Posted on 05/25/2015 2:37:28 PM PDT by lowbridge
Did The New York Times just inadvertently tell us what the real goal of the raise-the-minimum-wage campaign is?
A Times editorial last week cheered Los Angeles’ enactment of a $15-an-hour minimum wage — but noted that restaurants, particularly fast-food joints, don’t like it. Said The Times: “The restaurant industry . . . will not go down without a fight.”
We didn’t think that bringing down an entire industry was what the campaign for a $15 minimum was supposed to be about. Oops.
Back in March, we noted that a similar hikein Seattle’s minimum wage was leading to a spate of local restaurant closings, given that labor costs account for 36 percent of the average restaurant’s earnings.
Case in point: Z Pizza, which has to shut down — putting all 11 employees out of work — because its owner can’t afford the higher labor costs. Ritu Shah Burnham says she tried layoffs, cutting hours, price hikes and not paying herself — to no avail.
(Excerpt) Read more at nypost.com ...
you can say that again
If the minimum wage were just adjusted to keep up with inflation or cost of living, whatever you want to call it, it would still be a bit under $10. I could see that, really, since in real terms it's just paying the same thing people were paid back then. $15, though, is totally out of line and especially for restaurants.
I think the bottom line is being able to make the argument that employees being paid with tax dollars aren't making enough money or aren't that much better off than people making minimum wage. Whatever the reason, there's a lot more to the drive for a $15 minimum wage than helping out the suckers who are soon to be unemployed due to the higher labor costs.
You can bet the people pushing for this know full well it'll put a lot of people out of work but it's still going to be part of their argument for higher tax paid wages sooner or later. Especially since they'll still be comparing apples to oranges by comparing full time tax paid employees with part time minimum wage employees who have nothing near the sort of benefits and work rules the tax sucking people do.
JMHo
legs not eggs
Ah, you seem to forget in 50/60, govt was small enough that one adult in the home could bring in enough for: 2 kids, a home, a car, TV, vacations, college....
Yet, I see NO authority for the ‘minimum wage’ to begin. In fact, I seem to recall something about interference in contracts (aka employment)....I’ll have to dig to pull it back up /s
I started at $1.20 in the mid-1960s working part-time while in high school after classes. As I became more valuable by learning more skills, the boss gave me raises. Skills like handling a torch, heavy machinery and machine skills; I soon quadrupled my salary, and then became a supervisor.
Kids nowadays think they deserve more money just by breathing. Nope, you have to prove value to your boss so you're too valuable to lose to someone else.
The large shops do have the advantage of moving money around in the hopes that the damage caused by the necessary price increases will ease over time. But business is business, and if your New York franchises are losing money on a permanent basis, you're not going to keep them open on the backs of the ones in Georgia and Oklahoma, you're going to close them.
And what's with those child labor laws, too? Any kid who has a parent that wants to contract the kid out to work somewhere or to sell the kids organs should be free to do so as long as they get a lawyer involved to make sure the contract is valid. Not to even mention the safety laws that were passed before there was even an OSHA.
I hear ya', the government should stay completely out of contracts. It's about time the Chinese are allowed to contract with Berkshire Hathaway to import opium, too. Just like the good old days when the Brits were advocates of the "invisible hand" fisting everyone except the nobility.
Great graphic which makes the point.
Kudos.
Question: What is a “fair” minimum wage?
Is it $10 per hour?
Is it $15 per hour?
Is it $20 per hour>
Is it $50 per hour?
Is it $100 per hour?
Is it $500 per hour?
Is it $1,000 per hour?
Now, at some point you're going to say “that's too high.”
WHY is it “too high”?
Is it too high because the employer cannot afford to pay it (or say they cannot)?
Is it too high because the worker's skills don't justify that high a level of pay?
Is it too high because you, a typical liberal customer, don't want to pay for the increased cost to YOU that such pay demands an owner charge his patrons in order to pay his employees?
In truth, you're saying that there is no reason for a minimum wage because the higher you raise the amount, the more negative effects the raise has.
What are those effects you ask?
Employers cut staff because the cost of their labor, the highest component of their prices, just took a huge spike.
Or, employers cut employee hours to minimize costs.
Or, the employer decided to automate his business to eliminate labor that's priced itself out of his ability to pay for the skills required of the employees.
Or, the employer decides to move to escape the jurisdiction of the minimum wage tyranny and the jobs are lost.
Or, the employer goes out of business and everyone loses their job.
Is raising the minimum wage about more pay for workers or destroying the employers of these workers? Does it ever occur to you that destroying the employer's businesses not only costs employees their jobs but it eliminates the TAXES both employer and employee pay on those wages. Who is supposed to make up the shortfall? You say you don't know? I thought you said you knew ALL the answers. Apparently you don't have a clue.
Therefore, dear liberal, why should any serious person listen to you?
I was listened ng to the 15 an hour idiots defending the city. They all say if the businesses can’t afford the extra costs then they should not have been in business anyway. And when confronted by the fact that people leave town to shop cheaper places then they say that’s why 15 an hour needs to go national.
The real goal is to cause unemployment among the poor and low-skilled so they can’t get on the economic l;adder and remain dependent on leftists for their entire lives.
It’s called “compassion.”
Big Business can afford the hit from the minimum wage increase, but small businesses can’t. Thus, the left’s support for it.
Go to any of the real estate websites and look up the cost of a single family home in the Los Angeles basin. $1 million will get you into a basic 2 or 3 bedroom home built 100 years ago on a 1500 sq ft lot. $1 million means at least $5000 a month mortgage. Assuming there are 2 breadwinners in the home each will need to make in the area of $50 per hour. $50 may not even cover it when you consider that Uncle Sam is going to take at least 20% of that net, the State of CA will take ~9% via income tax plus another 10% in sales taxes (and more in other taxes), and the County of L.A. will take $15,000 a year in property taxes on that home. So no way, $15 is not enough. $50 will barely do it if you have a spouse.
Maybe you could work in LA and live far away, which is what this law will encourage of course, people will begin to trade cost/benefits and there will be great competition for jobs inside the LA basin. Why would employers hire an unskilled worker when they could get someone with skills at this higher wage? And why wouldn’t an unskilled worker trade $3 an hour in additional expenses (gas, living, car, food etc) to swap her $10 job for a $15 job? So many unintended consequences will arise. And what of the employers who were paying $15 now? Won’t they be sort of expected to bump everyone to $20 or $23? What kind of internal disruptions (or, strife) will this foment? Indeed a lot of equal and opposite reactions will ensue.
As I read, in 2014 even the increased volume of illegal immigration to Mexifornia didn't make up for the businesses and individual taxpayers fleeing. This exodus has been increasing every year. Sooner or later this experiment in organized theft by the state to cement the illegal alien/public employee union vote as the lynchpin of the Donkey Party ruling class will reach a tipping point. The Donkeys will run out of money to steal and their house of cards will crash down. I wonder if this will cause a reverse mass migration to Mexico for the illegal aliens? Who knows where the broke public employee union/political hack crooks will go?
I do believe the time is drawing near when fast food places including pizza shops will try to automate their services, and I certainly can’t see why a good portion of it couldn’t be done.
I have a feeling, if things keep progressing they way they are going, unfortunately we haven’t seen anything yet. As I stated many times in the past, we live in very interesting times...and yes please pass the popcorn..
...What kind of internal disruptions (or, strife) will this foment? Indeed a lot of equal and opposite reactions will ensue.
**************************
Very good overall posting. Since you’re in CA, it provides a good view of what’s going on.
straw-man much?
Yep, it was horrible, just HORRIBLE I say, that one parent could support the family and the other RAISE their children.
Problem with those Socialist tendencies, from the R or L...that pesky Constitution and the simple English it’s written.
Course, even when children *had* to work, in our recent past, their 8th grade education still produced some of the finest minds to usher in our early 20th century.
bttt
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.