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Minimum wage hypocrisy

Loren Pechtel said:
http://thepunditpress.com/2014/10/1...-20hr-min-wage-offers-13hr-for-web-developer/



Obviously it's really about making big business pay more.
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I noticed nobody has answered this OP yet so I will take a crack at it. First, nobody I know is advocating $20 per hour for flipping hamburgers...at least not immediately. When I was a boy, a quart of milk cost 25 cents. Today, even at the ultracheap 99cent store, it costs $1.19. By the way, that milk is a real bargain. Gas then, even premium gas was $.249 per gallon. Today, depending on what week it is, it is pushing $4.00 per gallon. It is not inconceivable that at some time in the future twenty bucks would end up being a basic minimum wage...and that future is not too far off.

The main complaint people like Loren have with raising the minimum wage is the simply the limitations of his Utopian capitalist system that is INCAPABLE OF meeting the needs of all our people. $10 to $15 per hour is not all that unreasonable today, depending on where you are. Loren is defending a system that indeed cannot survive the exigencies of today's world, which incidentally was caused by his Utopian system. It just doesn't work.

Let's get on with the business of redistributing the wealth more fairly and stop listening to foot draggers. It is true that egalitarian solutions to social and environmental problems cannot fit within the framework of Capitalism as it now stands. It restricts demand more and more as it concentrates wealth in fewer and fewer handa. At the same time, the alleged target of Capitalism (continuous economic growth) is not even a remote possibility in a world with limited natural resources. Loren needs to hit the books and show us he is on the side of humanity and quit carping about evil stupid poor people causing all the trouble. Give them some money and they will become a demand. Our environmental solutions are a lot more complicated than that, but we could at least start with a well paid, well nourished and educated population.

People who work for third parties work in part as volunteers. Third parties are not industries, but rather the largesse of their membership. If a good IP man should volunteer to work for the socialists and accept $13 per hour to make it possible for him to do some political work, then so be it. It really has nothing to do with hypocrisy as Loren would have us believe.
 
arkirk said:
Let's get on with the business of redistributing the wealth more fairly and stop listening to foot draggers. It is true that egalitarian solutions to social and environmental problems cannot fit within the framework of Capitalism as it now stands. It restricts demand more and more as it concentrates wealth in fewer and fewer handa. At the same time, the alleged target of Capitalism (continuous economic growth) is not even a remote possibility in a world with limited natural resources. Loren needs to hit the books and show us he is on the side of humanity and quit carping about evil stupid poor people causing all the trouble. Give them some money and they will become a demand. Our environmental solutions are a lot more complicated than that, but we could at least start with a well paid, well nourished and educated population.
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You talk about redistribution but I don't really think you would like to see a true redistribution--even you would end up with less as the money went to the true poor of the world.
 
You mean to tell me that there are people in politics who are hypocrites?
 
There are examples of more equitable societies/economies/incomes than that of the US model. It can be done, and even the best examples can be improved on.
 
Loren Pechtel said:
arkirk said:
Let's get on with the business of redistributing the wealth more fairly and stop listening to foot draggers. It is true that egalitarian solutions to social and environmental problems cannot fit within the framework of Capitalism as it now stands. It restricts demand more and more as it concentrates wealth in fewer and fewer handa. At the same time, the alleged target of Capitalism (continuous economic growth) is not even a remote possibility in a world with limited natural resources. Loren needs to hit the books and show us he is on the side of humanity and quit carping about evil stupid poor people causing all the trouble. Give them some money and they will become a demand. Our environmental solutions are a lot more complicated than that, but we could at least start with a well paid, well nourished and educated population.
Click to expand...

You talk about redistribution but I don't really think you would like to see a true redistribution--even you would end up with less as the money went to the true poor of the world.
Click to expand...

You're still not getting it, Loren. I think I would like to see if perhaps all people were not homeless and not hungry and not hounded by enemies and sufficiently educated that they could stop having too many children. It wouldn't have anything to do with ME getting more or less money. We don't have to take a pie and cut it into billions of pieces. We have to design and build an economy that supports all the people. Now that is an unattainable goal, but it is a goal that even attempting to approach it is the civilized thing to be doing...in my estimation.

It really remains for the human race to discover for itself if there are enough resources to support all of us, and if not, what adjustments would make those resources serve us most efficiently. Some of our resources, we have to start serving. They are the environmental services..(things that nature provides for us, like watersheds, soils, and ecosystems that provide oxygen for us to breathe and water to keep us hydrated and food to keep us alive.

We need to dedicate the right amount of human labor to the public good and quit squabbling over our wretchedly unreliable money system. If nobody is hurt and a job is done for $13 per hour, that is fine. But when a wage system causes a child to come to the dinner table hungry and leave in the same condition, then it must be adjusted. The same type of adjustment went wanting in our system when so many people lost the roof over their heads in the housing crisis. We were able to build houses, but we were not capable of living in them once the big banks got involved. They're still there doing their dirt. There are so many areas of organization of our society that need updating and adjustment and are not getting any. That's because the focus is only on money and not the real world. To make matters worse, we have a system that rewards greed and aggression.
 
Apparently "A honest day's pay for an honest day's work" is no longer a thing.
 
arkirk said:
Loren Pechtel said:
http://thepunditpress.com/2014/10/1...-20hr-min-wage-offers-13hr-for-web-developer/



Obviously it's really about making big business pay more.
Click to expand...

I noticed nobody has answered this OP yet so I will take a crack at it. First, nobody I know is advocating $20 per hour for flipping hamburgers...at least not immediately. When I was a boy, a quart of milk cost 25 cents. Today, even at the ultracheap 99cent store, it costs $1.19. By the way, that milk is a real bargain. Gas then, even premium gas was $.249 per gallon. Today, depending on what week it is, it is pushing $4.00 per gallon. It is not inconceivable that at some time in the future twenty bucks would end up being a basic minimum wage...and that future is not too far off.

The main complaint people like Loren have with raising the minimum wage is the simply the limitations of his Utopian capitalist system that is INCAPABLE OF meeting the needs of all our people. $10 to $15 per hour is not all that unreasonable today, depending on where you are. Loren is defending a system that indeed cannot survive the exigencies of today's world, which incidentally was caused by his Utopian system. It just doesn't work.

Let's get on with the business of redistributing the wealth more fairly and stop listening to foot draggers. It is true that egalitarian solutions to social and environmental problems cannot fit within the framework of Capitalism as it now stands. It restricts demand more and more as it concentrates wealth in fewer and fewer handa. At the same time, the alleged target of Capitalism (continuous economic growth) is not even a remote possibility in a world with limited natural resources. Loren needs to hit the books and show us he is on the side of humanity and quit carping about evil stupid poor people causing all the trouble. Give them some money and they will become a demand. Our environmental solutions are a lot more complicated than that, but we could at least start with a well paid, well nourished and educated population.

People who work for third parties work in part as volunteers. Third parties are not industries, but rather the largesse of their membership. If a good IP man should volunteer to work for the socialists and accept $13 per hour to make it possible for him to do some political work, then so be it. It really has nothing to do with hypocrisy as Loren would have us believe.
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I disagree that capitalism can't provide for all of our citizens or protect the environment. There are a lot of countries where capitalism is being used to do both. Countries with a whole lot less income and wealth per capita than the US.

The workers' paradises weren't too good for the environment. And while they did achieve the equitable distribution of income they didn't achieve a high national income because they lacked the innovation, the willingness to accept risk and the reward for hard work that capitalism does.

We don't have to abandon capitalism to improve income distribution or to protect the environment. Nor do we have surrender to the known problems of unfettered capitalism that the free market fundamentalists like Loren advocate in order to avoid the certain disasters of social democracy including slip sliding to certain totalitarianism.
 
There is no hypocrisy here at all. A central reason for increasing the min wage is that companies that would like to do it on their own are limited having to compete in their prices with companies that will always pay as little as they can get away with. It is the same as the reason for most regulations, such as pollution. Most socially/morally responsible practices that costs the company more $ will tend not to be done at a widespread level without regulations that force all companies to do it. This is not because there are no owners who care about the issue, but because they will be pushed out of business by the more uncaring and ruthless companies that only act decently when forced. The fewer the regulations requiring decency, the more sociopathic and ruthless the companies that flourish from price competition. IOW, when there are no rules or they aren't enforced, those without decency and integrity tend to win.
So, it makes perfect sense for a company to push for a regulation requiring something that they would like to do, but cannot economically do it while their competition does not.

In addition, a minimum wage increase shifts more money into the hands of people who will immediately use it all to consume products and services that give more jobs and more pay to yet other workers, meaning more money among the workers who can afford to give more of it to support an organization that helps to push for these things that benefit them. They would be able to pay their workers more.


Anyone who thinks that it is hypocrisy to support requirements that one's own business does not currently meet doesn't grasp the most basic facts of economics or the meaning of the word hypocrisy.
 
Loren Pechtel said:
arkirk said:
Let's get on with the business of redistributing the wealth more fairly and stop listening to foot draggers. It is true that egalitarian solutions to social and environmental problems cannot fit within the framework of Capitalism as it now stands. It restricts demand more and more as it concentrates wealth in fewer and fewer handa. At the same time, the alleged target of Capitalism (continuous economic growth) is not even a remote possibility in a world with limited natural resources. Loren needs to hit the books and show us he is on the side of humanity and quit carping about evil stupid poor people causing all the trouble. Give them some money and they will become a demand. Our environmental solutions are a lot more complicated than that, but we could at least start with a well paid, well nourished and educated population.
Click to expand...

You talk about redistribution but I don't really think you would like to see a true redistribution--even you would end up with less as the money went to the true poor of the world.
Click to expand...

You jumped straight from "more fairly" which advocated at least making sure the bottom layer was not starving, homeless, wracked by insecurity and too ignorant to be able to plan their own future straight to "exactly equal". Why did you do that? It is not what was proposed, far from it.

Did you go out and buy straw to build this one, or did you just have it lying around?
 
Also I'd like to point out that most of the world is dirt poor and capitalist.
 
arkirk said:
Loren Pechtel said:
You talk about redistribution but I don't really think you would like to see a true redistribution--even you would end up with less as the money went to the true poor of the world.
Click to expand...

You're still not getting it, Loren. I think I would like to see if perhaps all people were not homeless and not hungry and not hounded by enemies and sufficiently educated that they could stop having too many children. It wouldn't have anything to do with ME getting more or less money. We don't have to take a pie and cut it into billions of pieces. We have to design and build an economy that supports all the people. Now that is an unattainable goal, but it is a goal that even attempting to approach it is the civilized thing to be doing...in my estimation.
Click to expand...

You think you have a small enough amount that nothing would be taken. If you look at the world's population, though, that's not the case.
 
Loren Pechtel said:
arkirk said:
Let's get on with the business of redistributing the wealth more fairly and stop listening to foot draggers. It is true that egalitarian solutions to social and environmental problems cannot fit within the framework of Capitalism as it now stands. It restricts demand more and more as it concentrates wealth in fewer and fewer handa. At the same time, the alleged target of Capitalism (continuous economic growth) is not even a remote possibility in a world with limited natural resources. Loren needs to hit the books and show us he is on the side of humanity and quit carping about evil stupid poor people causing all the trouble. Give them some money and they will become a demand. Our environmental solutions are a lot more complicated than that, but we could at least start with a well paid, well nourished and educated population.
Click to expand...

You talk about redistribution but I don't really think you would like to see a true redistribution--even you would end up with less as the money went to the true poor of the world.
Click to expand...

The economic policies of a nation determines the income distribution in that country. The policies of the US are now set up to distribute the gains from productivity and innovation pretty much exclusively to reward capital and wealth, limiting the gains to labor to inflation. If you exclude the 10% of the top earners the wages of the remaining 90% of earners has stayed the same or even gone down in real terms. It is redistribution to the wealthy. How can anyone justify this?
 
maxparrish said:
Nice Squirrel said:
Apparently "A honest day's pay for an honest day's work" is no longer a thing.
Click to expand...
Reminds me of an old joke among workers in the former Soviet Union:

"We pretend to work and they pretend to pay us".
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That kind of thing is rampant in the US and an inherent byproduct of unregulated capitalism. Employers wind up with all the power, and use it to treat their employees poorly and with disrespect. The employees rationally react as the adversary, rather then collaborator, that their employer treats them like. Just like the employer tries to pay the worker as little as he can get away with, the worker gives the employer as little as labor as he can get away with in return.
 
Loren Pechtel said:
arkirk said:
You're still not getting it, Loren. I think I would like to see if perhaps all people were not homeless and not hungry and not hounded by enemies and sufficiently educated that they could stop having too many children. It wouldn't have anything to do with ME getting more or less money. We don't have to take a pie and cut it into billions of pieces. We have to design and build an economy that supports all the people. Now that is an unattainable goal, but it is a goal that even attempting to approach it is the civilized thing to be doing...in my estimation.
Click to expand...

You think you have a small enough amount that nothing would be taken. If you look at the world's population, though, that's not the case.
Click to expand...

We are not trying to take care of the world's poor now by intentionally boosting the incomes of the wealthy. We are not even taking care of the poor in our country. Why do you think that it is our responsibility to take care of the world's poor if we decide to take care of the poor in this country?
 
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