's an open question. That there must be a minimum wage is not.

Haven't works councils (that I mentioned in my reply to another user) been more successful in that regard than minimum wage laws? (If the Scandinavian countries are any indicator)

Minimum wage laws are often inadequate and ineffective as even when done at the state level, it's covering too broad a territory geographically speaking.

A minimum wage amount that may be more than adequate in Township A, may not even scratch the surface in City B.

Minimum wage law efforts often try to cater to the highest common denominator. (The bigger metropolitan areas where everything costs double compared to the rural areas)

Thus the reason there's so much pushback against the idea specifically in said rural areas.

We can't mandate that every grocery store in rural upstate New York has to pay their employees what's considered a "living wage" for NYC.

Rural tradesmen in areas where the cost of living is low aren't going to love the idea that the 18 year old kid cooking fries is now making almost as much as them.
(Minimum wage laws don't adjust all of the salaries up the chain, it's not as if the fry cook going from 10 to 20 an hour means that the rural plumber making 45k will get a bump to 90k)

And we haven't even scratched the surface yet in terms of how such efforts lead to layoffs and clamoring for automation to replace those employees with software and machines.

 

[RoBo1988]

Grim new survey surrounding California Gov. Newsom's $20 minimum wage

The Employment Policies Institute survey of nearly 200 fast food firms across the state further found that 89 percent of them have already been forced to reduce scheduled hours for their employees.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Not such a rosy picture from this POV

 

[rambot]

The billionaires got 40,000,000,000,000 dollars richer in the last decade on this planet.

Yes, the bosses get to choose the wage. But let's not pretend there is some "invisible hand guiding the wage market".

The only hand guiding the wage market is the hand pushing down on the working class. All the theoretical metrics and talk about minimum wage is moot.
Why did those 40,000,000,000s become centralized into the hands of a few hundred people? Why should 6billion people NOT have had a portion of THAT particular growth. Yes their wages increased too but their wages didn't increase by 40trillion.

We CANNOT pretend that the 40trillion dollars that billionaires NOW have access to is because of their business acumen. IT has EVERYTHING to do with appropriate wages being withheld from workers. IT has to do with stock buybacks being used to enrich the ALREADY rich and not being given to workers.

 

[rambot]

Grim new survey surrounding California Gov. Newsom's $20 minimum wage

The Employment Policies Institute survey of nearly 200 fast food firms across the state further found that 89 percent of them have already been forced to reduce scheduled hours for their employees.

www.dailymail.co.uk

Not such a rosy picture from this POV

You know how these fast food corporations could save money so that their workers could be happier? What about lowering franchising and start up costs?
What if fast food franchise don't work because the bloated expensive happenings at the top and to shareholder dividends and payouts.

 

[ThatRobGuy]

The billionaires got 40,000,000,000,000 dollars richer in the last decade on this planet.

Yes, the bosses get to choose the wage. But let's not pretend there is some "invisible hand guiding the wage market".

The only hand guiding the wage market is the hand pushing down on the working class. All the theoretical metrics and talk about minimum wage is moot.
Why did those 40,000,000,000s become centralized into the hands of a few hundred people? Why should 6billion people NOT have had a portion of THAT particular growth. Yes their wages increased too but their wages didn't increase by 40trillion.

We CANNOT pretend that the 40trillion dollars that billionaires NOW have access to is because of their business acumen. IT has EVERYTHING to do with appropriate wages being withheld from workers. IT has to do with stock buybacks being used to enrich the ALREADY rich and not being given to workers.

Here's the conundrum, not all businesses (or billionaires) shared equally in those gains. Some businesses may have seen a windfall of cash, others may have lost a bit, others may have had a flatline year.

That's where it gets tricky...

Let's say "MachineCorp" has a rich CEO, and saw record profits, is paying their warehouse workers $17/hour, and the CEO padded his pocket and that of the executive team with the gains.

"Machines-USA" also has a rich CEO, but had a flatline year, is forecasting some losses in the upcoming year, and also pays their warehouse workers $17/hour.


Just because "MachineCorp" is in a financial situation to raise all of their workers from $17 up to $25 and could easily sustain it, "Machines-USA" isn't in that situation.


Here's where the tough options come in.

1) You could mandate a minimum wage increase of $25/hour for all warehouse workers, it won't hurt MachineCorp, but Machines-USA will likely have to resort to layoffs, thereby making them less competitive, and giving MachineCorp even more power.

2) You could try to target it to a company-level where the former has to give their employees a raise, but the latter is allowed to maintain the status quo, but that would also make people want to jump ship and go to MachineCorp, again... giving them more power.


Realistically speaking, we can't tailor national wage policy to what Amazon, Walmart, and McDonald's could afford to pay their employees if a figurative gun was to their heads.

Because if you mandate a wage that only Amazon, Walmart, and McDonald's could "technically afford to pay their employees", in 10 years, those will be the only 3 companies left.

Walmart and Amazon could afford to pay all their retail associates and warehouse workers $25/hour and still likely enjoy some decent profits. "Sal's Hardware" or "Joe's Country Grocery Market" can not...

Even within our current structure/system, we see small and medium sized businesses having to fold and having their market share gobbled up by the big players. Wage policy that mandates hourly rates that only the big players can afford to pay (while well-intentioned) only serves to accelerate that process.


In short, if you don't want the only store to be Walmart, and you don't want to have to work at Walmart 5-10 years from now, it's probably best not to write a rulebook that only Walmart can financially afford to abide by.