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“Not to mention that fact that you and your wife ought to see a paycheck somewhere in that mix. Have you ever done that, Bob?
I have. More times than I can tell you.
The fact is, there is only so much pie to go around in any business. McDonalds restaurants may do lots of business, but there’s only so much any one store can carve off for payroll. Just like there’s only so much they can charge for a Big Mac. At the end of the day, you can only pay your employees what the market will support.”

Yes I have.
If the company can’t pay wages that even keep their employees just a bit below the poverty line, then by the free market principle, shouldn’t they close the doors.

Also we’re not talking about a family run small business like the one you described. We’re talking about a national chain. Someone pointed out that the stores are franchises but they still have a lot of heft from being part of a national chain.

If the only way they can stay open is by paying substandard wages, or hiring illegals, then hasn’t the free market spoken?

I guess if they can’t afford the arbitrary regulations imposed by the behemoth in DC, the “free market” has spoken?

seriously?

We could see every retail level establishment in the country put all their employees on part time schedules because of Obamacare and other needless regulations.... but you think they should all shut down because the “free market has spoken”??

If Obama imposes a 100% tax on business and businesses shut down, its the “free market” that has spoken?

If workers walk off the job and you aren’t allowed to replace them, is that somehow the “free market” too?

Here is the test. If these $8 an hour workers refuse to work, let us see if this business can replace them. If it can with people who are willing to work, then the “free market has spoken”.

‘kay?

Yes I have.

Bob, I read through your posts on the thread, and nowhere did you relate your personal experiences as a business owner. You say you paid a competent professional to do some work for you once, but that's very different from owning and running a real business for an extended length of time.

Frankly, your posts throughout this thread read exactly like someone who's always been (and still is) a wage earner, not an entrepreneur.

If the company can’t pay wages that even keep their employees just a bit below the poverty line, then by the free market principle, shouldn’t they close the doors.

Whose free market principles are those? Karl Marx'? SEIU's? Obama's?

The free market is just that -- free. It's trade conducted between willing sellers, and willing buyers. If I have a shop that sells cheap hamburgers to customers of modest means, then there's only so much I can afford to pay someone to flip patties for me. There's just not that much profit margin built into the sales price of the product.

Just as I offer the public a decent sandwich for a cheap price, I offer a low paying burger flipping job to anyone who's willing to do that menial job for the pay. Not everyone will take it, but there are some who (for whatever personal reasons) will.

Not everyone will buy my burgers, either. Some folks want a better meal, and are willing to pay more to get it. It's a free market, and they've got choices. So do people looking for employment. Not everyone's going to be willing to flip burgers for me for what I can afford to pay, but that's alright. It's a free market. They're free to try and sell their labor to someone who can afford to pay more. Like the more expensive restaurant up the road.

There isn't any rule in free market capitalism that says you MUST provide a 'living wage' to everyone who works for you. Some jobs simply don't have that level of real world exchange value. Sorry, but that's just elementary economics at work.

The expectation that any job in the economy should pay a so-called 'living wage' is a total arbitrary invented by leftists. Everything has a value, including labor. Some types of labor is more valuable than others. Some has hardly any value at all. In a truly free market, there will always be someone who's willing to trade with you, if the perceived value of labor to dollars is equitable.