Businesses brace for serious cuts for $15 minimum wage

[boutons_deux]

Here's What Texas Gets When It Elects Minimum Brains

Rick Perry: Government Shouldn’t Set A Minimum Wage

“I don’t think — I don’t think it’s government’s business to be setting the minimum wage out there,” Perry said. “And even the CBO said if you want to get rid of a half a million jobs between now and 2016, raise the minimum wage.”

the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago found that even when potential job losses are taken into account, an increase in the minimum wage to $9, as President Obama proposed in his 2013 State of the Union, would increase household spending by $28 billion, or 0.2 percent of GDP. That extra spending stimulates the economy, which can lead to more job growth.

Real world experience of state and local efforts to raise the minimum wage with the unemployment rate at 7 percent or more have also found that the rate actually declined 52 percent of the time and in a few cases remained unchanged.

Perry claimed that 95 percent of all the wages in Texas are above minimum wage, but the state leads the nation in the number and percentage of minimum wage jobs. Nationwide, American workers’ wages are growing at just 2 percent per year, the slowest rate since at least 1965.

http://thinkprogress.org/economy/201...-minimum-wage/

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In Real Life, Higher Minimum Wage Doesn’t Kill Jobs

Economists and government officials endlessly speculate on the impact of raising the $7.25 federal minimum wage.

Most recently, a report by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said that raising the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour might cut employment by 500,000 workers. That is balanced by the projection that higher pay could also boost about 900,000 people out of poverty.

But some places in the U.S. already have real-life experience with raising their minimum wage.

Washington state, for example, has the nation’s highest rate, $9.32 an hour. Despite dire predictions that increases would cripple job growth and boost unemployment, this isn’t what happened.

At 6.6 percent, the unemployment rate in December was a click below the U.S. average, 6.7 percent, and the state’s job creation is sturdy, 16th in the nation, according to a report by Stateline, the news service of the Pew Charitable Trusts.

In Seattle, where metropolitan-area unemployment is 5.3 percent, that $9.32 sounds so yesterday. The mayor and city council are practically in a race to see who can move faster and with more gusto to increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Safe bet: They will make a move by summer. Seattle could then surpass San Francisco, another city that fancies its role as a laboratory.
The City by the Bay’s minimum wage is the highest (not counting airport workers), at $10.74 an hour, and officials are discussing a new rate of about $15.

While Seattle and San Francisco are unrepresentative of the nation, they have helped pressure their states to raise their minimum wages. Fifteen years ago, Washington voters approved an initiative giving the lowest-paid workers a raise almost every year, with increases now tied to inflation.

Those increases produced the highest U.S. rate, although California could lap that in 2016 when it hits $10 an hour. Washington governor Jay Inslee and Democratic legislators have been pushing to raise the statewide amount to almost $11 or $12 an hour, but that now seems unlikely this year.

Critics of the voter-approved increase in Washington said it would harm the economy and cause businesses to flee to lower-wage states, such as neighboring Idaho, where the minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. That didn’t happen, as the experience of Washington counties bordering Idaho show.

At the Olive Garden in Coeur D’Alene, Idaho, the spaghetti and meatballs are about $1.70 cheaper than at the Olive Garden about a half-hour away in Spokane, Washington. That may be explained by Idaho’s lower minimum wage, taxes, land costs or something else. A restaurant spokeswoman would only cite vague costs of products and of doing business in various locations. Whatever it is hasn’t stopped Olive Garden from operating two restaurants in the Spokane area.

Bruce Beckett, government affairs director of the Washington Restaurant Association, said he wasn’t aware of any restaurants bailing out of Spokane for Idaho. He said he had heard anecdotes about local restaurateurs buying cheaper supplies in Idaho — fairly small potatoes.

http://www.nationalmemo.com/real-lif...snt-kill-jobs/

[Wild Cobra]

Washington state, for example, has the nation’s highest rate, $9.32 an hour. Despite dire predictions that increases would cripple job growth and boost unemployment, this isn’t what happened.

You have to remember. Oregon and Washington have had higher minimum wage level for for nearly 100 years. This is not sudden change for us here in the Pacific NW. If you wish to do this on a Federal scale, then it needs to be implemented slowly. Maybe an extra 2% to 4% per quarter, until the desired levels are archived. I don't think having a higher minim wage is going to cause us any significant harm, unless it's done in such a manner that it creates economic shock. I don't think it will do any good either, unless you consider more inflation good.

[Nbadan]

Inflation is gonna happen either way...at some point we have to increase wages so that consumers have money to drive the economy..no disposable money, no domestic economic growth..

[boutons_deux]

Minimum wage hike would cut food stamp spending by $4.6 billion a year

Raising the minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour would reduce federal food stamp spending by $4.6 billion a year, according to a report to be released Wednesday by the liberal-leaning Center for American Progress.

The proposal, a top legislative priority for President Obama and congressional Democrats, would reduce enrollment in the food stamp program by as much as 9.2 percent, the report said.

A report last month from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said about 15 percent of the nation’s workforce would see wages rise under Obama’s plan to raise the minimum wage, adding that the increase would lift 900,000 people out of poverty.

The CAP report, which was written by University of California Berkeley researchers Rachel West and Michael Reich, is the latest in a line of research highlighting the connection between low-wage work and government support programs.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/busine...d1394&hpid=z15

Repugs/Ryan: no minimum wage hike AND cut their benefits, they're poor and therefore deserve to be punished, by Repugs acting on behalf of God, for being poor.

Dems: hike the minimum wage AND extend their benefits.

[TSA]

Minimum wage hike would cut food stamp spending by $4.6 billion a year

Raising the minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour would reduce federal food stamp spending by $4.6 billion a year, according to a report to be released Wednesday by the liberal-leaning Center for American Progress.

The proposal, a top legislative priority for President Obama and congressional Democrats, would reduce enrollment in the food stamp program by as much as 9.2 percent, the report said.

A report last month from the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said about 15 percent of the nation’s workforce would see wages rise under Obama’s plan to raise the minimum wage, adding that the increase would lift 900,000 people out of poverty.

The CAP report, which was written by University of California Berkeley researchers Rachel West and Michael Reich, is the latest in a line of research highlighting the connection between low-wage work and government support programs.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/busine...d1394&hpid=z15

Repugs/Ryan: no minimum wage hike AND cut their benefits, they're poor and therefore deserve to be punished, by Repugs acting on behalf of God, for being poor.

Dems: hike the minimum wage AND extend their benefits.

http://www.anncoulter.com/columns/2014-02-26.html

Democrats believe they've hit on the perfect issue to distract from the horror of Obamacare in the 2014 elections: the minimum wage.

Apparently, increasing the minimum wage was not important for American workers during the first five years of Obama's presidency -- least of all his first two years, when Democrats controlled Congress and could have passed anything. (And did!)

No. The minimum wage did not become a pressing concern until an election year in which the public's hatred of Obamacare is expected to be the central issue.

As The New York Times explained, Democrats see the minimum wage as an issue that "will place Republican candidates in a difficult position," and also as a tool "to enlarge the electorate in a nonpresidential election, when turnout among minorities and youths typically drops off."

(Unlike Republicans, Democrats consider it important to win elections.)

To most people, it seems as if the Democrats are giving workers something for nothing. But there are always tradeoffs. No serious economist denies that increasing the minimum wage will cost jobs. If it's not worth paying someone $10 an hour to do something, the job will be eliminated -- or it simply won't be created.

The minimum wage is the perfect Democratic issue. It will screw the very people it claims to help, while making Democrats look like saviors of the working class, either by getting them a higher wage or providing them with generous government benefits when they lose their jobs because of the mandatory wage hike.

Of course, the reason American workers’ wages are so low in the first place is because of the Democrats' policies on immigration. Republicans might want to point that out.

Since the late 1960s, the Democrats have been dumping about a million low-skilled immigrants on the country every year, driving down wages, especially at the lower end of the spectrum.

According to Harvard economist George Borjas, our immigration policies have reduced American wages by $402 billion a year -- while increasing profits for employers by $437 billion a year. (That's minus what they have to pay to the government in taxes to support their out-of-work former employees. Of course, we're all forced to share that tax burden.)



Or, as the White House puts it on its website promoting an increase in the minimum wage, "Today, the real value of the minimum wage has fallen by nearly one-third since its peak in 1968."

Why were wages so high until 1968? Because that's when Teddy Kennedy's 1965 Immigration Act kicked in, bringing in about a million immigrants a year, almost 90 percent of them unskilled workers from the Third World.

Our immigration policies massively redistribute wealth from the poorest Americans to the richest. It's a basic law of economics that when the supply goes up, the price goes down. More workers means the price of their labor plummets.

Unfortunately, politicians spend a lot more time talking to rich employers than to working-class Americans. And the rich apparently have an insatiable appe e for cheap labor.

Having artificially created a glut of low-wage workers, now Democrats want to artificially raise their wages.

It's win-win-win-win-win for Democrats.

-- Employees who get a higher minimum wage are grateful to the Democrats.

-- Employees who lose their jobs because of the minimum wage hike are grateful to the Democrats for generous government handouts.

-- Poor immigrants who need government benefits are grateful to the Democrats.

-- American businesses enjoying the deluge of cheap labor are grateful to the Democrats.

-- Democratic politicians guaranteed re-election by virtue of ethnic bloc voting are grateful to the Democrats.

Do Republicans have any principles at all? Why isn't the GOP demanding an end to this dump of unskilled workers/Democratic voters on the country?

Democrats show how much they love the poor by importing a million more of them to America each year. But then they prevent the last batch of poor immigrants from getting decent, well-paying jobs by bringing in another million poor people the next year.

You want a higher minimum wage? Turn off the spigot of low-wage workers pouring in to the U.S. and it will rise on its own through the iron law of supply and demand.

In response to the Democrats' minimum wage proposal, Republicans should introduce a bill ending both legal and illegal immigration until the minimum wage rises naturally to $14 an hour.

Australia has a $15 minimum wage for adults -- more than twice the U.S. minimum wage. Meanwhile, their official unemployment rate is lower than ours: 6 percent compared to 6.6 percent in the U.S. -- and that's with a lousy $7.25 minimum wage.

Sound good? Try immigrating there. Australia has some of the most restrictive immigration policies in the world. Their approach to immigration is to admit only people who will be good for Australia. (Weird!) Applicants are evaluated on a point system that gives preference to youth, English proficiency, education and skill level.

Similarly, New Zealand will soon have an official minimum wage of $14.25 for adults. Even our Democrats aren't proposing that! New Zealand's minimum wage hit $10.10 -- the Democrats' current proposal for us -- back in 2006. Their unemployment rate is also 6 percent -- up from several years of 4 percent unemployment a few years ago.

Like Australia, New Zealand's immigration laws are based on helping New Zealand, not on helping other countries get rid of their poor people, which is our policy.

Instead of training the citizenry to look at the government as our paternal benefactor, distributing minimum wage laws and unemployment benefits in important election years, why don't Republicans put an end to the artificial glut of low-wage, low-skilled workers being imposed on the country by our immigration laws?

Republicans could guarantee a $14 minimum wage simply by closing the pipeline of more than 1 million poor immigrants coming in every year.

Businessmen will gripe, but maybe the GOP could explain to their Chamber of Commerce friends that they will help them by slashing oppressive regulations, reining in government bureaucracies, passing tort reform, etc. They'll also be able to cut taxes because the welfare state will shrink, a result of Americans going back to work.

But if the plutocrats insist on admitting another 30 million Democratic voters in order to get ever-cheaper labor, then, soon, Republicans won't be in a position to help them at all.

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"distract from the horror of Obamacare"

the only horror is that FABRICATED by Repugs who have deluded themselves into believing the HORROR is a winning Repug issue, like Benghazi, IRS, food stamps provide luxury goods, etc, etc.

[TSA]

"distract from the horror of Obamacare"

the only horror is that FABRICATED by Repugs who have deluded themselves into believing the HORROR is a winning Repug issue, like Benghazi, IRS, food stamps provide luxury goods, etc, etc.

Seriously, that's your only rebuttal?

[boutons_deux]

Seriously, that's your only rebuttal?

seriously, you think Ann Coulter is anything but an extreme right-wing provocateur, you think she's serious?

[Th'Pusher]

seriously, you think Ann Coulter is anything but an extreme right-wing provocateur, you think she's serious?

No joke. Come on TSA. ing Ann Coulter?

[TSA]

No joke. Come on TSA. ing Ann Coulter?

I like Coulter as much as I like Maddow. Having said that, remove the democrat/republican drivel and she brings up some good points.

"Our immigration policies massively redistribute wealth from the poorest Americans to the richest. It's a basic law of economics that when the supply goes up, the price goes down. More workers means the price of their labor plummets. Unfortunately, politicians spend a lot more time talking to rich employers than to working-class Americans. And the rich apparently have an insatiable appe e for cheap labor."

"Government" show how much they love the poor by importing a million more of them to America each year. But then they prevent the last batch of poor immigrants from getting decent, well-paying jobs by bringing in another million poor people the next year. Turn off the spigot of low-wage workers pouring in to the U.S. and it will rise on its own through the iron law of supply and demand."

[boutons_deux]

"More workers means the price of their labor plummets."

supply and demand?

bull , undoc workers are ripped off, wage theft, raped, exploited by the business people that Randian AC adores. As undoc workers, they have NO bargaining power.

the govt doesn't import workers. NAFTA destroyed millions of MX subsistence farmers AND stopped MX govt from subsidizing them. In desperation, guess where they went looking for work? Perot's "huge sucking sound" was USA sucking MX workers across the border.

AC's point just suck.

[TSA]

lax immigration policies=importing

[TSA]

bull , undoc workers are ripped off, wage theft, raped, exploited by the business people that Randian AC adores. As undoc workers, they have NO bargaining power.

She says as much right here.

"Unfortunately, politicians spend a lot more time talking to rich employers than to working-class Americans. And the rich apparently have an insatiable appe e for cheap labor."

[Nbadan]

Highest Minimum-Wage State Washington Beats U.S. in Job Creation
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-0...with-jobs.html

When Washington residents voted in 1998 to raise the state’s minimum wage and link it to the cost of living, opponents warned the measure would be a job-killer. The prediction hasn’t been borne out.

In the 15 years that followed, the state’s minimum wage climbed to $9.32 -- the highest in the country. Meanwhile job growth continued at an average 0.8 percent annual pace, 0.3 percentage point above the national rate. Payrolls at Washington’s restaurants and bars, portrayed as particularly vulnerable to higher wage costs, expanded by 21 percent. Poverty has trailed the U.S. level for at least seven years.

The debate is replaying on a national scale as Democrats led by President Barack Obama push for an increase in the $7.25-an-hour federal minimum, while opponents argue a raise would hurt those it’s intended to help by axing jobs for the lowest-skilled. Even if that proves true, Washington’s example shows that any such effects aren’t big enough to throw its economy and labor market off the tracks.


“It’s hard to see that the state of Washington has paid a heavy penalty for having a higher minimum wage than the rest of the country,” said Gary Burtless, an economist at Brookings Ins ution who formerly was at the U.S. Labor Department.
43

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Repugs, and their asshole voters here, are blatantly Bad For The American People.

[pgardn]

So what would occur if there was NO minimum wage?

Your own thoughts please, gleaned from what you know about the whole debate.
These questions need to be asked. Is there even a need for minimum wage?
If yes, then please explain how you determine what it should be. ( seems a minimum wage for the entire country will go a lot further in some States than others )

I have read on this topic and it seems as if both sides can present data to bolster their claims, so back to fundamentals. I look forward to trying to getting a better grip on this topic, thus an answer to the most fundamental question is appreciated.

[boutons_deux]

you can't answer that yourself?

no minimum wage would mean asshole employers would pay a couple $/hour. Would mean an increase in unemployment since people would refuse to work for such ty wages, and go welfare, or into the black market

Repugs also want to repeal child labor laws so kids can be paid wages.

[pgardn]

you can't answer that yourself?

no minimum wage would mean asshole employers would pay a couple $/hour. Would mean an increase in unemployment since people would refuse to work for such ty wages, and go welfare, or into the black market

Repugs also want to repeal child labor laws so kids can be paid wages.

So having good employees unwilling to work is good for business? As an employer I would want good workers, otherwise I don't survive. I would try to negotiate a reasonable wage. I beat the asshole employers because I have good reliable workers as opposed to a bunch of crapy workers I can't rely on.

Thats too simple Boots.

The child labor issue is what got minimum wage started. I got that.

[boutons_deux]

So having good employees unwilling to work is good for business? As an employer I would want good workers, otherwise I don't survive. I would try to negotiate a reasonable wage. I beat the asshole employers because I have good reliable workers as opposed to a bunch of crapy workers I can't rely on.

Thats too simple Boots.

The child labor issue is what got minimum wage started. I got that.

you pay peanuts, you get monkeys (disengaged, unreliable employees, high turnover, don't-GAF at ude towards their bosses or customers). This is true of K12 teachers, too. Pay throw-away wages, get throw-away workers.

[pgardn]

you pay peanuts, you get monkeys (disengaged, unreliable employees, high turnover, don't-GAF at ude towards their bosses or customers). This is true of K12 teachers, too. Pay throw-away wages, get throw-away workers.

Do monkeys deserve minimum wage?

Most of my HS teachers were very good. And elementary. Don't remember MS

[Wild Cobra]

Highest Minimum-Wage State Washington Beats U.S. in Job Creation
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-0...with-jobs.html

Correlation equals causation...

I think not.

I can correlate so many other things, but I would be making it up like your source is.

[TeyshaBlue]

The article was pointing out that the min wage increase did not cause a decrease in jobs. Their conclusion is demonstrably true. :facepalm

[boutons_deux]

Robert Reich: Lousy wages are the real job killers

When in 1996 I recommended the minimum wage be raised, Republicans and the Chamber screamed it would “kill jobs.” In fact, in the four years after it was raised, the U.S. economy created more jobs than were ever created in any four-year period.

For one thing, a higher minimum wage doesn’t necessarily increase business costs. It draws more job applicants into the labor market, giving employers more choice of whom to hire. As a result, employers often get more reliable workers who remain longer – thereby saving employers at least as much money as they spend on higher wages.

A higher wage can also help build employee morale, resulting in better performance. Gap, America’s largest clothing retailer, recently announced it would boost its hourly wage to $10. Wall Street approved. “You treat people well, they’ll treat your customers well,” said Dorothy Lakner, a Wall Street analyst. “Gap had a strong year last year compared to a lot of their peers. That sends a pretty strong message to employees that, ‘we had a good year, but you’re going to be rewarded too.’”

Even when raising the minimum wage — or bargaining for higher wages and better working conditions, or requiring businesses to provide safer workplaces or a cleaner environment — increases the cost of business, this doesn’t necessarily kill jobs.

Most companies today can easily absorb such costs without reducing payrolls. Corporate profits now account for the largest percentage of the economy on record. Large companies are sitting on more than $1.5 trillion in cash they don’t even know what to do with. Many are using their cash to buy back their own shares of stock – artificially increasing share value by reducing the number of shares traded on the market.

---

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Walmart spent $7.6 billion last year buying back shares of its own stock — a move that papered over its falling profits. Had it used that money on wages instead, it could have given its workers a raise from around $9 an hour to almost $15. Arguably, that would have been a better use of the money over the long-term – not only improving worker loyalty and morale but also giving workers enough to buy more goods from Walmart (reminiscent of Henry Ford’s pay strategy a century ago).

There’s also a deeper issue here. Even assuming some of these measures might cause some job losses, does that mean we shouldn’t proceed with them?

Americans need jobs, but we also need minimally decent jobs. The nation could create millions of jobs tomorrow if we eliminated the minimum wage altogether and allowed employers to pay workers $1 an hour or less. But do we really want to do that?

Likewise, America could create lots of jobs if all health and safety regulations were repealed, but that would subject millions of workers to severe illness and injury.

Lots of jobs could be added if all environmental rules were eliminated, but that would result in the kind of air and water pollution that many people in poor nations have to contend with daily.

If the Affordable Care Act were repealed, hundreds of thousands of Americans would have to go back to working at jobs they don’t want but feel compelled to do in order to get health insurance.

We’d create jobs, but not progress. Progress requires creating more jobs that pay well, are safe, sustain the environment, and provide a modi of security. If seeking to achieve a minimum level of decency ends up “killing” some jobs, then maybe those aren’t the kind of jobs we ought to try to preserve in the first place.

Finally, it’s important to remember the real source of job creation. Businesses hire more workers only when they have more customers. When they have fewer customers, they lay off workers. So the real job creators are consumers with enough money to buy.

Even Walmart may be starting to understand this. The company is “looking at” whether to support a minimum wage increase. David Tovar, a Walmart spokesman, noted that such a move would increase the company’s payroll costs but would also put more money in the pockets of some of Walmart’s customers.

In other words, forget what you’re hearing from the Republicans and the Chamber of Commerce. The real job killers in America are lousy jobs at lousy wages.

http://www.salon.com/2014/03/01/robe...llers_partner/

[Wild Cobra]

The article was pointing out that the min wage increase did not cause a decrease in jobs. Their conclusion is demonstrably true. :facepalm

I was responding to what Dan wrote, not the article or quote. The le suggests falsehood. I have lived in the northwest all my life except when I was in the military.

Its not excessive at $9.32, and Oregon's not far behind for minimum wage at $9.10 per hr. It neither helps the economic conditions or hurt it because such higher minimum wages were going on for decades in both states. Minimum wage increases that are slow and predicable are not a problem. The notion of suddenly increasing minimum wage to like $15/hr that this thread is about is ridiculous. If we are to choose such a number as a goal, or even the $10+, then maybe we should increase it by double or triple the change in cost of living per quarter. But do things in slow progressive step. Not suddenly.