The O'Crappy Factor.

[The Grand Nudger]

Why is it the businesses responsibility to pay a living wage?

It's not, they could always close up shop.......but it's in their(and our..as a nation) best interests that they pay a livable wage (and of course they have to pay a wage - ever since we decided that people weren't property..they can always set up shop somewhere this isn't the case, or somewhere where they can pay 30cents a day...and they do). People need money to buy the goods they produce.

Look, it is a cold hard fact of nature that an animal(which humans are) have to work until their nut is made. That might take 4 hours a week, or 40 hours a week, or 80 hours a week.

When it takes more hours a week than an animal can be reliably depended on to "make that nut"...then nuts won't be made, and we'll all suffer for it, including the business in question.

I'm sure Walmart isn't working its minimum wage workers 80 hours a week.

No, they;re working a larger pool of workers just under 35 to avoid the impositions made by fulltime employees with full knowledge that Uncle Sam will pick up the remainder of the tab and that a large portion of their employees wages plus that subsidy will be returned to them. Walmart is an -actual- welfare queen.
(plenty of walmart employees -would- work an 80 hour week if they could...and on the rare occasion that happens..but mostly it's the salaried guys who pull the 80 hour weeks..for obvious reasons...amusingly, an 80hr walmart work week still won't make that nut)

Why should Walmart be required to pay more just to subsidize a shorter work week for its employees?

They already prefer a shorter work week and subsidies, what's the problem?

With the amount of productivity we have today and our compassionate nature to our fellow man....I agree nobody should have to work 120 hours a week to support themselves or their family.....but it isn't Walmart's responsibility to see that happen. It is the responsibility of our society at large because it is a goal of our society.

Exactly, that's why we pass minimum wage laws. That the mimimum wage has not kept up with cost of living is understandable, there's pressure to freeze it in the interests of business, and yes, the economy. We ask the consumer/worker to bear the load for as long as possible but eventually, the back breaks.

It certainly isn't Walmart's goal. We shouldn't try to pawn the responsibility of achieving societal goals on employers like Walmart because when we do so...we price the least productive out of the labor market.

They want to do business here don't they? They want to avail themselves of the advantages that our society provides a business don't they? They want there to -be- business to do here, they want there to -be- advantages to business here...don't they?

No minimum wage and universal basic income for the win. Nobody is priced out of the labor market, and the necessities of life are re-distributed so nobody has to work a 120 hour work week just to earn their nut.

Where does the money come from to pay for this basic income? In what way would it differ from a minimum wage or current welfare? Hmn......deja-vu....