The bolded part is the important part, IMO. I'm not married to this particular plan, just *something* that will mitigate this kind of damage. Whatever regulation we put in place, I think it should be strongly tied to the market, not implemented by fiat declaration.
The plan I suggested (is supposed to) self-regulate through the same market forces at work in the economy. A more stable, more predictable economy is a faster-growing economy. It would trim the peaks a bit, but it would also fill the valleys.
I went back and looked at your plan there a little. I don't know. I almost feel like it is hard to guage unless seeing it in practice. Like What exactly is medium or large and does it take into account what the job roles are? Like skilled vs. non-skilled. I don't necessarily think that if a company needs people to keep chairs warm (I know, not a real job that I know of...) that it should pay a living wage... I almost think that your proposal would be drifting away from a supply, demand, and skillset based pay system. I don't know. I do agree that large businesses can take advantage due to their size. SOMETHING could be done I think.....
__________________
__________________
"A society that puts equality ... ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom."
I went back and looked at your plan there a little. I don't know. I almost feel like it is hard to guage unless seeing it in practice. Like What exactly is medium or large and does it take into account what the job roles are? Like skilled vs. non-skilled. I don't necessarily think that if a company needs people to keep chairs warm (I know, not a real job that I know of...) that it should pay a living wage... I almost think that your proposal would be drifting away from a supply, demand, and skillset based pay system.
I don't know. I do agree that large businesses can take advantage due to their size. SOMETHING could be done I think.....
I suppose one could say it's a slight drift from a "pure" supply/demand system. Without getting into a debate on the merits of a completely free-market system, I propose an analogy:
If the economy is a car's speed, and government is the foot operating the gas pedal of that car, what I'm suggesting is something akin to cruise control, which cuts the driver out of the loop, letting the car itself keep the speed well regulated without input from that driver. (And let's face it, the folks driving this particular car have no clue what the hell they are doing. We're doing 20mph on the freeway and our left blinker has been stuck on for the past 50 miles)
Now, I don't mean to imply that the government is completely in charge, more that it has the power to "regulate" the throttle of this car. Cruise control also has the ability to regulate the throttle, but cruise control doesn't have a constituency to impress; it's operation is entirely dependent on the car itself.
What I'm talking about are replacing some of the functions that government currently performs and replacing them with a negative feedback loop, automating the essential changes. In this case, most of what the government is trying to accomplish with changes to minimum wage, I think should be shifted to (nearly) direct market control.
But this means that whatever "cruise control" system we put in place will have to be capable to replicate the effects of the government: forcing the adjustments of wages over a broad swath of the market.
The negative feedback loop is the important part. I proposed a "standard wage" or "living wage" to adjust, instead of a minimum wage. A "standard wage" is $1 greater than an arbitrarily defined poverty line. The exact line is not entirely critical because it doesn't just move the compensation amount, but also, inversely, the percentage of people who must be paid that amount. So the government can fiddle around with it a bit if they want to, but their changes won't have the broad, harmful impact that a minimum wage hike would.
We're still hiring based on supply and demand, but now, we can't get rich by convincing people they should be happy with whatever slave wages they can command, just so we can get rich from them sacrificing themselves.
__________________
We work together every damn day. --Jon Stewart
I think I understand your idea.. I'm just not certain it is feasable due to it not taking into account the type of jobs being provided. If one place in small town X is providing a large percentage of jobs and it is a somewhat skilled position being filled then yeah, maybe they should pay (just to give a number/doesn't really mean anything) $9 per hour. Okay, fair enough... But, small town a few miles away all other things being equal EXCEPT they need people of absolutely no skill level whatsoever... easy to replace people.... Should that job pay the same amount? That may not be a good example but hopefully you get the picture.... I don't know, what you have as an idea is likely better than what we have now... But I still have issue with people thinking that all jobs should pay a so called "living wage" for the reasons I mentioned earlier...
__________________
"A society that puts equality ... ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom."
I think I understand your idea.. I'm just not certain it is feasable due to it not taking into account the type of jobs being provided. If one place in small town X is providing a large percentage of jobs and it is a somewhat skilled position being filled then yeah, maybe they should pay (just to give a number/doesn't really mean anything) $9 per hour. Okay, fair enough... But, small town a few miles away all other things being equal EXCEPT they need people of absolutely no skill level whatsoever... easy to replace people.... Should that job pay the same amount? That may not be a good example but hopefully you get the picture.... I don't know, what you have as an idea is likely better than what we have now... But I still have issue with people thinking that all jobs should pay a so called "living wage" for the reasons I mentioned earlier...
I'm starting from the idea that if an essential task requires a human to perform it, even an unskilled human, a human performing that task should be able to meet 100% of his essential needs from performing that task as his full time employment.
Stocking shelves at Walmart is an essenntial task. Walmart can't function without product on its shelves. Those stockers should be adequately compensated to meet their needs. Otherwise, walmart and its customers are simply "stealing" from these workers.
Greeting customers at the door is not an essential task for walmart. They can do business without a greeter.
Remember, companies *can* and *should* pay some of their employees less than a "standard wage". If the poverty rate in their region is 20%, they can hire 20% of their employees at minimum wage, well below the poverty line.
But what they shouldn't be able to do is pay 80% of their employees below poverty wages. If they do that, they are earning a profit by causing harm to the economy. They are conducting an unfair competitive practice.
__________________
We work together every damn day. --Jon Stewart
I'm starting from the idea that if an essential task requires a human to perform it, even an unskilled human, a human performing that task should be able to meet 100% of his essential needs from performing that task as his full time employment.
Stocking shelves at Walmart is an essenntial task. Walmart can't function without product on its shelves. Those stockers should be adequately compensated to meet their needs. Otherwise, walmart and its customers are simply "stealing" from these workers.
Greeting customers at the door is not an essential task for walmart. They can do business without a greeter.
Remember, companies *can* and *should* pay some of their employees less than a "standard wage". If the poverty rate in their region is 20%, they can hire 20% of their employees at minimum wage, well below the poverty line.
But what they shouldn't be able to do is pay 80% of their employees below poverty wages. If they do that, they are earning a profit by causing harm to the economy. They are conducting an unfair competitive practice.
I don't know... I still think that things like stocking shelves should be left to the highschooler looking to make a few bucks.. If an adult has to stock shelves (no offense if you stock shelves for a living(:...) to support a family then THAT INDIVIDUAL has their own issues that THEY have at least contributed to in some way. I am not certain that making businesses support those who did not prepare for life a very fair proposal.). It really depends what you mean by essential needs also... I THINK IN THIS COUNTRY WE HAVE A WARPED SENSE OF WHAT ESSENTIAL NEEDS ARE. If someone can manage to meet NON ESSENTIAL needs then they should not need help meeting essential needs. Agree?
Have you visited a 3rd world country?
__________________
"A society that puts equality ... ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom."
I don't know... I still think that things like stocking shelves should be left to the highschooler looking to make a few bucks.. If an adult has to stock shelves (no offense if you stock shelves for a living(:...) to support a family then THAT INDIVIDUAL has their own issues that THEY have at least contributed to in some way. I am not certain that making businesses support those who did not prepare for life a very fair proposal.). It really depends what you mean by essential needs also... I THINK IN THIS COUNTRY WE HAVE A WARPED SENSE OF WHAT ESSENTIAL NEEDS ARE. If someone can manage to meet NON ESSENTIAL needs then they should not need help meeting essential needs. Agree?
Have you visited a 3rd world country?
For traditional government welfare programs, the definition of "essential needs" is critical. For the plan I'm talking about, the poverty line is not an absolutely critical - if we set it at 9k/year or we set it at 90k/year, we won't have the massive compounding effect that a few pennies difference in minimum wage will.
We just draw a line across the population of society and the populations of our company's workforce and say the percentage of workers above the line should be equal or greater than the percentage of people above the line. We say "this is the standard wage in our economy. If you're a standard worker, this is what you should be earning. If your skills are substandard, you'll earn a substandard wage. If you're skills are superior, you'll earn a superior wage.
Really, I'm not too concerned about individual employees. My concern is how large-scale hiring practices affect the labor market and thus the consumer market. I think that companies like Walmart are shooting us all in the feet. When they refuse to compensate their workforce to even meet the poverty rate, it means fewer potential clients and customers for my products and services in non-competing markets. It means fewer people buying cars, fewer people buying houses, etc.
__________________
We work together every damn day. --Jon Stewart
I understand your point. I do however think our problems are rooted in several places. I feel that the quality of folks that parents are raising is declining. People are more and more selfish and entitlement minded. Families are broken. I see on the news parents kicking their small children, leaving them alone for hours and hours (SMALL kids), in cars, with people they barely know, locked in closets, all types of detestible things. Somewhat older kids, put in front of the TV for hours so the parents OR PARENT can go do other things and not be bothered by the responsibility of parenting. Children unsupervised or worse encouraged to do wrong. Those influences aren't even mentioning the influence of just observing their parents' behavior.... Things are on a quick downhill path. It is not all the fault of business. It is not fair to expect business and taxpayers to pay for the symptems of a greater problem.
__________________
"A society that puts equality ... ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom."
I understand your point. I do however think our problems are rooted in several places. I feel that the quality of folks that parents are raising is declining. People are more and more selfish and entitlement minded. Families are broken. I see on the news parents kicking their small children, leaving them alone for hours and hours (SMALL kids), in cars, with people they barely know, locked in closets, all types of detestible things. Somewhat older kids, put in front of the TV for hours so the parents OR PARENT can go do other things and not be bothered by the responsibility of parenting. Children unsupervised or worse encouraged to do wrong. Those influences aren't even mentioning the influence of just observing their parents' behavior.... Things are on a quick downhill path. It is not all the fault of business. It is not fair to expect business and taxpayers to pay for the symptems of a greater problem.
Are we willing to have the government step in and regulate the parent-child relationship to the extent that would be required to fix that? Unless we are, it's a fairly moot point.
__________________
We work together every damn day. --Jon Stewart
Are we willing to have the government step in and regulate the parent-child relationship to the extent that would be required to fix that? Unless we are, it's a fairly moot point.
You will likely disagree... I feel that it is partially a vicious circle. In attempting to "help" oftentimes the government is only enabling behavior and encouraging mentalities that promote poor performance, poor examples, and overall poor parenting. Frankly, I don't have a set of ideas that will work. But It is apparent to me that the root cause will not be dealt with. The root cause (in my opinion) is that we are becoming an anything goes type of society where moral fibers are being stripped in the name of so called "open mindedness"... This results in broken families and repercussions that we try to control or ignore all together.
__________________
__________________
"A society that puts equality ... ahead of freedom will end up with neither equality nor freedom."
Linear Mode
