02-16-2021, 10:49 AM
People willing to work full time should be able to support themselves. People making the federal minimum wage qualify for food stamps, because they only bring in $1,160/month before payroll taxes (less than $14,000/year pre-tax). Not everyone has the skills to be an engineer, doctor, lawyer, accountant, etc., and our economy and society requires non-skilled labor to function. I'm not arguing that non-skilled labor should make more than skilled labor, or that non-skilled labor should be a path to riches, but am arguing that non-skilled labor should at least be able to afford basic necessities and not live in peril of a single flat tire or doctor visit causing bankruptcy, and a likely decrease in lifetime productivity or complete exit from the labor force.
The roughly 3.5 million people (~2.1% of the total workforce) out there earning minimum wage shouldn't have to resort to government benefits just to survive. Companies paying those wages are ripping off taxpayers. We shouldn't have to subsidize Fortune 100 companies with our tax dollars. They can take a page from arch-capitalist Henry Ford and pay their employees a living wage. Demand drives the economy, and wages drive demand. Labor costs are 20-35% of gross sales on average for most industries. The multiplier effect to injecting additional wages into the economy among people who tend to spend the majority of their disposable income out of necessity is higher than the marginal rise in the cost of goods and services.
I support a minimum wage increase because I support broad-based economic growth, which is the driver of EPS and dividends and puts money in my pocket. If a company can't provide goods or services without resorting to starvation wages, that is just as poor a business model as no-growth dividend "aristocrats" that get by with <1% annual raises while they play financial engineering games with debt. Legislation and public policy should disincentivize those businesses for being parasites that don't contribute to meaningful economic growth.
No one working 40+ hours a week should have to live in poverty. The fact that sometimes people earning that wage are high school students earning a bit on the side, or other edge cases, shouldn't be the basis for consigning millions who actually work to intractable and permanent poverty. Trying to live on $7.25/hour anywhere in this country is like playing one of those perma-death zombie survival games. Just one small mistake, and it's game over.
The roughly 3.5 million people (~2.1% of the total workforce) out there earning minimum wage shouldn't have to resort to government benefits just to survive. Companies paying those wages are ripping off taxpayers. We shouldn't have to subsidize Fortune 100 companies with our tax dollars. They can take a page from arch-capitalist Henry Ford and pay their employees a living wage. Demand drives the economy, and wages drive demand. Labor costs are 20-35% of gross sales on average for most industries. The multiplier effect to injecting additional wages into the economy among people who tend to spend the majority of their disposable income out of necessity is higher than the marginal rise in the cost of goods and services.
I support a minimum wage increase because I support broad-based economic growth, which is the driver of EPS and dividends and puts money in my pocket. If a company can't provide goods or services without resorting to starvation wages, that is just as poor a business model as no-growth dividend "aristocrats" that get by with <1% annual raises while they play financial engineering games with debt. Legislation and public policy should disincentivize those businesses for being parasites that don't contribute to meaningful economic growth.
No one working 40+ hours a week should have to live in poverty. The fact that sometimes people earning that wage are high school students earning a bit on the side, or other edge cases, shouldn't be the basis for consigning millions who actually work to intractable and permanent poverty. Trying to live on $7.25/hour anywhere in this country is like playing one of those perma-death zombie survival games. Just one small mistake, and it's game over.