Posted on 07/08/2009 3:21:53 AM PDT by MartinaMisc
AS IF the recession hasn’t been rough enough on those near the bottom of the economic food chain, fresh bad news is on the way. Beginning July 24, the federal government will be making it more difficult for employers to hire low-skilled and unskilled American workers. Thanks to an ill-advised law enacted with bipartisan support in 2007, the cost of providing an entry-level job to individuals with few skills or minimal experience will be going up by more than 10 percent. Those who cannot find a job paying at least $7.25 an hour will not be permitted to work.
Welcome to the latest chapter of America’s minimum-wage folly.
This will mark the third time in recent years that Washington has forced up the cost of employing low-skilled workers. Last July the minimum hourly wage was increased from $5.85 to $6.55; the July before that, from $5.15 to $5.85. By the end of this month, in other words, the lowest rung on the employment ladder will be nearly 41 percent higher than it was just two years ago. Needless to say, that will put it beyond the reach of many marginal workers, leaving them without work.
Those who press for a higher minimum wage often claim that making entry-level jobs more expensive won’t reduce the number of entry-level jobs. Were the government to compel a 41 percent increase in the price of gasoline or movie tickets or steel, every rational observer would expect a drop in the demand for gasoline, movie tickets, or steel. Yet when it comes to the minimum wage, politicians and journalists somehow persuade themselves that making workers more expensive won’t reduce the demand for workers.
(Excerpt) Read more at boston.com ...
Well, it will raise the demand for workers who are willing to be paid under the table, or who are hired on fixed price contracts.
That’s a plus, right? No? Never mind.
My daughter works at a kiosk in a mall and usually can’t get more than 8 hours a week. This may eliminate her job entirely. Thanks Congress! At this rate she may never move out!
Don’t forget that under many union contracts journeyman wages are kept at x times the lowest paid workers. So, it’s not just the entry level workers who will getting more per hour.
Thomas Sowell discusses this brilliantly in his book “Basic Economics: A Citizen’s Guide to The Economy”.
Ol’ Jeff Jacoby, the lone remaining token conservative at the Boston Fishwrap does a good job here as well...
Detroit tried that. A citywide minimum wage that was higher than the national one.
We know how all of those progressive experiments worked out in Detroit now, don’t we?
The Liberals turned what was once one of the world’s most prosperous cities into an impoverished ghetto where the average home price is now around $7,500 and falling.
Most fast food restaurants and retail stores will be letting workers go because sales have not risen to pay the extra wages. These types of jobs were not meant to provide a living, they are first jobs for teenagers with no skills.
Minimum-wage laws don’t make low- and unskilled Americans more productive, more experienced, or more desirable. They merely make them more expensive - and more likely, therefore, to be unemployed.
Sorry, forgot the quotation marks.
“Minimum-wage laws don’t make low- and unskilled Americans more productive, more experienced, or more desirable. They merely make them more expensive - and more likely, therefore, to be unemployed.”
the cost of providing an entry-level job to individuals with few skills or minimal experience will be going up by more than 10 percent.The purpose of a business is not to provide jobs, the purpose of a business is to get credit for doing something useful (such credit being known as "money"). The purpose of getting a job is, of course, the same thing.Those who cannot find a job paying at least $7.25 an hour will not be permitted to work.
Nonsense. Of course they will be permitted to work; they just won't be permitted to work for money. They can volunteer until they starve - just not for anyone who will lead them to do work which is sufficiently worthwhile to be rewarded with money.
When the cost of labor goes beyond the benefit to the employer they either one do without or two find a way to do the work without labor.
I am old enough to remember a lot of jobs once done by non-skilled people that have been replaced by automation or self service.
Raising the minimum wage does nothing but raise cost and raise unemployment.
And if I'm going to have to wait half an hour at McDonald's because they've only got one kid running register, I'll turn around and walk out.
He is thrilled to even have a job in this economy, and grateful that they re hired him, but he will be training (if they hire anyone else) someone making the same amount as him.
My Dad, after retiring, took a part time job driving a medical transport job. It is for fun only, but he will now only be a "minimum wage worker" after getting a raise (I think he makes all of $7.20/hour right now).
With such a huge increase at one time, there will be millions of part time workers, who have worked a couple of years at a job, that will now also be "minimum wagers", and I am sure they won't be happy about it.
If I owned a small business, I would feel morally obligated to raise the wages of my dependable staff to above min. wage.
But then you'd look at the state of the economy and you wouldn't. And even though your company is healthy and making a profit, you're looking to the future and making decisions based on 'what's coming next?'
See, you've just raised the price of your product in order to meet the new wage requirements, you also had to cut back on your bottom line, including people's hours (since that's your biggest expense), and put in place a hiring freeze -- not because you can't hire anyone else, but because due to the governments heavy hand you don't want to commit to another employee with all the added expense that implies. So you tweak your business model and hunker down for the coming economic storm.
Government is not here to help, that's for certain.
When will liberals get it through their heads, that regardless of the amount, minimum wage will ALWAYS be minimum wage?
“If I owned a small business, I would feel morally obligated to raise the wages of my dependable staff to above min. wage.”
Sorry, my husband and I own a small business and this attitude is going by the wayside. We do have some employees that we gave a higher hourly wage, but with the change in Missouri’s minimum wage and now the federal minimum wage we cannot continue to do so.
In fact, we will probably eliminate a few jobs after the summer season—something we have done each time the minimum wage is increased. We have been in business for more than 30 years and provided hundreds of jobs for kids entering the workforce. The other effect of raising the minimum wage is that we used to really work with the kids and give them plenty of time to adjust to holding a job. Now they are out the door if they cannot catch on quickly.
I tell our employees that we do not decide their wages anymore—the government does. This is unfair to employees who have been with us for a long time, but we are not taking risks in owning a business so that we can break even at the end of the day.
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