This is What Pisses Me Off About The Democrats

[SteelCurtain]

It amazes me that when 75% of the population supports a minimum wage increase, our representative legislators still vote along party lines rather that representing their districts. Same with 90% population support for the gun laws after Sandy Hook.

[DeistPaladin]

It amazes me that when 75% of the population supports a minimum wage increase, our representative legislators still vote along party lines rather that representing their districts. Same with 90% population support for the gun laws after Sandy Hook.

More evidence that money talks. Representatives will go with money long before popularity. Money can buy ad spin, afterall.

We need a constitutional amendment banning all forms of paid political advertisement.

[Lek]

We've had a minimum wage since 1938 and we still have poverty. Raising the minimum wage has done nothing to decrease poverty, because inflation continues to burn up the purchasing power of the minimum wage. Government welfare programs have nothing to decrease poverty either. We've just got a bunch of poor people living off the pittance they get sent to them each month. What I believe has empowered workers and led to the rise of the American middle class is unionization. Instead of employees whining about low wages and asking the government to raise their pay to a still unlivable level, why not unionize and do something for themselves? Wal-Mart isn't going to do much business if all their employees are on strike. This process brings management and workers to the table to negotiate a reasonable wage. America became a great nation due individuals striving to attain success for themselves, not by waiting for the government to take care of them.

[Ryantology]

We've had a minimum wage since 1938 and we still have poverty. Raising the minimum wage has done nothing to decrease poverty, because inflation continues to burn up the purchasing power of the minimum wage.

Because the minimum wage isn't tied to the rate of inflation, and definitely should be.

But, I do admit, that's definitely a novel justification: because a sub-poverty minimum wage doesn't work, we should just go back to allowing the sub-survival, or live in a mud shack, or not even real money wages common before the before the introduction minimum wage (and still done in the modern era by that paragon of corporate rapaciousness, Wal-Mart).

[Statler Waldorf]

Let an MBA educate you on how business works.

MBA eh? Here’s where’d you would whine about fallacious appeals to authority.
The majority of my family members are business owners and understand how things work in the real world; I’ll take their word over yours.

If you lay off workers for any reason other than lack of demand for your products or services, you are cutting off your nose to spite your face. If you cut positions or reduce hours, your customer service will suffer and your production will be reduced. Your disgruntled customers will leave you and go do business with an owner what wasn't so dumb.

You mean that wasn’t so dumb?

This is just basic arithmetic. If I have $1000.00 per week to pay my employees and they are currently making 5 dollars per hour I can afford to keep five of them full time on staff. If people like you come in and tell me I now have to pay them 10 dollars per hour I can now only keep two of them working full time on staff. If you do not understand that then I think you need a refund on your degree.

On the other hand, if you raise prices, the business owner that didn't will steal all your business. You don't control prices. The market does by supply and demand. You can't just raise price because you want to make more money.

Nope, the other business owner will have to raise prices as well because you have told us both we have to pay our employees more. All you’re doing is reducing the buying power of the dollar. Again, very basic concepts; but this is why the left is so horrible at running even local economies.

That's why there's no correlation between a minimum wage increase and either inflation or unemployment.

Again, this is just factually incorrect. Let’s look at states that have a higher minimum wage than the national wage and where they rank in unemployment (1 being the lowest unemployment rate).

Washington- 28th
Oregon- 36th
California- 48th
Nevada- 50th
New York- 36th
Michigan- 44th

Now let’s look at states that do not have a state minimum wage higher than the federal wage.

South Dakota- 3rd
North Dakota- 1st
Texas- 17th
North Carolina- 28th
Utah- 6th

[Figures from the US Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics]

And as long as I'm schooling you...

I think it’s rather embarrassing that this is the best you can do if you seriously have the education you claim to have; but when you’re defending a losing argument what can you really do? You can only argue that 2+2=5 for so long.

The only reason that businesses can get away with paying as little as they do is because the workers go on food stamps to stay alive. The government is subsidizing the labor costs of certain businesses. If we won't raise the minimum wage, we should at least bill all corporations who's [sic] employees are on food stamps so that they reimburse the tax payers for the cost of the food stamps plus administrative fees.

Or even better we could get rid of food stamps all together.

Yeah, you're just as full of shit as the last guy.

Well obviously looking at national rates is inappropriate when each state has their own minimum wage and unemployment rate. That being said you’d think that if you took the time to find that graph you’d actually take the time to look at it. The real minimum wage rate correlates much more closely to the overall unemployment rate than even I thought it would. Thanks for the support on that.

The opposite seems to happen, actually. Raise minimum wage and you increase demand. If, all of a sudden, I got $1 an hour raise, I'd immediately use that raise to get things like food, car repairs, video games, clothes and stuff like that. In turn, that increases the amount of business the stores who sell those things do.

That’s falsely assuming that that $40 a week would not exist if it was not going to you. The money still exists, and would most likely be going towards giving someone else a job. I can pay one employee $10 an hour or two employees $5 an hour, which do you think is better for reducing the unemployment rate?

I swear, the right side of politics is so focused on 'supply' that they've forgotten that demand is even a thing.

The left side has forgotten that government interference undermines the entire supply and demand system.

Surprise, surprise, it doesn't work that way. There is no magic way that an employee can suddenly increase their productivity by 25%.

This is where you’d whine about bare assertions. I am getting a kick out of using your own whining against you.

So, a number of possible things can happen as a result of your bone-headed decision to spitefully lay off an employee because of the government mandate:

1. Quality suffers.
2. Case delivery falls behind schedule.
3. Customer service suffers with fewer employees servicing the same number of customers.
4. Widget production suffers more mistakes and rework because of excess workload per employee.

I can also simply automate so that two workers can do the work of five; why pay a person a ridiculous wage when a machine can do it for much less? Or I just raise the price of my widgets so I can keep my five employees and still produce 100 a day. Surprise! Now everyone’s dollar loses its buying power and we are right back where we started. Now you on the left will point this out and cry that we need to raise minimum wage because cheeseburgers now cost 15 dollars and 15 dollars an hour is just not enough money to live on. Let the market determine prices and wages, keep your grubby little fingers out of it.

Bottom line: You begin losing customers and your business suffers. Meanwhile, your competition picks up your disgruntled customers and they grow.

Nope, this is a federal minimum wage and therefore my competition did the very same thing I did.

His/her competition that simply lives with less margin will make up for it in volume.

Depends on how large their market is, volume is not infinite.

Hope this helps.

It certainly did.

It amazes me that when 75% of the population supports a minimum wage increase, our representative legislators still vote along party lines rather that representing their districts. Same with 90% population support for the gun laws after Sandy Hook.

Where did these figures come from?

We need a constitutional amendment banning all forms of paid political advertisement.

Banning free speech now? You truly are a leftist aren’t you?

[DeistPaladin]

MBA eh? Here’s where’d you would whine about fallacious appeals to authority.

Appeal to authority is only a logical fallacy when the authority doesn't provide any evidence. Even experts must have reasons to believe what they do. Had I just said, "I'm an MBA and I say so" without making a case, that would be a fallacy.

Let me map it out for you in greater detail, complete with number crunching, since your slow to accept the facts. Here's the scenario: I and two other businesses, run by conservative Tea Baggers, make and sell widgets. Our companies are the same size at first. We each have five employees, sell 100 widgets a day at a price of $100 each. Our fixed costs are 35%, our variable costs are 60%.

So daily sales of Teabagger Widgets inc., GOP Widgets Inc. and Progressive Widgets Inc. (me) are all currently $10,000 a day. All of our fixed overhead costs are $3,500 and our variable costs are $6,000, making $500 our net daily income.

In theory, "variable costs" such as supplies and labor, will vary with the unit sales. In practice, greater inefficiencies can be attained when you are close to capacity. During slow times, your labor costs will be less efficient even if you are careful to lay off workers. When workers are close to peak capacity, they are going to be more efficient in production. However, to keep it simple for this exercise, labor is considered variable.

In theory, "fixed costs" will remain the same no matter how many units you sell. These would include insurance, rent on the building, certain office staff members, etc. In reality, these too may be somewhat variable. If your production increases to a point, you may need a larger building, for example. Again, to keep it simple, fixed costs will be fixed.

One day the government comes along and raises the minimum wage we can pay our workers. Our variable costs (including labor) increases to 62%, making the total $6,200 and our net daily income is reduced to $300.

Tea Bagger Widgets lays off a worker. GOP Widgets raises their prices to $102 a unit to compensate. I decide to bit the bullet and maintain prices and labor force as they are, accepting the reduction in my contribution margin.

Teabagger Widgets is now expecting 4 workers to do the work of 5. Without some competitive advantage in automation, this is impossible without something suffering. If automation WERE possible, we'd all do it anyway, regardless of the government. So your bringing that up is a red herring. Quality goes down, mistakes from a fatigued, overworked labor force goes up, delivery times are delayed.

Teabagger's sales suffer with disgruntled customers getting upset with the reduction in quality and the late deliveries of the product. Let's be nice and say they only lose as many customers as needed to re-establish production equilibrium and their sales go down to 80 units a day.

GOP Widgets also loses customers as some of them will go for lower priced competition. Why pay him $102 when you can pay me $100? To keep it simple, let's say he loses sales to the same equilibrium. He has to lay off one worker and is now down to 80 units a day.

Progressive Widgets hires both laid off workers and picks up the extra disgruntled customers, bringing my sales up to 140 units a day. Since 35% of my costs are fixed, some of that sales increase is gravy that goes to my bottom line. But to spell it out in numbers:

Teabagger Widgets
Sales: $8,000
Variable Costs: $4,960
Fixed Overhead: $3,500
Net (Loss): ($460)

GOP Widgets
Sales: $8,160
Variable Costs: $4,960
Fixed Overhead: $3,500
Net (Loss): ($300)

Progressive Widgets
Sales: $14,000
Variable Costs: $8,680
Fixed Overhead: $3,500
Net Income: $1,820 (increase in profit of 264%)

News of the change in the market reaches Wall Street. In finance theory, the stock's price reflects the net present value of future returns, as forecast based on reported corporate earnings, against the current prime rate of interest, which currently at 3.25%.

Previous, annual net income was reported at $130 K (52 weeks, 5 days a year). This makes the NPV (net present value) of the company roughly $4 M. The price of all outstanding stock has sold and been traded accordingly at that price.

This year's net income is going to be $473 K (and change). The NPV of the company has changed now to $14,563 M. Stock prices soar accordingly, more than tripling in value.

Meanwhile, stock prices for my competition crashes.

While my labor costs have gone up, I have more than made up for it in volume. My employees are happy. I'm happy. My stockholders are VERY happy. I'm going to get a lot of atta-boys at the next Board of Directors meeting and take home a nice bonus. The CEOs of my competition are going to be fired and their replacements will have a big mess to clean up.

Are we learning yet?

[DeistPaladin]

Banning free speech now? You truly are a leftist aren’t you?

You can have all the free speech you want. You just can't buy more. Money is not speech. A rich man should not have more speech than a poor man.

[Statler Waldorf]

Appeal to authority is only a logical fallacy when the authority doesn't provide any evidence. Even experts must have reasons to believe what they do. Had I just said, "I'm an MBA and I say so" without making a case, that would be a fallacy.

Then why mention the MBA at all? Why not just present the evidence? You’ve never understood the appeal to authority fallacy though.

Let me map it out for you in greater detail, complete with number crunching, since your [sic] slow to accept the facts.

Facts? What on Earth makes you think that hypothetical scenarios about widgets are somehow “facts”?

Here's the scenario: I and two other businesses, run by conservative Tea Baggers, make and sell widgets. Our companies are the same size at first. We each have five employees, sell 100 widgets a day at a price of $100 each. Our fixed costs are 35%, our variable costs are 60%.

I am not sure what a tea bagger is but ok.

So daily sales of Teabagger Widgets inc., GOP Widgets Inc. and Progressive Widgets Inc. (me) are all currently $10,000 a day. All of our fixed overhead costs are $3,500 and our variable costs are $6,000, making $500 our net daily income.

I could have guessed which one was you.

In theory, "variable costs" such as supplies and labor, will vary with the unit sales. In practice, greater inefficiencies can be attained when you are close to capacity. During slow times, your labor costs will be less efficient even if you are careful to lay off workers. When workers are close to peak capacity, they are going to be more efficient in production. However, to keep it simple for this exercise, labor is considered variable.

You provide nothing to support any of this but ok.

In theory, "fixed costs" will remain the same no matter how many units you sell. These would include insurance, rent on the building, certain office staff members, etc. In reality, these too may be somewhat variable. If your production increases to a point, you may need a larger building, for example. Again, to keep it simple, fixed costs will be fixed.

Ok.

One day the government comes along and raises the minimum wage we can pay our workers. Our variable costs (including labor) increases to 62%, making the total $6,200 and our net daily income is reduced to $300.

Ok.

Tea Bagger Widgets lays off a worker. GOP Widgets raises their prices to $102 a unit to compensate. I decide to bit [sic] the bullet and maintain prices and labor force as they are, accepting the reduction in my contribution margin.

If you did not know what the other two companies were going to do what would compel you to do this? You’re ascribing yourself a level of omniscience in this scenario that is unrealistic.

Teabagger Widgets is now expecting 4 workers to do the work of 5. Without some competitive advantage in automation, this is impossible without something suffering.

Bare assertion. I see no reason why this is impossible.

If automation WERE possible, we'd all do it anyway, regardless of the government.

Another bare assertion. You’ve already stated that you are willing to take a loss out of the kindness of your heart, I find it hard to believe you’d lay off workers simply in order to automate.

So your bringing that up is a red herring.

Not at all, I have personally seen it happen.

Quality goes down, mistakes from a fatigued, overworked labor force goes up, delivery times are delayed.

Again, I see no reason as to why any of this must necessarily occur.

Teabagger's sales suffer with disgruntled customers getting upset with the reduction in quality and the late deliveries of the product. Let's be nice and say they only lose as many customers as needed to re-establish production equilibrium and their sales go down to 80 units a day.

If they reduce to 80 units a day the quality would then go back up because each employee is only producing 20 widgets a day. You’ve just proven my point; all you have successfully done is cost an employee their job.

GOP Widgets also loses customers as some of them will go for lower priced competition. Why pay him $102 when you can pay me $100? To keep it simple, let's say he loses sales to the same equilibrium. He has to lay off one worker and is now down to 80 units a day.

Now you’ve cost two workers their jobs.

Progressive Widgets hires both laid off workers and picks up the extra disgruntled customers, bringing my sales up to 140 units a day. Since 35% of my costs are fixed, some of that sales increase is gravy that goes to my bottom line. But to spell it out in numbers:

Nice sleight of hand. What money are you using to hire these two employees? You already “bit the bullet” and reduced your profit margin to only $300/day, how are you affording two new employees (you cannot say from the additional 40 widgets sold a day because you do not currently have the employees to produce more than 100 widgets per day)? You’re stuck at 100 widgets per day with five employees and two people lost their jobs thanks to the government increasing the minimum wage. Of course now there are only 260 widgets being produce daily in this market (down from 300) which would in turn drive the price of widgets up; so not only have you cost two people their jobs but you have also made it so that I can no longer buy as many widgets as I once could thus driving the power of my hourly wage and everyone else’s for that matter down. Nice work.

While my labor costs have gone up, I have more than made up for it in volume.

Nope, your volume cannot increase until your labor first increases; cart before the horse.

My employees are happy. I'm happy. My stockholders are VERY happy. I'm going to get a lot of atta-boys at the next Board of Directors meeting and take home a nice bonus. The CEOs of my competition are going to be fired and their replacements will have a big mess to clean up.

A delightful fantasy, but unfortunately nothing more.

Are we learning yet?

Nope, I already knew that fantastic hypothetical scenarios based on unrealistic conditions prove nothing. I’d need something to actually support any of this nonsense.

You can have all the free speech you want. You just can't buy more. Money is not speech. A rich man should not have more speech than a poor man.

“You can have all the free speech you want as long as you keep your mouth shut.”

If I want to buy airtime to say whatever I want, and if someone wants to sell it to me it’s my right to do so. Take your fascism elsewhere.

[DeistPaladin]

Then why mention the MBA at all? Why not just present the evidence?

Because of all the money and two years of my life spent gaining it give me some bragging rights and dammit I'm going to use them.

By-the-way things like that don't invoke a fallacy, the same as calling someone an idiot while presenting a case isn't an ad hominem. It's using authority or an insult in place of an argument (rather than in addition to) that invokes the fallacy.

I am not sure what a tea bagger is but ok.

That's what they originally called themselves. Today, in supreme arrogance, they call themselves "The Tea Party" and our corporate controlled media lets them get away with it. I refuse out of respect for our Founding Fathers and the patriots that founded this country. Just because you put a tricorner hat on your head doesn't make you a Founding Father. These people are posers and cosplayers, and bad ones at that.

You provide nothing to support any of this but ok.

? This is how accountants track costs of doing business. Among other practices, they divide costs between fixed and variable. I pointed out how in practice the line between the two can be fuzzy, that labor can be more or less efficient based on whether or not you are at capacity. What part did you have problems with?

If you did not know what the other two companies were going to do what would compel you to do this? You’re ascribing yourself a level of omniscience in this scenario that is unrealistic.

Anticipating your competition is an important business skill but aside from that, I'm demonstrating the effects of three different courses of action and why accepting a lower contribution margin is the most rational.

Bare assertion. I see no reason why this is impossible.

What is your problem here? Four people can't suddenly do the work of five. If they could have, why did you have five people at any time? No rational business person hires extra people for no reason. If you employ someone, you are already trying to get maximum efficiency in terms of their production or else you were already mismanaging your company before this scenario even got started.

Another bare assertion.

I do not think that fallacy means what you think it means.

If you could increase your worker productivity by 25% at any time, why haven't you already done it? And if you have that option now because of some new technology, why wouldn't you do it immediately regardless of what the minimum wage is?

You’ve already stated that you are willing to take a loss out of the kindness of your heart,

Sorry, when did "kindness" or "heart" come into my decision making process? I did say you shouldn't make business decisions out of spite, especially when the course of action is self-destructive. I'm talking about pursuing profit maximization and the most rational course of action toward it. If it happens to work toward a kind end, well, that's nice.

I find it hard to believe you’d lay off workers simply in order to automate.

You'd be shocked, then. Cut my labor costs and still service my customers? Yes, please! Employment lost to automation finds its way into other sectors of the economy and still manages to increase the wealth of the whole. Perhaps we'll eventually move to a more leisurely time when automation will allow all of us to work half the week or something.

My motive in the scenario I mapped out was servicing my customers and boosting sales, making up for the decreased margin with volume.

Not at all, I have personally seen it happen.

Many people have throughout human history but it is beside the point here. It's a distraction and so it is a red herring.

Again, I see no reason as to why any of this must necessarily occur.

Then your grasp of business management is so frail that I'm not sure how to explain anything to you.

If they reduce to 80 units a day the quality would then go back up because each employee is only producing 20 widgets a day. You’ve just proven my point; all you have successfully done is cost an employee their job.

...at that company. Read on.

Now you’ve cost two workers their jobs.

...at that company. Read on.

Nice sleight of hand. What money are you using to hire these two employees? You already “bit the bullet” and reduced your profit margin to only $300/day, how are you affording two new employees (you cannot say from the additional 40 widgets sold a day because you do not currently have the employees to produce more than 100 widgets per day)?

I do after hiring the two workers from my competition. What part of that are you struggling with?

You’re stuck at 100 widgets per day...

Why am I "stuck" at 100 per day? What force prevents me from meeting the demand of the markets? And even if I couldn't, for some strange reason you haven't explained, why would there not be other entries into the market? Where there is unmet demand, suppliers will enter the market. That is the beauty of capitalism.

Nope, your volume cannot increase until your labor first increases; cart before the horse.

What prevents me from increasing my labor, especially with trained labor ready to go? Are you so dim that you think business can't hire new employees to meet expected demand in the future?

A delightful fantasy, but unfortunately nothing more.

"F". See me after class.

“You can have all the free speech you want as long as you keep your mouth shut.”

When did I say people need to keep their mouths shut? The Koch brothers can go preach on the street corners as well as anyone else. What's unfair is they can buy congress people and buy ad time so their speech is more powerful than anyone else's? Everyone's speech must be equal. No one should have more speech than anyone else.

If I want to buy airtime to say whatever I want, and if someone wants to sell it to me it’s my right to do so. Take your fascism elsewhere.

So you think rich people should just be able to buy the government and dominate our political discussions and poor people can go fuck themselves? Hmmmm, what is the definition of fascism again? Government run by corporate interests, I recall. If one of us is a fascist, it sounds like it's YOU.

[TaraJo]

Wow. I already read the story that said the US isn't really a democracy anymore and this doofus seems to make it even less democratic. No, I'd much rather restrict the say plutocrats have on our democratic process than let them continue to completely control it. As it is now, you have virtually no say in how our government is run unless you make $1,000,000 or more a year.

Here's a few truths about job creation: You don't get more and more job from billionaires having more money than they know what to do with. You get more jobs when they have a business need to fulfill. They aren't going to have any reason to build 300 refrigerators a week if they can only sell 200 refrigertors a week. How do you sell that other 100? They don't; they lay off the employees they would have used to build those extra 100 friges. If minimum wage is increased, it increases the nations spending power, giving business back to these factories and the stores that sell their products and even to the people who harvest raw material that the factorys turn into products.

You want to know what cutting taxes gets you, economically? Regan cut taxes almost immediately after he took office and we went into recession; I remember my dad getting laid off when that happened, resulting in my family having to move about 1,000 miles away, chasing jobs. Dubya spent most of his presidency cutting taxes every time there was any problem and the economy got really fucked over. Tax cuts were never a significant part of the Clinton administration, but the economy was BOOMING while he was in office. So, tell me, why is it we're emulating the economic practices that led to economic downturn instead of the economic practices that lead to amazing economic growth?