After admitting that you're not always right, you will find your conservative friend more willing to listen. Then it's time to make the case for why he or she should consider looking at things in a different light. The most important thing is to NEVER make the "moral" argument about why the Pentagon should get less money or why a sick child deserves to see a doctor. We have tried those arguments and they don't work with conservatives, so save your breath. Begin every point with this one sentence: "I want you to make more MONEY!" Then take a stab at discussing the issues with them:
Right, Michael... Leftists are so much more "moral" than conservatives... Because they believe in taking other peoples' money and giving it to those they believe "deserve it." Of course the pentagon should get less money in MM-Land! After all, providing for the national defense is one of the primary jobs of the federal government... And it's even codified in the Constitution... The last time I checked, paying doctors to see sick children isn't there.
And the only reason that a leftist might want you to make more money is to force you into a higher tax bracket, so they can steal more from you, to give it to "the deserving," after taking a hefty chunk for themselves...
Paying workers more money makes you money!
Dear brother-in-law, when you don't pay people enough for them to take care of life's essentials, it ends up costing you and everybody else a lot of money. When you pay your employees more money, what do you think they do with it? Invest it in stocks? Hoard it in offshore accounts? No! They spend it! And what do they spend it on? The stuff you make and sell! If you pay people squat, or lay them off, they can't buy your stuff. They become a drain on the economy; some turn to crime, and when they turn to crime, it's your Mercedes they want, not some junker Oldsmobile in their poor neighbour's driveway.
So, just how much should everyone get paid? Is $15.00 and hour OK? Nah... Let's just say $10.00/hr for the time being... Going from $6.00 an hour to $10 an hour is roughly a 66% pay raise... Not bad. But just how much is that going to increase to cost to business owners? Well, let's see... There would be increased unemployment and workmans comp insurance costs... And of course, the additional social security and medicare taxes that the employer would have to pay. Just in salary and SS/Medicare, the additional cost for a $6/hr worker to 10/hr would run $172 for a 40 hour week. I wonder just how much the employer would have to raise his prices to cover those costs: Or just how many people might have to have their jobs or hours cut? Yup... Raising pay across the board will make you more money... Of course you'll soon be paying $8.00 for a hamburger, but no big deal, right?
Providing daycare for your employees will make you money!
Absenteeism is a huge drain on our gross national product. Estimates put its cost to our economy as high as $50bn a year. The average employer loses almost $800 a year per employee due to unscheduled absences. Forty-five per cent of the time an employee is a no-show for personal or family reasons. Which means that mom or dad has taken time off from work because the babysitter didn't show up, or the kids were sick and needed to go to the doctor, etc, etc. This, my conservative friend, costs your business money.
The last time I checked, a daycare center will NOT take a sick child, for fear of having the sickness spread. So, you could have the most wonderful daycare center in the world, but unless you also provide a doctor and isolation wards, as usual, MM provides a solution that doesn't address the problem that he was talking about in the first place.
For the price of an on-site daycare room or facility, the company can make more money, you can make more money, and the babysitters can get real jobs with benefits.
Hmmm... Most "baby sitters" are not old enough to get a "real job with real benefits." Besides, Michael, due to your previous point, there won't be all that many entry level jobs any more. Do day care centers at work increase productivity and make for happier workers? Studies say "YES," however not for any of the reasons you give, you bonehead! If a company can afford to do so, they do. But it's hard for a smaller company to come up with the $$$ to do it (especially if you've jacked up the costs of the workers!)
Joining a union will make you money!
If you are a worker, and not a boss, who considers himself a conservative and hates unions, I have one question: why? If you want to make more money, "union" is the way to go. According to the US department of labour, union workers make an average of $717 a week. Non-union workers like you make an average of $573 a week. Being a conservative is about you and you making as much money as you can. So why stay non-union?
I was in a union once... I was living in NY at the time, which was NOT a "right to work" state. I was in high school, and wanted to get a job at a pharmacy. I got the job, but I found out that it was a union company. I had a part time job, and was being paid $3.35 an hour, which was minimum wage at the time. As I recall, they wanted me to pay a rather large amount of my pay into a union, and I wasn't even eligible for the benefits, being a part time worker! As I recall, the cost of being in the union was around a .45 an hour TAX! And you're right! Unions can force the employers to pay more, even if it's driving the company out of business... If I recall correctly, Eastern Airlines had a machinists union that refused to let those money grubbing, bastard "bosses" exploit their workers! They refused to give in... I wonder just how many people lost their jobs due to the union, and I wonder if their unemployment was equal to the $717 that Michael Moore touts?
You know, I can't even continue... Reading MM's garbage makes my head hurt, and makes me sick to my stomach. I can understand why MM can come up with this trash, though. He doesn't have anything in his head that can hurt!
Mark