Living wage

[Mister Agenda]

In part I agree with you, greed drives many of the top 1%

Why then do the the some of the other 99% vote republican?

1. A sense of superiority. I know many university students who came from low income backgrounds (especially those in the fields of medicine and education) vote conservative as a means of stating their new perceived higher class. Which is total bull.

2. "Der laaaawd asks that we stand against this Caaaamunist abomination!" (a.k.a: Rich people tell me who to vote for).

3. Stupidity.

It's usually a mistake to ascribe ill motives to those who diagree with you.

There's no need for a conspiracy, and the top 1% are unlikely the main employers of low-wage workers. To the average employer the main calculations are 'how much money can accomplishing a given task make for my business' and 'how much do I have to pay to get someone to do this work?'. Anybody in business understands that if it costs more to pay someone to do a job than getting the job done pays to the business, it's a job that needs to be eliminated. This isn't a selfish position, businesses that ignore this principle go out of business and then all the employees have no job, which pays zero.

Where the margin for a wage increase that doesn't require the job to be eliminated lies is in how much you have to pay to get someone to do it. If the job is highly valuable but you can pay low wages and still get it done because it doesn't require much experience or education, then it will survive a minimum wage hike, at least until automation catches up to it. Of course the tendency is to try to get more skilled workers to do the job now, so you 'get your money's worth'. People make a lot out of how much Cost Co pays, for instance, but they won't hire many of the same people who get work at Wal Mart. I can find an immigrant from a developing country 'fresh off the boat' a job at Wal Mart, not so with Cost Co.

Raising wages isn't a consequence-free magic wand that will solve poverty if we just force businesses to pay enough more. There's a reason why through the decades it's been raised small amounts while the economy was improving: it masks the ill effects. We raised in a bad economy last time, and some people are mystified why the recovery is particularly dragging among African Americans and people under 25...it's what always happens when we hike the wage, it's just not always as obvious.

I (perhaps naively) believe there's a way to manage a minimum wage increase that maximizes the benefits and minimizes the drawbacks, and think it's at least worth a try. But if we increase it too much too soon without providing for the persons most likely to suffer negative consequences from it, the drawbacks will be very obvious and it may be a very long time before the political will to try it again, even very carefully, will re-emerge.

And with the direction automation is taking, I think we may have to get used to the idea of long-term direct subsidies to the unemployed poor anyway.