A $14 per hour minimum wage + Employee Free Choice Act could immediately rescue our economy.

America used to be a nation that made and manufactured things. Coffeemakers, cars, Levi jeans etc. Workers worked on assembly lines, or as weldors and machinists, or carpenters etc. Workers that made and manufactured goods that we sell here or export. We were referred to as a nation with a manufacturing based economy. MBE no more.

The disasters known as NAFTA, CAFTA, GATT have transformed our economy into a service based, corporate owned economy. Service based means that most work as Walmart stockpersons, cashiers, greeters. Or as Mcdonalds cooks, cashiers. Or as waiters, waitresses. They provide a service rather than work on an assembly line making a sellable good. This type of work can often be grueling and often pays a low wage.

The shame and disaster known as our current trade policies has America on a crash course toward serfdom, low paid slavery. It is the lead driving force behind another shame- America's wealth divide.

The result.

90% of ALL of America's vast wealth is owned by the wealthiest 10-15% of our population.

Falling and stagnant wages, job losses, lay-offs, unemployment, union-busting and the downfall of unions have hastened a still growing wealth divide AND destroyed the earning and purchase power of the bottom 75% of our population.

How can a nation's economy grow and sustain when 75% of it's population can't afford to buy goods and services?

The legs have been cut out from under our economy because 3/4th's of us are broke.

Corporate America's master plan to slap down the working person has come full circle. We are seeing it in action as we speak. Sadly, we've obeyed for too fucking long. Their plan to plunder the working person and the poor has resulted in the greatest transference/upward redistribution of wealth in human history.

Not all hope is lost though. Not yet. There are remedies to fix an ailing economy and a dieing nation on life support. There are remedies to stop the rising tide of unemployment and create growth and jobs.

It starts with..

1. A $14 per hour minimum/living wage with annual cost of living increase triggers. Imagine how the lives of the millions of Americans who work for $8 per hour would positively change for the better if they got a raise to $14 per hour, a living wage. It would be a life changing transformation for millions of workers.

This newfound earning and purchase power of millions would spur economic growth. It would create demand for supply and create job growth to meet this new demand. It could create job growth like we've never seen before. When minimum wages go up, middle class wages also rise on their own.

2. Pass and sign into law the Employee Free Choice Act. Unions created the middle class. Union-busting and corporations behind it are working to kill the middle class. Our economy demands that we bring back pro-labor policies. And enforce them like we have a fucking spine.

Ban ALL federal funding to 'Right To Work'(for less) states until they repeal all anti-worker legislation.

3. Repeal the disasters: NAFTA, CAFTA and renegotiate GATT or scrap it altogether. Ban American corporations from using foreign labor markets to produce goods then reimport those goods to sell in American stores. Bring back our manufacturing base.

The enormous cost of that $12 coffeemaker is our nation's overall security.

4. Ban corporate personhood. Or, if our spineless "leaders" can't defeat a rethug filibuster than at least tax corporations like we tax wealthy people. If we're going to consider corporations as people then tax them accordingly, as people.

Folks, there are remedies. If only the ruling party would grow a pair of either genders "backbone".
(Ovaries, twignberries)

It's only class warfare when the poor fight back!
Fighting the good fight, fighting the wealth divide IS patriotic.

:patriot:

right now for 2 major reasons. First and foremost, we don't have enough jobs that add enough value to cover $14/hour the way we did when we had a manufacturing base - most small businesses right now would go under at that level. The loss of MBE and lack of a living wage are completely intertwined

The second is that you left out Big Box shopping - when small Mom & Pops handled much of the retail, the profits were kept locally and the communities prospered. It's not that the majority of them were gaining vast wealth, but when the Big Boxes moved in and took over, they concentrated all those small profits into one large one to be siphoned off by Wall St and the CEO's

How much do they make off each worker per hour? More than $14 I guess.

Nice.

not specifying how small business can afford it, you're basically saying that a fallback is...WalMart & McDonald's.

Yes, you are.

and I always always made an effort to pay a wage that I felt was reasonable for the work and skill level and it was always far above minimum wage and the employees pretty much knew we were paying top dollar so we had long term stable employees. You reap benefits that go beyond just the raw dollar being paid out: employee attitudes, the value they place on their jobs and their company, stability (which your customers like, customers hate turnover and always seeing a new face of someone who does not know them or the product or service).

People always haul out small business as the reason that minimum wage cannot be a living wage. If minimum wage were tied to inflation, as I believe it should be, than all business owners would just adjust to a (hopefull) small increase every year just as they do with EVERYTHING ELSE - gas goes up, insurance goes up, utilities go up, raw products go up, rent goes up, -------- the only factor that apparently is not supposed to go up is WAGES! So in other words, the worker has to take on the burden of all the other increases by keeping their wages artifically low. B*llsh*t.

Well paid workers take those dollars out and spend them in the marketplace and that is what keeps ALL businesses afloat.

is going to make a lot of people fall into minimum wage jobs or the jobs will disappear as employers struggle to pay the higher wages asked from their employees..

$10/hour vs the average $8 around this area (retail & housekeeping) - I'm a firm believer in paying people well for the benefits to them and us.

My partner & I have taken just enough to cover living expenses - for the 2 of us working this year, 6.5 days per week we've collectively earned under $8,000. That's for a conservative 4,472 hours worked (and there have been plenty of days that were more than 8 hours)

Previously, I had a commercial drywall company with an average of 200 employees - $15-18/hour was pretty standard wages - but we were taking fairly simple materials and making them into things that were considered useful and valuable enough to the end user that everyone involved could earn a decent living. Similar to manufacturing jobs.

That's the difference now - in addition to the loss of manufacturing jobs, we've got the loss of the construction jobs as well - one area that still paid decent wages to a substantial portion of their workforce

We have about 12 employees and I don't think we would not be *forced* to change a single wage by a $14. minimum.

I honestly don't think it is small companies paying minimum wage for the most part. I think a >$1 change would effect McDonalds more than Mom & Pops. But I can't honestly back that up with real world data beyond anecdotal stuff.

some small businesses are barely hanging on and will have to let people go if they give raises -

Whenever someone dares mention that raising the minimum wage by a huge amount will cause Mom & Pop shops to fire people, someone comes along and makes the case that WalMart can certainly afford to pay $14/hr.

Which is completely fucking stupid: if that's the retort, then what it means is that ultimately, everyone will work for WalMart, and Mom & Pop shops go away by fiat.

And I call bullshit that someone making $15 an hour now won't scream bloody murder when the minimum wage is raised to $14. Anyone who says there wouldn't be general upward pressure on wages is a fool.

I'm amazed at how many DUers think you can get something for nothing.

Labor is not that big a portion of the total costs of many goods and services, certainly not 100%.

Not to mention the median wage in the US is $15.57.

http://www.bls.gov/oes/2008/may/oes_nat.htm#b00-0000

It's good to try to increase the minimum wage, but it's foolhardy to think the economy doesn't quickly adjust upward on things minimum wage earners buy. The wages cannot increase without cost of goods and services increasing more. It's not possible and it will never happen.

If your job pays the lowest legal wage, it's not going to suddenly gain more buying power by ratcheting up your wage. Everyone who already makes more than you will charge more for their services.

It's a fantasy to think you can enact a law to make a person's place in the economic pecking order change.

Since it is already more than $14 an hour..

The value of the minimum wage in constant dollars was at a maximum around 1968 or so..



Edited to add: And your talking point has been spouted by Republicans every single time the minimum wage has been discussed and yet they have turned out to be wrong every time the minimum wage has been increased.

Talk to anyone who owns a business. They will cut employees the instant you tell them to pay twice as much, and everyone else will double their charges. Do you think all those people making twice the minimum wage are going to sit still for your fantasy solution?

The idea of doubling the minimum wage is right up there with "let's repudiate the national debt" in terms of stupidity.

Every time the minimum wage has been increased.

People on minimum wage are making half now in constant dollars of what they were in 1968..

as im sure the guy who was making $14.50 will as well... nothing to do with talking points, just teh fact that someone who has been working for a company for a few years with some experience isnt going to work for $14.50 if the new guys on minimum wage get $14...

There are plenty of people who have been working decades who are making minimum wage.

Edited to add: Going by your theory the best thing for the economy would be to eliminate the minimum wage altogether, let the Invisible Hand of the free market work things out.

It's only for the best.

level on a par with someone whos work is worth $14 an hour, do you really think the guy now making $14 an hour is going to happily just move to being a minimum wage worker. If so why not make minimum wage $25 whilst you are at it...

Clearly it is a bad thing and is driving up costs for consumers and costing jobs.

Let the Invisible Hand of the free market rule, right?

The argument over the minimum wage is an old one and the same talking points get made every single time and the Republican ones turn out to be false every single time.

wont have to have their wages increased or they will be minimum wage workers, its simple math. Are you prepared to keep working at a job that paid $14 an hour and now pays minimum wage.....

Would you support that, getting rid of minimum wage?

If not, why not?

it would devalue all labour and everyone would want their wages to be increased by the same percentage. Not sure why you dont get that, as im sure anyone you talk to who makes $14 will tell you...

If you want to do something about the declining minimum wage, you're going to have to stop illegal immigration. That is the main reason the relative value of the minimum wage has suffered. American workers have been squeezed by competition from below. It's hard to be for an open border AND American minimum wage earners.

Intuition would tell us that raising the minimum wage would cost jobs and drive up prices, that has not proven to be the case when minimum wage has been implemented.

Look at the average wage on the graph below, it is less than half what it was in 1968, are we as a nation less wealthy than we were in 1968? Or is it that we have a few more extremely rich people and a great many more people who are falling through the cracks?

But since the employers own the politicians it will never happen.

And I know in the construction trades there are a lot of undocumented workers already making more than the minimum wage, often under the table..

If they need X number of employees to meet demand, they can't simply fire people and expect to meet that demand. They would be forced to keep them or else lose customers.

My local McDonald's couldn't fire half of their staff and still expect to service the hundreds of orders they take a day.

adding the cost of living increases...


1. A $14 per hour minimum/living wage with annual cost of living increase triggers.

Sure, the costs of goods and services will go up to pay for the new living wage, but then the living wage will go up next year, and so on, and so on... if an very few short years, we could be seeing $50 an hour as the new minimum... imagine how great life will be when even the lowest paid worker in the country is making 100K. Wouldn't that be swell. :eyes:

Let's think about a few things.
1. I am not at all sure you know what the word median means.
2. The price an item is sold at depends partly on the cost to produce it... and partly on demand for the product. If you increase minimum wage to $14.00 you do NOT double the buying power of minimum wage employees. A drastic increase in demand simply results in higher prices until balance is archived.
3. You seem to be operating under the delusion that such a change would only effect employees who made less than $14.00. Of course no such thing is even remotely true.
First off some wages are an offst from minimum wage (as in (minimum wage + $X)/hr). But even beyond that if I currently make $16/hour I have a good job. Likely requiring some skill or experience. I make much more than the guy hired off the street at minimum wage. Now say you raise minimum wage to $14. Do you think I will still be willing to do my skilled job at just $2 over minimum wage? No. I will expect a raise. If people used to make two or more times minimum wage they are not going to suddenly settle for 5% above. So it will effect wages across the board.
That *could* mean some wage compression (ie. the spread between the lowest and highest paid employees is reduced) but it could also just result in general wage inflation which would mean no real increase in adjusted wages for minimum wage workers.
4. Labor is in fact a big portion of the cost of some goods and most services. Those would be directly effected.

The problem with minimum wage isn't that it is too low it is that the spread is too high so the adjusted buying power is too low.

I support increasing minimum wage but just setting it to $14 is going to have a more impact on inflation than it will on the buying power of low wage workers. And a hell of a lot more side effects than you seem to think it would.

to prevent that - or at least account for it.

against so called warnings raised by small business and Chamber of Commerce. Area SB and the COC predicted doom and gloom if the MW were raised. That prediction turned out to be bogus.

Workers make more and it costs more to live.

Switching between 1st and 2nd back and forth.

The 9.79 MW went into effect in Jan '09.

The COL in SF was sky high long before the MW even had a chance to affect the COL.

makes that impossible. The exceptions will be with the functional monopolies and 100% price increases would ensure that they lose market share to competition.

I know the kids in my neighborhood would support that.

If so then you are sadly misinformed.

In-n-Out already starts at $9.50 - $12 p/hr and they sell as many burgers as they can make and have expanded as far as they can with their model.

If it had been adjusted for inflation, the minimum wage would already be in that area.

can just all of a sudden start paying their employees $14 per hour?

This may work for a company that grows money on trees but most companies are just barely getting buy.

Also, even in large corporations like Walmart for instance, I know everyone at DU thinks "Just give the extra cash the companies make and stash away to the employees and the multi-million dollar executive salaries and bonuses should go to the workers", I haven't seen any studies on this but I'm guessing even if they threw all that cash into the money pool for employee pay it isn't going to make much of a dent in the 2.3 Million employee workforce, definitely not enough to raise the minimum wage up to $14 per hour, though maybe a few more bucks per hour than it is now.

That the Walton family has as much money as the poorest 100 million Americans.

I don't know if that is true or not but I've not seen anyone dispute that number..

Edited for speling.

http://www.lcurve.org/

The US population is represented along the length of the football field, arranged in order of income.

Median US family income (the family at the 50 yard line) is ~$40,000 (a stack of $100 bills 1.6 inches high.)

--The family on the 95 yard line earns about $100,000 per year, a stack of $100 bills about 4 inches high.

--At the 99 yard line the income is about $300,000, a stack of $100 bills about a foot high.

--The curve reaches $1 million (a 40 inch high stack of $100 bills) one foot from the goal line.

--From there it keeps going up...it goes up 50 km (~30 miles) on this scale!

When the minimum wage goes up, a shop owner will just fire one worker and make do with 4, or 5, or 6 employees instead of 7. That's already happened.

Mom and pop businesses run on thin margins and they will fire lower level employees if told to increase their wages by the hour. So, four or five might get a raise, but one to three will get fired.

as one possible solution

The employees deserve a wage they can live on as well.

As it is, the minimum wage doesn't have any buying power and there are people with families forced to LIVE on that. If the minimum wage went up with inflation instead of having to depend on the whim of the wealthy "public servants" in the capital it would probably be there already and no one would blink at it.

Minimum wage is a slave's wage. It is as Chris Rock has said, if they could pay you LESS they would. And we have people arguing about the hardship of the poor CEO's and owners who damn sure aren't paying themselves minimum wage? You've got to be kidding me.

There should be a living wage to sustain a family of four on one person's wages, and tied to inflation or a percent of the GDP. one problem with minimum wage, it is to easy for congress to forget about it, and years pass by without increasing it. You want a tamper proof mechanism that keeps on going without tinkering with it.

I wish . Unfortunately, I think the wealthiest 1 percent and their multinational fucktard corporate friends are in the business of creating huge swaths of slave labour and hoping the US public doesnt balk, but recedes slowly into 3rd world status fighting amongst themselves for crumbs from the masters' tables.
Also, dump the defense dept budget.

I think as we recede into 3rd world status that populism will make a comeback and the people will rise up. Possibly to the point of the same violence and labor riots that have dotted American history throughout the 19th and 20th centuries.

I think we're seeing the early stage of rising populism now. Just look at the increasing support for health care reform. But living in nation of obedient serfs, alot has to crash down before the slaves will rise up.

is that the guy who is currently making $14 an hour suddenly finds his real wage value drop to a minimum wage job, you would have everybody else wanting an increase in the same amount or what you would really be doing is just lowering the value of everyone elses wages as prices would have to increase to pay the increase in the minimum wage.

And yet it has been shown to be false every time the minimum wage has been increased.

Minimum wage in constant dollars is *half* what it was in 1968, do you think the country is better off now than it was in 1968.

or at least work it herself until the "trickle" effect kicks in.

That's 2-3 layoffs as a result of your program, right there, I'm afraid.

We have to stimulate the economy before we can raise wages, otherwise you're just asking small business to make pretty big sacrifices. And I can't connect higher wages to job growth, though I can connect job growth to higher wages.

If a low-interest/no-interest temporary line of credit were offered by the treasury or the SBA to get businesses through in the interrim, I could see how this would work.

When it comes down to keeping the big wheels awash in cash our government can move swiftly indeed.

I don't see why what you propose couldn't be done, it would give a far greater boost to the economy than the trickle down crap that we've done so far.

I do have a heart afterall.:) Especially for SB's that are struggling to stay afloat.

But also please consider, a strong local economy and a growing economy would benefit your wife's SB more than anything else wouldn't it?

hopeful, innovative and sustainable organic food movement that has meant so much to the depressed rural area where I live.

I grew up on a farm in a small farming community. A living MW can often be a boon to rural areas. An increase in peoples purchase and earning power in your area wouldn't have a positive effect on small business through increased sales?

I'd have to see it to believe it.

$14 an hour is not $9.79 an hour. The Northeast Kingdom is not San Francisco. I know for damn sure that my employer would go out of business if she had to pay 14 bucks an hour.

could certainly be exempted. And would likely be.

But everytime MW increase legislation is presented, be it a national increase or a local/state increase we keep hearing the same thing. That small business will die as a result.

In reality nothing is further from the truth. MW increases typically result in improved local economies, not depressed or leading to depressed economies.

Look anywhere that a recent MW increase has been enacted. I mean in recent years. Are there any cases where SB has died out in a state or local economy following a MW increase?

I have never heard of it happening. I've never heard of an economy that's been hurt by MW increases yet and don't ever foresee it happening.

Believe me, I would never support a law that hurt the smallest of SB. There are ways to work around any hardships that would arise for your employer as a result of a MW increase. Full or partial exemption is a way. But only for SB that don't have big sales figures or big profits.

An amendtment could be added to legislation that would protect low grossing SB from going under due to inabilty to meet payroll.

nation has a solid manufacturing base and isn't relying on the pushing of paper, ponzi schemes, and the sale of ideas rather than the implement of them we will continue down this road. You can't support an economy when you don't produce much more than financial schemes and insurance paper.

Reaganomics wasn't only the 'Trickle Down' BS.

It also ushered in the destruction of manufacturing in this country.

Then of course we would have to give eveyone else the same percentage increase.

only 3 times minimum wage when you can get a job sitting on your ass for similar or more money. They would have to percentage wise increase wages across teh board thereby negating the minimum wage increase....

What kind of a society have we become where a useless hedge fund manager makes $2 billion a year, while the firefighter who saves lives is paid $10 an hour?

you are going to have to increase the firefighters wage by the same percentage in order to keep him on par with where he was on the pay scale, we are always going to have low pay unskilled workers no matter what you do.

I read it as simply that fire fighters who put their lives on the line would need raises to justify risking their lives versus their compensation in comparison with others. In other words, if minimum wage went up that much, there would be a massive discussion as to how much higher than minimum wage should necessary and risky jobs compensate people.

executive paper movers, snake-oil salespeople, mid-level con men, etc.

If the pay is too low, refuse the job. Oh wait, the endlessly declining wages and living standards make that pretty hard...

i sure as hell dont, so if you suddenly make the guy working a minimum wage job on par with the above jobs you are going to have to increase their wages or they will all walk, then you will have minimum wage workers doing these skilled jobs...

but we as a society, don't. It is a fundamental problem with so-called "market forces" controlling relative values, especially in regards to essential social services.

erode the wages of the firefighter,cop, teacher etc etc, if you are not prepared to also give them wage rises at the same time...

what would call them if not unskilled labour....

Which is why so many states have laws that fire fighters, police and teachers cannot strike.

However, if there was a mass movement from those jobs into the private sector due to the already low compensation being made lower in comparison to minimum wage earners, we have a major problem due to the outflow of trained and seasoned veterans.

Ergo, if this happened there would be a heated discussion as to how much they will be compensated in the new financial reality.

Frankly, this same discussion would be happening in a lot of places, as there will be a need to rebalance compensation for either risk or education if minimum wage increased to a $14/hr level.

my biggest one would be the person who had been making $14 an hour before it, he is suddenly now a minimum wage worker, his spending power has dropped from where it was....

That's the problem.

It gives me at least a bit of hope when it seems that all hope is lost.

Getting a nation of knuckledraggers to rise up and walk upright will be a slow process. But it sure seems that Populism and Progress are making a comeback.

Hope is all I got left.

Peace.

The uber-wealthy drove us into this ditch, they can sure as hell drag us out of it.

People making minimum wage shouldn't be paying any taxes; not for health care, not for social security, not for education, not for any of life's essentials.

Under such a system there would be a vast increase in the number of good decent jobs that benefit local communities, while the parasites who make their fortunes churning financial markets, exploiting workers, and bleeding cash from our government might begin to fairly pay for the social problems they create.

But we also must address sub poverty wage rates. It is a leading factor in driving our economy into the ditch.

We'll stay in a depressed economic state as long as America practices serfdom.

But, then again, my 2,200 square-foot home cost $160,000. It would be worth over $2 million in California (or even parts of Michigan).

And, I'd only be making a few ticks above minimum wage at that price.

Im having a hard enough time finding employment at 8 dollars an hour.

:patriot: :kick:

:grr:

for a lot of people who would get caught up in the inflation...

tell me why it wouldnt be inflationary, cause im telling you right now i would be looking for a wage rise as well, as im sure most people would...

wouldnt your union force your employer to raise your wages to keep you above the minimum wage. Thats inflationary whether you admit it or not...

And how it would affect job negotiations, company hiring, cost of utilities, university enrollment, etc.

The main disagreement I would say is the immediate raise to 14 dollars. Certainly enough people on this website have already supported eliminating corporate personhood and passing the EFCA.

That said, a $14 minimum wage would cause a lot more problems than it would solve.

I have never seen or heard of the sky falling after a MW wage increase. Despite anti-MW propaganda usually coming from COC's. That propaganda has always turned out to be false.

The fall out from doing so would be tremendous across pretty much ever facet of business if the minimum wage essentially raised to the same level as what skilled labor or college graduates entering the workforce earn.

If thats all it took to pass a massive piece of legislation such as this I'd say SIGN IT YESTERDAY.

However, compromise does not mean that it should take forever to reach the $14 rate. I'd say incremental increases over a span of no more than 12-18 months.

Proposing an incremental increase of $1 to $2 in year 1 and $1 to $2 in year 2 followed by linking to an inflationary measure would definitely go a long way towards meeting your proposed goal of $14 an hour though with the understanding that pretty much every person making more than minimum wage is going to want the same automatic cost of living increase.

cause i sure as hell would be as im sure your union will as well...

You know what businesses would do in response? Cut employee hours and benefits. You must be joking.

They'd be hiring.

Nice try though.

Don't just plop in $14 right away.

even some of them now being the level of minimum wage....

typically rise following MW increases.

not that im saying we cant raise minimum wage but people who want to catapult the minimum wage have given no thought to how the rest of the market would respond to it.

Also increasing vacation time would help drastically.

on yet another issue.

There's a vast majority of Americans who live in their own bubble. Maybe if those people got out and saw how the rest of the world operates I think we'd be much better off for it.

immediately rescue anything.

Between the immediate inflation and strangling small businesses that have no reserves or margin to deal with such a ramp up you've not done enough to solidify the actual structure of the economy to have growth.

Maybe if you implemented your suggestions in reverse order they'd have more impact but starting off with doubling the min wage would do far more harm than good is my guess. The people with money to spur that are still allowed to hoard it and there are far too few of them to circulate the resources in what is still a 70% service economy. Until we do something serious about getting the fruit from the tree we'd just be revaluing the 10% of the currency we peons are battling over.