Posted on 08/06/2008 10:27:28 PM PDT by newbie2008
Teenage workers are disappearing from the U.S. workforce. Something appears to have happened to drive them out of the workforce in large numbers. Phil Miller and Doc Palmer say that the recent mandated hikes in the minimum wage very likely has something to do with the teenagers getting disappeared, but no one in the media is willing to finger them as a promising culprit behind the workplace disappearances.
Could they be right?
To find out, we went straight to the source: the Bureau of Labor Statistics. What we did was to take the BLS' report on the Characteristics of Minimum Wage Earners, 2007 and compare it to their report on the Characteristics of Minimum Wage Earners, 2005. Why these two years? Mainly, 2005 was the last full year in which the BLS' compiled the report under the old minimum wage rate of $5.15 per hour, while 2007 saw the mandated minimum wage rate increased by 13.6% to $5.85 per hour on 24 July 2007.
Here's what we found when we compared Table 7 of both reports, which breaks down the number of hourly wage earners by age group. Our first table shows the number of hourly wage earners in each wage group, broken down by those making more than the federal minimum wage for 2005 and 2007 and those earning the federal minimum wage or less for both years:
(Excerpt) Read more at politicalcalculations.blogspot.com ...
We can see that the Age 16-19 and Age 20-24 groups saw dramatic declines in the number of people earning the minimum wage or less, while all the other age groups either saw increases or fairly minor decreases.(emphasis added)
If raising the minimum wage had no effect upon the level of employment, we should not see this result. At all.
I’m sure everyone that has a teenage daughter or son is excited about the prospect of having them work at the local fast food joint, alone with uneducated, 40 year old illegal aliens that speak little or no English.
Seems odd that this time of “recession”. I still remember my first job at 16, McDonald’s. I think that’s how I became a conservative overnight.
And no, I “tried” NOT spitting into those burgers.
Look at the bright side. These kids are on the fast track to learn Spanish. How do you say "Keep your filthy hands off me you perv?" in Spanish?
ping to read later
Nothing wrong with that. I worked at Subway when I was a snot nosed kid, and I dreamt of getting an extensive high paying job after toiling in university at WSU. I simply tired of saying ‘Olives with that, sir?” Now my job here at Boeing is telling those lazy union bums in Wa. State to hurry up with the cable connections for the 777.
Illegals are cheaper to hire to cut lawns and flip burgers. Plus, if you work, the financial aid system penalizes you (how dare you save for college), and, after inflation and the systematic devaluation of the U.S. dollar, it's almost impossible to save for college.
Kids think they are owed, and parents think they owe them. So many kids are horribly spoiled. We have two teenage children (one over 14 and one under) and almost none of their friends worked this summer. One of mine did, and one did unpaid chores around the house (you want supper ... you do x, and y and z). We're considered mean and ruthless ... none of their friends even have chores to do, and if they do ... it's laughable what's expected ... and many get paid for the bare minimum. I know one kid that gets $50 per week to clean his room on Saturday!!
Kids aren't working because they don't have to.
Many kids can’t compete with the low wage Latino workers at all of the fast food joints, whether they be legal or illegal. I live in a suburb of Chicago and my local McDonalds is now almost totally Latino run. Barely any whites at all, teenager or otherwise. There is one older white woman, and that’s about it. A couple of blacks. But, primarily, it is all Latino. Same at other fast food restaurants, Burger King, KFC, Wendy’s, you name it, they are all chock full of minorities, mostly Latino. The white kids have gone the way of the dodo bird. And this is in a primarily white suburb, although that is rapidly changing now also. I go to my local Walmart and it is like the Tower of Babel. Hmmm, very soon I will be the minority. Good thing I’m retired and not trying to find a job.
For some girls, the illegals are just dangerous Casanovas who will really make their parents mad. They won’t acknowledge that their parents were right until they are 45 and caring for three fatherless high school dropouts.
and mexicans are very predjudice, the favor their own kind, and they will not hire americans
I think that is part of the equation. Another part may be the limitations on what kids can do, which renders them less useful to an employer.
My first job after doing a lot of farm work on my grandfather's and great uncle's farms was driving sheeting on a seawall crew with a 110 lb sheeting hammer. I was 14. It was hot hard work, but paid much better than minimum wage (got me in shape, too).
Nowadays, kids just are not allowed to do that sort of work.
I just can't blame them for not being excited over a fast-food job.
Out in South California all McDonalds are “Little Mexicos” you must speak Spanglish to work there as all the orders and talk is in that language. Heck you almost need to speak Spanish to order. The Latinos have driven out the High Schoolers and Blacks. The Latinos are good hard working folks to be sure but I wonder of its all that good for the nation as a whole.
Mexico? Si.
I'd love to find a kid that would help out around my farm. Over the past 10 years or so I've hired, on average, one to three kids per summer to help out with mowing, weed eating, fence repair, etc. One kid out of about 15 I've hired actually stayed with me all summer (and he made a pile of cash in the process). The rest lasted two to four days before they either quit because "it's hot" or I had to let them go because they just wouldn't work. After the first two days of work, I reviewed the efforts of the most recent kid I hired this year and he blew up at me, screamed a bunch of vulgarities, flipped me off and told me to go do something that is physically impossible. This was a 13 year old, no less.
I pay cash, daily, and it's much better than minimum wage, but I expect them to work and work hard for their pay. That doesn't seem to fly with these cry baby kids these days......
I’ve had similar experiences, with similar results.
Part of it is a side-effect fo the two income paradigm, where parents substitute money or material goods for time spent with their kids.
We took pride in being able to work hard. The perks of responsibility were more responsibility, but that meant you were driving the tractor (at 8) running a bulldozer (at 10), hunting deer ( at 9), had your own boat (just a skiff, but a boat, at 10), and a bunch of stuff which laws have basically shut down since, but for us were part and parcel of the great rites of passage to manhood.
Because there is no cultural emphasis on self-respect, and because the law also hobbles the development of those who would be responsible and capable, you get a small fraction left who would jump at the chance, and a bunch who would rather water ski or fish on a video game than do the real thing.
The kids you get who are willing to work will likely be shakers and movers and the achievers of their generation. Some of the rest may develop later, but the former will be the core.
Work 'em, pay 'em, praise them when they do well, mentor them.
As for the ones who won't work, well at least they can add a reason to do well in school so they can get a soft job in out of the sun...or not and haunt their parent's basement and hang out on DU...
Maybe if you presented it as a chance to lose weight, increase muscle tone, increase stamina, and make money, too...
How do you say "Keep your filthy hands off me you perv?" in Spanish?
I'm pretty certain it's something like "no toucho".
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