OFF_TOPIC Re: Cows, Geopolitics, and Big Business Re: Re: Thy

April 11, 2009

I don't think a 10% increase in the minimum wage would lose all those jobs.

No one is advocating doubling the minimum wage. As far as I know, in this

area, there are jobs that students get at less than the minimum wage.They

just raised the minimum wage, and it looks like you are attributing the big

layoffs to that. I'd say that more than 90% (just my estimate) of the people

laid off were making way over the minimum wage, so the little increase had

nothing to do with them. In fact, companies tend to keep the lower paid

employees in hard times except for a couple of key employees that can lead

the rest. If the raise in minimum wage were the problem, you would be seeing

reporting of that all over the place.

I'd like to ask if you could work for less than $8.00 an hour in these times,

and if you did, what could you afford, food, gas, shelter, medical expenses,

dental expenses, telephone, pet food, auto repair, utilities, insurance,

clothing?

The list goes on, but the money doesn't. $320 used to be a living wage in the

50s and before, but not now.

Roni

<>Just because something

isn't seen doesn't mean it's

not there<>

> Roni, it is precisely because I've been in the poverty class when minimum wage

was increased; it resulted in a 'net loss' for me as well as everyone else I

knew who was also in that same 'income bracket'...my husband lost his job, as

did many others...I've also been just a little over the newly increased minimum

wage, along with all of my co-workers when it's happened; I again, saw what

happened to all of us! We all suddenly became 'poverty level'. It became more

difficult to keep up with living costs and we had to cut every thing in our

lives that weren't essential...we ate a lot of beans and rice!

>

>>>> One: The free market system works, in that it provides the most

>>>> benefits for the most people than any system in history.

>>>>

>>>> Two: Minimum wage is a total perversion of the free market system.

>>>>

>>>> Three: If it works why don't we just set the minimum wage at $20 or $30

>>>> per hour. That should REALLY help those whose actual output is about $3

>>>> per hour.

>>>>

>>>> NOTE: If you can follow the logic of why this last suggestion is pretty

>>>> stupid you will then understand why minimum wage laws in general are

>>>> pretty stupid.

>>>>

>>>> .

>>>>

>>>>> Posted by: " Roni Molin " matchermaam@

>>>>> <mailto:matchermaam@

>>>

?Subject=%20Re%3A%20Cows%2C%20Geopolitics%2C%20and%20Big%20Business%20Re%3A%2

>>> %5Bhypothyroidism%5D%20Re%3A%20Thy>

>>>>> matchermaam <matchermaam>

>>>>>

>>>>> Thu Apr 9, 2009 10:36 am (PDT)

>>>>>

>>>>> I agree about illegal aliens. As far as the minimum wage is concerned,

>>>>> how much does it cost you to feed your family per person per week? Why

>>>>> do you think it's all right for you to be able to feed yourself and

>>>>> your family, but you don't support fair treatment of all Americans to

>>>>> get a decent wage (not that minimum wage is decent, but it's a start).

>>>>> With homes being what they cost, food up in price every week, gas

>>>>> going crazy, heat and electric being ridiculous, why do you object to

>>>>> people who are WORKING and not sponging off the government (which I

>>>>> know you don't like) being able to house, clothe and feed their

>>> families?

>>>>> Roni

--

Steve - dudescholar4@...

Take World's Smallest Political Quiz at

http://www.theadvocates.org/quiz.html

" If a thousand old beliefs were ruined on our march

to truth we must still march on. " --Stopford

------------------------------------

April 11, 2009

Roni,

It's a continuous scale. If you raised the minimum wages to $100/hour,

a lot of people would get laid off, most of them. $50/hour would also

result in mostly layoffs. Keep decreasing it and you get less and less

layoffs. There is no magic point where employment stops increasing as

the minimum wage decreases except at 0, and there are people that even

work for that in volunteer organizations. At $6.55/hour there are less

workers than there would be at $5.15 - the only question is how many

workers were sacrificed on the alter of minimum wage laws for the last

increase.

Personally, I usually only hire people for piece work so the law doesn't

affect me. When I hire someone to do unskilled work in the yard, I pay

between $10 and $12 per hour. When I hired a moving company (they drove

only, did not pack or load) many years ago to move my goods across

country and then hired local labor to load the truck, our agreement in

about 1995 was $10/hour and I paid $20/hour at completion, something

that I didn't intend when I made the deal for the hourly rate. Those

guys didn't take breaks and didn't screw around. I got excellent

workers at both ends of my trip and I always negotiated the $10 rate and

paid $20/hour at completion. Those guys were happy campers. I paid

those rates because I was pleased with the work, it was worth $20/hour

in my opinion, and I paid them EVEN though I had been out of work for 8

months and wouldn't get my first paycheck for at least 3 more weeks AND

I would likely never ever see them again.

Four years ago I needed a 6100/sq ft home worked on. It needed a lot of

painting, not the whole thing, but quite a bit. I was in Utah and the

home I was trying to sell was in Las Vegas. After getting some painting

done via a company in Utah, I made a deal with the guys on the side to

drive down to Las Vegas and work on my house there. I would supply the

paint, they would provide the other supplies, and I would pay the whole

lot $15/hour each. The house was still decorated and furnished for top

showings and they each got a bedroom to stay in while they did the work

and I bought dinners. They worked all day and " spent " their earnings

every night. I got a $15,000 job done for about $1400 and they got to

party in Vegas. We were all happy with the price and the results.

The theory that the lower the minimum wage are, the less employers pay

for all labor is completely wrong. None of business people I've been

associated with has ever paid minimum wages to my knowledge. When you

get good workers, you pay good prices because you want to keep them or

of they are contract or piece type workers, you may want their efforts

again in the future. Treating people poorly is not a good competitive

strategy as happy employees will out compete the scrooges of the world

every bloody time. The scrooges use regulation and government influence

to level the playing field instead of doing quality work and paying

quality rates. Raising the minimum wages levels the playing field to

some degree between the quality employers and the scrooges, and thats

not the results desired.

As to what kind of work would I do for lower wages? I will do WHATEVER

it takes to advance my circumstances. If I couldn't get any other work,

I would shovel shit for $2/hour if necessary but you can be darned sure

that I would be scheming to figure out a more efficient way to shovel

sh*t and be scheming to become the lead sh*t shoveler and the manager of

all the leads, or be looking to do something else.

When I did unskilled work in my younger years from busboy to toilet

cleaning and janitorial work, I never got paid minimum wages. They

always started people higher than that AND gave a raise in the first

month or two. At least that's how it worked for me at all the places I

worked. I remember one day during a rush at the restaurant where I was

the busboy who got and loaded all the dirty dishes, the other worker

that was assigned to that time period was slow and just kept getting in

my way. I went to the manager and said " Get that guy out of here so I

can get the job done. " The manager sent him packing right then and I

did the work of two and still had time to waste.

Some people however barely get the job done if that no matter how much

they are paid. I never moved up in life because I did the job I was

hired to do. I moved up in life because I my goal was always to get the

work done at a level two pay grades above where I was. As a result, I

was always UNDERPAID and yet I was always paid more than everyone with

the same job title as me. I didn't hang out with the people who bitched

about their pay or the work.

Steve

Roni Molin wrote:

> I don't think a 10% increase in the minimum wage would lose all those jobs.

> No one is advocating doubling the minimum wage. As far as I know, in this

> area, there are jobs that students get at less than the minimum wage.They

> just raised the minimum wage, and it looks like you are attributing the big

> layoffs to that. I'd say that more than 90% (just my estimate) of the people

> laid off were making way over the minimum wage, so the little increase had

> nothing to do with them. In fact, companies tend to keep the lower paid

> employees in hard times except for a couple of key employees that can lead

> the rest. If the raise in minimum wage were the problem, you would be seeing

> reporting of that all over the place.

>

> I'd like to ask if you could work for less than $8.00 an hour in these times,

> and if you did, what could you afford, food, gas, shelter, medical expenses,

> dental expenses, telephone, pet food, auto repair, utilities, insurance,

clothing?

>

> The list goes on, but the money doesn't. $320 used to be a living wage in the

50s and before, but not now.

>

> Roni

> <>Just because something

> isn't seen doesn't mean it's

> not there<>

>

>> Roni, it is precisely because I've been in the poverty class when minimum

wage was increased; it resulted in a 'net loss' for me as well as everyone else

I knew who was also in that same 'income bracket'...my husband lost his job, as

did many others...I've also been just a little over the newly increased minimum

wage, along with all of my co-workers when it's happened; I again, saw what

happened to all of us! We all suddenly became 'poverty level'. It became more

difficult to keep up with living costs and we had to cut every thing in our

lives that weren't essential...we ate a lot of beans and rice!

>>

>>>>> One: The free market system works, in that it provides the most

>>>>> benefits for the most people than any system in history.

>>>>>

>>>>> Two: Minimum wage is a total perversion of the free market system.

>>>>>

>>>>> Three: If it works why don't we just set the minimum wage at $20 or $30

>>>>> per hour. That should REALLY help those whose actual output is about $3

>>>>> per hour.

>>>>>

>>>>> NOTE: If you can follow the logic of why this last suggestion is pretty

>>>>> stupid you will then understand why minimum wage laws in general are

>>>>> pretty stupid.

>>>>>

>>>>> .

>>>>>

>>>>>> Posted by: " Roni Molin " matchermaam@

>>>>>> <mailto:matchermaam@

>>>>

?Subject=%20Re%3A%20Cows%2C%20Geopolitics%2C%20and%20Big%20Business%20Re%3A%2

>>>> %5Bhypothyroidism%5D%20Re%3A%20Thy>

>>>>>> matchermaam <matchermaam>

>>>>>>

>>>>>> Thu Apr 9, 2009 10:36 am (PDT)

>>>>>>

>>>>>> I agree about illegal aliens. As far as the minimum wage is concerned,

>>>>>> how much does it cost you to feed your family per person per week? Why

>>>>>> do you think it's all right for you to be able to feed yourself and

>>>>>> your family, but you don't support fair treatment of all Americans to

>>>>>> get a decent wage (not that minimum wage is decent, but it's a start).

>>>>>> With homes being what they cost, food up in price every week, gas

>>>>>> going crazy, heat and electric being ridiculous, why do you object to

>>>>>> people who are WORKING and not sponging off the government (which I

>>>>>> know you don't like) being able to house, clothe and feed their

>>>> families?

>>>>>> Roni

>

--

Steve - dudescholar4@...

Take World's Smallest Political Quiz at

http://www.theadvocates.org/quiz.html

" If a thousand old beliefs were ruined on our march

to truth we must still march on. " --Stopford

April 11, 2009

I totally agree that paying people well for doing a good job is beneficial to

the boss as well as the worker. I just don't understand how this entire economy

breakdown seems to be blamed by some people on minimum wage. I don't think

anyone should not be able to get a decent paying job, and then provide good work

for it. If they don't then I have no qualms about letting them go. I don't wish

to be cheated any more than I wish to cheat any one else.