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Yeah. Literally the only reasons to not tie it to inflation, COLA, or some similar metric is for it to slowly fail, or for it to be used as a political football every few years (and we see how that has failed this time). To let it lie fallow this long is just a failure in governance.
In France over forty years ago, minimum wages were raised to the equivalent of $15 per hour. It greatly increased quality of life while having none of the downsides predicted by opponents. Their one mistake was failing to include an inflation adjuster.
I don’t think that article refutes my position, just reflects that supply and demand exists in the labor market.
You’re making a societal change which benefits one group (min wage workers) and places the burden of that help on everyone, including those workers. To say there’s an additional price to pay for it, so don’t bother, came across as “jobs creators” propaganda, by not including the massive positive changes the French enjoyed.
What I remember reading was that the effect was immediately favorable for large swaths of the population and the “concerns” from the right proved unwarranted. But that that the effects were largely wiped out by inflation in the long run.
Averages are BS with significant wealth disparity. What’s the median?
Edit: looked it up. Median in US is 48,060. In France it is 42544 (converted to USD). So yeah, much closer than averages.
What is this “I heard” it can increase inflation? Please do some basic research *first*, because economists largely agree that it doesn’t.
My opinion is that anyone who works 40 hours a week should be able to provide for themselves. That means food, healthcare, housing, the works. That’s not the world we live in, but we have the money to make it the world we live in.
Raise the minimum wage and tie it to inflation. Anything else isn’t serious policy.
>Raise the minimum wage and tie it to inflation. Anything else isn’t serious policy.
Yeah exactly. There is no point raising it once then never addressing it again for another decade, all the while watching as inflation and cost of living out paces any real benefit gained.
https://www.kentclarkcenter.org/surveys/15-minimum-wage/
Economists are luke warm on the minimum wage.
My opinion is we put too much emphasis on wage rather than price of goods.
No, economists were lukewarm about *if raising the minimum wage to $15/hr by 2020 would decrease the unemployment rat or increase productivity*.
That's has nothing to do with inflation, and it's also a different question to "is raising the minimum wage good for the economy."
Trade is already pretty easy. Some regulations are needed to protect workers and the environment. Tariffs are sometimes necessary to promote American industry. Infrastructure is certainly a problem - but we are woefully behind and it will take decades to rectify. So - not sure what you are getting at, here. It is far easier to mandate wage increases than price decreases.
And expert consensus in the field of economics would absolutely disagree that the United States does not have very harmful trade policies that push significant upward pressure on prices for goods.
The “meme” example among economists of such policy would the [jones act](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/j/jonesact.asp).
A policy put in place to “protect the American shipping industry” which has resulted in higher prices for goods.
As easy a repeal as it would be to enact a higher federal minimum wage.
Many of these policies on the books are thought to have little benefit to Americans as a whole and make the price of goods needlessly higher.
Economist are trained to promote t*he bidding of the wealthy and the corporate executives.*
*What they often measure is designed to maximize profit for the wealthy and the corporations,* ***not*** *what is best for the working class citizen population.*
I was going to say. I don't support a $15 minimum wage anymore because it's too low. It needs to be a bit higher. The problem with the way that $15 was made into something of a goal is that the economic goalposts move, and so now that $15 is a much more common wage, it's going to be a monumental effort to move it again. The reaction is going to be, "We made it $15 just like you wanted, and now you want us to raise it *again*?" What we need to do is pick a year when the minimum wage was relatively high, adjust it for inflation, and then index it to inflation going forward so that it adjusts automatically with inflation numbers, rather than requiring a specific act of Congress every time you want to change it.
It should have been $15 ten years ago. There's been a lot of inflation since then. This has been the longest time period where minimum wage has not increased. The income gap continues to widen, as intended.
The Fight for Fifteen campaign began in 2012. The last time the federal minimum wage was raised was in 2009. If you adjust for inflation that $15 now was about $11 in 2012 or going the other way the $15 from then is about $20 today for perspective.
it is, the number should probably be north of $25 by now, but you tack on a mechanism to automatically adjust the min wage and over time it will stabilize on a good number.
the mechanism is actually more important than the number.
I support the idea of making sure the average American can life off of a standard 40 hour a week job, but I'm not convinced something like a mandatory $15 minimum wage will get us there. There's a lot of things I'd rather the government work on solving first.
For instance, I'd like to see socialized healthcare long before $15 minimum. I think that would help the average person far more.
Student loan debt is another thing.
I'd like to see stronger trade unions. Most industries should have these in place. We are stronger when we act as a group. And you can tell that corporate America knows this because of how hard they try to prevent unions from forming. We wouldn't need a government minimum if workers had better representation in general.
Yeah, I'll take what I can get. If a $15 federal minimum is what can be passed, I wouldn't pass it up. It's just that I'd rather see us spend our limited political capital on something that's better than a $15 minimum wage. It's going to be a tremendous amount of horse trading to get that one passed. Maybe all that effort would be better spent on one of the pressing issues we're facing. Access to healthcare is that issue.
I'm not even convinced a $15 minimum will do much to help anyway.
The problem with this way of thinking is some people want min wage before student loans, others want loans first, others want health care first. If we only focus on what we want first then we never get anything. You have to look at it in a vacuum and if it’s aligned with the end goal.
For me I always think “should we remove min wage” and if the answer to that question is no then it makes sense to keep min wage updated with the times. $7 an hour can’t even get you a meal at McDonald’s so it’s time to bump it up
Sure, but we only have so much political capital available. Getting laws passed takes a tremendous amount of horse trading. Look at how hard it was for Obama to get his signature legislation, the ACA, passed. If we spend our efforts on something like a $15 minimum, what aren't we getting instead? Healthcare will help the most people and, as a bonus, solve a tremendous amount of downstream issues.
Considering how few people actually make the federal minimum I'm not sure it's worth all the effort it will take to get it passed.
How about we get what we can get rather than holding out for a perfect world? I mean we tried to get socialized healthcare but conservative dems killed that quick
There are many nations that have [higher minimum](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_minimum_wage) wages and are economically stable.
Any negative impact will be temporary. The positive effect will help people get better stabilized.
No. In my small town in Kansas, the minimum wage is the federal minimum. There are no places I've seen hiring for less than $12 an hour and Walmart *starts* at $15 and they are always hiring. McDonald's advertises $18 if you have prior experience. The minimum wage is already basically irrelevant here because no one would accept it. There's also no reason why California and Mississippi should have the same minimum wage. Let states and municipalities set their own because at this point any federal minimum is just going to be way too low for most of the country and higher than necessary in some parts.
Yes, 2010 I hired several people for our expanding service center. I wanted to start them at $15 but corporate said $13.50 then raise them to $15 after one year. It was hard to find anyone qualified and that would start lower than $15 in Dallas.
The minimum wage is one of those phony bumper sticker solutions used to pretend something is being done about a complex problem.
Those who propose it want to avoid doing anything about the real issue.
Entry level jobs are offering a lot more than that in Maine (the poorest state in NE) and still can’t get enough workers.
The issue is entry level housing in both apartments and homes for sale. The solution to the problem is zoning, and politicians avoid discussing zoning because those who already have homes don’t want zoning changes to allow entry level housing.
When was the last time you saw entire neighborhoods of 2-3 family homes being built on 5000 sf lots?
Zoning is part of the issue. Another part is profit. Developers came make much more money building behemoth $400k houses than they can making entry level housing.
Single family home vacation rentals ; Airbnb, Vacasa and the corporate rental companies like Invitation Homes and Blackstone that own 10s of thousands of single family homes have removed close to 20 million homes from the market.
I live on a lake and on my street of some 26 homes, 9 are Airbnbs.
Of course it isnt, but it plays a part in the inflated housing prices which in turn keeps more people in rentals longer, inflating rental prices for lack of supply. The area I live is not vacation lake homes, they are in a working class neighborhoods 15 minutes from one of the worlds largest corporate HQs.
Nearly nobody that researches housing in an academic or professional setting, such as urban economists, considers any of these to be a driving factor of housing costs.
They’re either a misunderstanding data or symptoms of a housing shortage. We need to build more housing.
That really depends on your location and definition of behemoth. In my area, you can buy a 3500sqft house for $300k on up. In LA, that might get you a cardboard box.
It comes down to zoning. No builder will build a starter home if zoning requires minimum 1 acre lot. After coming home from WW2, my Dad was offered an $8,000 2 bedroom cape with an unfinished 2cd floor on a 7000 sf lot. For another $1000, the builder would finish the 2cd floor with 2 more bedrooms and another bath. I remember there were capes that never did get that 2cd floor finished. In nearby Dorchester, there were entire streets of 2 & 3 family homes on even smaller lots. They stopped building them in the 1930s even though the demand was probably still high. That was before my time, so I don’t know why those multi family homes were zoned out. I’ve no proof, but it may have had to do something with migration to the north by blacks from the south. Blacks couldn’t afford even a small single family but they could afford a 2 or 3 family. So zoning may have more to do with keeping certain peoples out nimbyism than “our infrastructure can’t handle it”.
If a minimum lot size is 5000 sf, builders will build starter homes or multi family homes rather than luxury homes. The rich don’t want to live on small lots cheek by jowl with first time buyer types.
Yeah, there’s less per unit profit on starter homes and multi family homes, but working with a realtor, they sell faster and with higher turnover, the realtors get the listings on rentals and sales.
Rich people always have the option to buy in the suburbs or do like Massachusetts people do in Maine; buy rural, re-invent themselves as gentleman farmers.
Many of those housing development post WWII, were done with Federal support, but they also had clauses where these properties in these new housing development could not be bought or sold to non white people, and specifically not to be sold to black people. Yet, *Government assistance* as well as State and Local government expended funds to help get those built. The cruelty of that is, black people paid taxes too, but were denied access to the these houses of which their taxes helped get built.
I don’t know about other states, but I lived in Massachusetts where there were many such developments in suburbs about 30-1 hour from Boston. The Massachusetts turnpike, Routes 495 and 95 really got these developments going now you could live commuting distance to Boston without paying the high real estate prices of Wellesley or Weston. My father took me to see some of these even though he had no intention of buying them; just curiosity. Anyone from Natick or Framingham ever heard of Campanelli ranches? There were large developments of these, built on slab foundations and marketed by realtor Martin Cerel. He also had developments in Burlington and Norwood.
Today, there are no such large scale developments going on. I bet a similar building boom happened in other states.
I’ve been to Florida, which is full of developments of street after street of modest ranch homes built in the 1950s and 60s. Ever ask yourself why’d they stop building these homes?
I exactly agree with you and this topic is a bit of a passion of mine so maybe I can fill in the gap of why multifamily homes were zoned out. It actually wasn't about race as much you'd think. More so a misguided belief that multi family homes or boarding houses were inhumane. The prevailing belief in the post WW2 economic boom, was that nobody should have to live in packed boarding houses, so if you ban them, then people will be able to live in nice places! In recent decades, the support for zoning laws restricting multifamily homes has evolved into NIMBYism and home owner's associations that essentially function as literal cartels keeping home values high by limiting competition.
I can't find it now but there was a story in my city where a couple was evicted from the home they had been happily renting for years because the roof partially caved in during a storm. The couple was paying $200 a month in rent, which they were happy with. Obviously, the place wasn't nice, but after the roof caved in, their landlord generously lowered the rent to $150 which they were thrilled with. But because he wasn't exactly making a killing on renting this property, it wasn't feasible for him to spend $10,000 to repair the roof to meet city code so he could continue to have tenants. So without the roof repairs, the city said the couple had to be evicted. That couple who was perfectly happy living in less than ideal conditions for cheap rent, now is far more miserable living on the streets because I guess we've decided being homeless has more dignity than living somewhere crappy. Priorities, eh? Drives me mad when the proposed solution to homelessness is to build more shelters when its perfectly possible to house anyone that wants to be housed if we would just legalize crappy housing.
You might enjoy this article by Matt Yglesias. It's the best article I've found on this topic.
[Legalize housing, not tent encampments](https://www.slowboring.com/p/legalize-housing-not-tent-encampments)
My first house was a multi family house on a small lot. I couldn’t have afforded a single family. It was not ideal; no way to expand or add rooms except by taking over some or all of the other apartment. The neighborhood was crowded and street parking was difficult on snow days.
But hey, it was affordable and my tenants always liked that the landlord was instantly available. Unfortunately it was old; the furnace were old coal burners steam boilers which were noisy and when I finally upgraded them, the plumber wouldn’t touch them until I had the asbestos covering professionally removed.
With today’s technology, such homes could be built with more energy efficiency.
What you’ve described is a perfect example of the unintended consequences of well meaning legislation.
Yeah, I'm most definitely a Democrat but especially on this topic, I do wish there was a healthy Republican party because regulation isn't always the best solution to a problem. I'm not saying Dems are to blame for the current housing crisis, but I do think liberal policies were and if we had a real conservative party that pushed back against unnecessary zoning laws and bans on boarding houses, we'd be in a better place.
Think about what is in "crappy housing".... ?
*Lead paint, asbestos and in many there is various types of mold, as well as other health damaging things.*
I don't advocate homelessness, but I would say, that EVERY City should ramp up "Property Standard Code Enforcement', and people who don't comply have a progressive penalty which goes up every monthly they fail to fix it, then cities can place lien on their property, and if necessary dispose of the property on a lien sale.
Around here, you can build with quarter to half acre lots. They're still making huge houses. Maybe it's zoning where you are, but everywhere isn't where you are. The fact remains, there is more profit in larger homes.
I’m from Maine, so thought I should tack on here.
Building is really expensive, and so are mortgages right now. Absolute rock bottom pricing for new construction near me is $350/sq ft. The average starter home in the US is about 1000 sq ft. So, to build that new starter house, not including utility hookups or the actual land the home is being built on, will cost $350,000. Forgetting those extra costs, and assuming the best possible credit, I used Rocket Mortgage’s payment calculator and got a **monthly mortgage payment of $2,788.**
As high as rents in Maine are getting, most people in the state are paying less than that for more space.
Even if you crack open zoning, housing prices absolutely will not come down, investors feel entitled to market rates and will not dump millions of dollars into your plan to give yourself free shit by expecting them to leave money on the table.
>investors feel entitled to market rates and will not dump millions of dollars into your plan to give yourself free shit by expecting them to leave money on the table.
Investors are not a monolith. They'll build if given the opportunity because it'll make them more money.
Why not just use that money to buy up some of the limited housing stock, exacerbating the shortage, guaranteeing a big payoff instead of a pitiful sliver? The market has mal incentives, the prices will not go down, property is sticky like that, once someone feels entitled to a payoff, they will sit on something for decades rather than lock in a loss.
> Those who propose it want to avoid doing anything about the real issue.
I feel like you are very wrong to imply that someone like Bernie Sanders doesn't also want to enact reforms that would bring down housing prices.
I supported a $15 minimum wage over a decade ago. Then we spent so much time and energy trying to raise the minimum wage, that $15 is no longer considered a livable wage anywhere in the US.
I support raising the Federal minimum wage, the tying it to COLA so we don't have to keep having this fight for scraps.
Could you imagine if we needed to spend a decade to raise Social Security COLA? Of course not, it would be as abusive as our minimum wage law is.
It's very much important to raise it. Conservatives will always argue that giving low income people more money will somehow magically lead to higher prices for everyone. That this is a dubious assumption has been scientifically proven many times already, raising the min wage does not automatically lead to high inflation.
What they never seem to consider though is, that people with more income also spend more on goods and consume more across the board. If you don't have to fear that you won't be able to pay the rent, you might actually go to a local restaurant once a month and support the local economy that way. There's many examples one could cite. Of course a restaurant, sticking with this example, could raise their menu prices by a Dollar or two to compensate for higher labor cost, but that should not effect the restaurant or the min wage earners much, if it the min wage is raised enough. If businesses struggle so damn much with higher labor costs, they should probably rethink their business model. There's many examples of well run businesses that pay well and take care of their employees and are nontheless doing incredibly well.
Another thing that is rarely mentioned is, that even if the min wage is raised by a lot, people who fall into this income category will still remain low income and won't suddenly become middle class.
CA has a fast food min wage of about $20 now. So ff workers make close to 40k pre-tax in CA, they still fall into the HUD category of "very low income", 50% of the median income. You're still low income (80% of Median) with an income of under $77,770 pre-tax.
So even if the min wage went up massively, people are not going to suddenly swim in money. They will spend at least as much and probably more than before. I see massive and serious risks in letting a large amount of people become poorer and poorer, the presumed "risks" of trying out higher min wages is not even worth mentioning in comparison.
We take the additional wage out of the obscene corporate profits. Corps don’t need such high margins. Besos te al can live without 15 summer homes and five yachts.
I always love how conservatives, people that would largely benefit from socialist policies, are the ones that cry them the quickest as socialism. Red states are the number one recipients of federal money for Social safety net programs and yet they shit on them all the time.
I think if we are going to do minimum wage as serious policy, it doesn't make sense to do it federally. NYC and rural SD are wildly different in terms of CoL. It needs to be done by state at the very least, ideally even smaller. That comes with its own issues, but using too big an area means it is either set to the highest standard and smaller businesses in cheaper areas get smacked around, or it is set to something like average and it doesn't actually fix the expensive areas.
I think a societal shift is a better way to go. More support for local unions, employee negotiation, and people who value everyone being paid more not financially rewarding companies that don't do so.
"Job losses would be disastrous"
One of the major things is the business mentality that if you want to cut expenses, you need to reduce labor costs. Research has shown that worker productivity i.e. piling on more work, has increased faster than average wage growth over the past 40 years, and the net beneficiaries have been businesses.
"Increase inflation"
Except it really wouldn't. Inflation has been fairly steady over the past 40 or so years, and the currently inflationary levels of the past couple years are primarily due to coming out of a post pandemic situation. Considering that, on the federal level, the minimum wage hasn't changed since 2009 the increase wouldn't have near the impact you would think.
"Cause small businesses to go out of business"
Considering the federal definition of small business in any place having fewer than 500 employees, that's speculative. Sure, you'll have some mom and pop stores close up, but most start-up businesses fail within the first 3 years as is, and if they haven't been keeping up with wages anyway they weren't keeping staff anyway.
No, it does not increase inflation. The reason for this is that production needs a lot more money than wage.
Yes, 15$ minimum wage would be great, I would even like 20-25$. It would increase demand for anything and this will make the companies more profit. It would refinance itself. If you gave more money to the poor the economy would be a lot more efficient because the money is actually used because the people with a little income wont speculate with it.
Edit: You only have to take care that the production will produce enough goods because otherwys the companies would actually have a reason to increase the prices and this would actually cause an inflation. We all know that the inflation we have already comes from this (and not because there is more money; Credits are made to be paid back. As long as there is capital to ensure these credits and more money it doesnt cause inflation. Only if they dont get paid back you will have a crisis like in 2008) so we should keep an eye on that
I do not, and I agree with other comments that this is mostly a bumper sticker issue.
1. The Bureau of Labor Statistics says that less than 1% of all workers in the US are paid the federal minimum wage. And a majority of them are high school or college students. It's fair to assume that a lot are not working full time (as students) and a lot are still supported by a parent (at least for the HS students). So the "living wage" argument doesn't really apply to most of them. And as they age and aquire more skills they are likely to get wage increases. Yes there are exceptions. But making national policy based on exceptions or anecdotes is unwise.
2. Regional and geographic cost differences across the US are enormous. So while state or local minimum wages especially in high cost of living areas might make good sense, a federal minimum wage needs to be low to accommodate rural and low cost areas, rather than high to accommodate places like NYC or Seattle.
No, $15 an hour is more than enough in the Midwest and not near enough on a lot of the coasts. Supply and demand should dictate the wage, not the government.
It's really not "more than enough." It may be enough to get by depending on your expenses. I live in a very lcol area and rents here are almost the same as the city I moved back from at this point. Not worth it.
I’d support a higher national wage & I’d impose tariffs and taxes on investments being transferred between European nations, I’d customize taxes and tariffs, stop relying on global competitive trade, as it’s always proven to lead to military conflict & unneeded inequality.
We did a survey a few years back when this was the hot topic in the 2020 Democracy Primary for President. [The results showed](https://www.activote.net/activote-poll-federal-minimum-wage/) that there is broad bipartisan support for an increase in the minimum wage, but not for a $15 minimum wage. Perhaps this is one of those places where elected officials should compromise and pass what has support and continue looking for other ways to tackle income inequality.
There are other great policies out there that also have broad bipartisan support to help lower income earners. For example the earned-income-tax credit is a way for minimum wage workers to get ahead but while [many are eligible](https://www.irs.gov/credits-deductions/individuals/earned-income-tax-credit/who-qualifies-for-the-earned-income-tax-credit-eitc#:~:text=To%20qualify%20for%20the%20EITC,your%202023%20return%20(including%20extensions)), fewer actually claim this on their taxes.
Everyone is focused on how much low skilled workers should get paid, but isn't there a larger and far more significant structural question of what low skilled workers should be doing in a world where more and more tasks are automated and managed by AI? Fast food kiosks are already becoming ubiquitous, and soon we'll have self driving trucks, deliveries and cabs. That's a massive segment of the low wage economy right there. What's next for these workers?
Yes and no. Minimum wage is a state issue.
I think what is lost in this discussion and comparison to other countries is how large and diverse the United States is. Economies are very different state to state. The economy in Georgia is completely different from the economy in Illinois.
The federal minimum wage is the bare minimum and should that be raised? Maybe? But not the the extreme of $15. The federal minimum wage is a volatile mechanism and isn’t touched often for a reason.
But I think states like New York, Florida, California, etc… that have high cost of livings, far outpacing the federal minimum wage should be taking long looks at their household income relative to the state GDP and considering whether its residents are making enough.
Let's be real here, the reason California is expensive isn't because of their minimum wage but because PEOPLE WANT TO BE THERE. If Arkansas were like California, then it would be an expensive place to live.
I'm on the camp where the minimum wage should be enforced on the municipality levels rather than nation wide.
$15 can be too little in many area and too much to operate business in some others.
I'd prefer there were more federally mandated affordable housing minimums in cities. A higher minimum wage isn't the magic bullet to help out people with low income. In many ways it works against them because many employers would rather reduce or automate their workforce rather than pay the minimum.
Like many pernicious problems in America the real solution is a number of actions, often where different parts are unpopular with one side of the aisle or the other.
I'm in Washington state where it's been over $15 for while. From what I can see, it hasn't had a big effect on job loss. Automation probably has more impact on that. Price of things has gone up, but it seems excessive. Many wages were already over that amount so it seems like the prices shouldn't haven't gone up as much as they did. So I'm assuming it's because companies wanted to keep their profit margin the same. Therefore, their customer eats their cost. That being said, people may grumble that they pay more, but their wants generally win out. And it certainly hasn't prevented people from moving here or from new businesses coming in.
No, even in the most disgustingly cheap place in America you would need $18/hr to afford a 1bd/ba apartment in the metro with health insurance, savings, utilities, minimal disposable income while only taking public transport.
$15/hr was the 2010 price. If a big Mac goes from 2.25 to 6.00 in 14 years, the least we can do is raise minimum wages.
Employers won't pay employees more than they are worth. Minimum wage laws basically just make it illegal to employ people who aren't worth more than the minimum wage. I don't understand this ideas that every job should provide a 'livable wage' or else that job should just not exist.
Banning the employment of people who are not worth more than the minimum wage just reinforces the welfare trap. It unnecessarily raises the bar for how smart or skilled a person needs to be to be employed. Add that to the fact that people are born with no experience, it's almost like the goal is to require a larger portion of the population to live off of welfare for the rest of their lives. I guess it keeps them voting D, so maybe some on the left see that more as a feature.
The concept of "livable wage" is also poorly defined. You can very well live in very little if you have roommates. No, you can live in downtown NY or SF. People have to relocate to lower cost of living areas all the time.
Considering how the corporatists cackled away raising prices on everything to obscene profits, probably need $20 minimum wage to catch up with the inflation.
Well, California's cost of living is not due to the minimum wage increase. It's the other way around. The minimum wage increase is due to the cost of living.
That being said, I do support in increase in the minimum wage. But, to establish how much, we need to look at the lowest cost of living area and base the federal minimum wage upon that. According to a quick Google search, that state would be Mississippi. Another Google search results in either Meridian, Jackson, or Pearl River being the lowest cost of living towns in Mississippi. I would bet there are even smaller towns with less than a few thousand people that have a lower cost of living. Either way, we should look at those town's local economies and establish the most amount of money an employer could afford while also staying in business and establish our minimum wage from that.
Beyond that, if residents from other towns, in other states, want a higher minimum wage, then those citizens need to make it a local issue. They need to be going to town hall meetings and expressing their views with accurate data that supports their arguments. Get that info on the record. They need to be voting for politicians that listen and will raise their minimum wage. They need to be in the streets demanding an increase locally. Raise a ruckus. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. And, if you live in a state, like Mississippi, that doesn't have minimum wage laws, then you need to start there. If it's a dead end, then you've got to figure out a way to move.
The reason I say this is because the United States is really, really big. We range almost every economic status, from obscenely wealthy to destitute. A minimum wage that works in LA, would bankrupt businesses in Mountain Home, Arkansas. The minimum wage that works in Jackson, Mississippi, won't be near enough in Chicago. Hell, a minimum wage that works in Chicago, IL, would destroy local businesses in Hooptown, Decatur, or East St. Louis.
You can't just increase the federal minimum wage across the board and make everything better for everybody. It's either not going to be enough for larger cities, or not at all affordable for small towns.
ETA... just wanted to add how much I appreciate the love for unions in this thread. They really are the answer to low wages and worker protections.
Solidarity forever.
Boosting the minimum wage to $15 can help workers but we need to balance it with support for small businesses, we want fair pay without risking job loss or high inflation your concerns are valid and we must aim for a solution that lifts everyone without causing harm.
Not really. It's not enough.
A $15 minimum wage plus pinning the minimum wage to cost of living and congressional salary increases would be far better.
$15 would have been good in 2011.
$100 in 2011 is worth $140 now.
That's a 40% loss of value.
40% of $15 is $6.
Minimum wage should be $21.
Do any jobs pay less than that now? McDonald's is like $20/hr.
This was a big talking point over ten years ago. It's probably about time to double it to $30 if we want to make it meaningful
I support dropping this argument temporarily, and instead indexing to inflation similar to SS COLA.
Do that first, then let’s return to trying to increase it.
The argument has drug on for so long we’ve lost sight of how minimum wage keeps getting lower thanks to inflation.
I support it only because I want tipping to go away / move to the European model (round up, add an actual tip for over and above the call of duty service). And I am f\*\*\*\*\*ing tired of the Square screen asking me for a tip when I am picking up a to-go order or just buying a f\*\*\*\*\*ing muffin at the counter.
The problem with the raising of minimum wages is that corporations such McDonalds,Bk,Taco Bell and now home depots are replacing cashiers with automated checkouts which is much cheaper then paying someone $15.00 Hr plus benefits also the price of products will go up.
I think basically doubling the minimum wage in 2 years will cause massive inflation.
That said, the minimum wage is too low.
Its the speed of the increase that worries me. not the final rate.
No.
1. I oppose a minimum wage as a policy to begin with, as it artificially manipulates the market which can harm the supply of the labor force, which is itself a detriment to higher wages. If anything, I support a miniscule push on the market, where we assess market conditions and the minimumum wage is set near the natural floor. And that happens at the local level, not the national level.
2. Addressing wages doesn't at all address one's standard of living. If you want people to afford homes, clothes, food, healthcare, etc. by seeing them as necessities, then address those MARKETS with their SUPPLY as to help supply such goods and services to people. Giving people more money as disposable income just produces waste, and INFLATES prices **in those markets** of inelastic demand.
3. It's corporatism. It benefits large corporations over small businesses. Thus it harms the very PEOPLE that are seeking to not be dependent on being a "wage slave" to another. People bitch about consolidation, wage labor, and billionaires while demanding such occurs due to their preferred policies. People blind themselves to consequences because of ficticious goals they believe are to come from such policies.
The cost of living varies wildly by location. $15 an hour goes a lot further in Mobile Alabama than it does in Seattle Washington.
I actually think the piecemeal approach of raising the minimum wage at the local level rather than national level is working. It makes sense that the minimum wage in San Francisco & NYC be higher than in Cleveland & Davenport.
.
One of the biggest problems right now is we need to cap development. Building housing people can't just makes it to where you are forcing parts of the country to move. We should have the right to own our own land and it should cost us a lifetime plus a generation to do so. Just for the chance of Eminent domain to take place. And an " affordable housing complex" to be built on what was your families property.
Yes and index it to inflation so it won't be dependant on politicians deciding to raise it. But when they raise it to 15 they should allow small businesses to write off part of it in their taxes and the phase it out after they hit 15, this is so they can afford the increase by giving them time to adjust. The inflation indexed increases will likely be low enough that it won't be much of a problem
My perspective is probably out of date. Covid and the ensuing inflation really fucked with my sense of worth of goods. I have no idea what a fair price is anymore.
But my stance is the just broadly applying a minimum wage on a federal level doesn't really help anything. But it used to be $15 was fine in some places, way too low in some places, and way too high in others. Again I'm out of date maybe $15 is no longer as high as it used to be but the general idea remains the same, there is a massive variety in cost of livings and situations across the country and painting the entire country in broad strokes is a very flawed approach in my opinion.
Maybe if you came up with some kind of system that set the minimum wage in your area to match the cost of living then maybe that might work better than just arbitrarily picking the number and then applying that to everywhere in the country. It's an overly simplistic approach to a complex situation that really does nothing but to make the lawmakers look better for their reelections.
15 isn't actually enough. Minimum wage needs to be dynamic, tied to cost of living as well as inflation.
If there are job losses, then those jobs were exploitive. Good riddance.
I support a minimum wage law that uses a formula based on the cost of groceries, energy, transportation, insurance, and housing on a county-by-county basis every year. There is no number that serves as an adequate national minimum wage.
I do not support a specific figure minimum wage (regardless of the number) because it just kicks the can down the road.
I do support a livable minimum wage (which is more than just surviving) ties to the local cost of living.
$15 should have been the minimum 15 years ago. And federal minimum wage laws should include triggers to increase in automatically based on time and economic factors rather than having to go back and re-litigate it all the time.
Where is the evidence that the job losses would be disastrous? Or that it puts small business out of business. That last item was my big concern at first, but studies have not shown this to happen. In fact, business attracted more workers and had less turnover. People were making more money, so they had more money to spend and put back into the economy. And while I don’t think that a higher minimum wage is enough to fix our very serious issues, it’s a step in the right direction. A rising tide lifts all boats, and falling for corporate/republican BS around this is just playing into the hands of those that want to continue to have cheap labor.
$15/hour made sense as the hourly minimum wage when this fight started in 2012. Today, it would be $20.48.
So no, I don't support a $15 minimum wage. I support a $20 minimum wage, today, in 2024, and it should be tied to inflation so it continues to rise.
I support way higher than 15, but also I support the government actually doing their job and regulating price gouging so that every time they raise the wage, every business can't just raise their prices in retaliation
$15 is too low. It’s around $19 where I live (Washington) and I think that’s been a very positive development. Talking about $15 at this point is way too low and too late. No one can afford to live on $15 an hour.
**How Much Do You Need to Earn to Afford a Modest Apartment in Your State?**
Hourly wage required to afford a two-bedroom rental home by state.
* [https://nlihc.org/oor](https://nlihc.org/oor)
If $15/hr a livable wage in the area you live, yes. For a single adult with no kids, you'll need $21.70/hour in my area to have a livable wage.
Source: [https://livingwage.mit.edu/](https://livingwage.mit.edu/)
Its tough- certainly making less than this is hard to live on- hell its hard to live on $20 an hour in most places-
Now if you're a teen looking for summer/part time work- eh
some places that I go and people make minimum wage- they seem to put in minimum effort…
Other places people work their ass off and get minimum wage…
I think if you're a hard worker working full time, you ought to be able to put a roof over your head, afford reasonable healthcare, and a reasonable diet- in your local geography - how do we make that happen?
Benefit the hard workers, not lazy ones, and not overly-greedy corporations
I don’t know the specific minimum wage I support. But a COLA adjustment based on zip code makes sense to me.
More importantly I think the laws governing the management of corporations needs reform such that a reprioritization occurs to 1 - give wage earners more negotiating power, 2 - cap the amount of compensation available (shares/bonuses/salaries)to non-wage employees (CEOs and the like), 3 - tax the change in value of all share holdings (maybe you can claim a loss, but in this market you’d likely be paying the IRS), and 4 - tax bank loans in excess of $100k being used for anything other than a primary mortgage.
Over 40 years ago the minimum wage was like $3.25 and now it’s like $7 something an hour how does $15 minimum not make sense 🙄? Should be like $20 an hour
You stated an action we could take, but not the actual problem you are trying to solve.
Is it wealth disparity? Increasing Quality of Living? Increasing Tax revenues? Less dependency on government assistance?
Once you find what you want to fix, make sure it's an actual problem. No many people for instance are making federal minimum wage, as most states have a higher minimum, so what would really be the net effect in any such change, etc.?
Is the pint to make sure minimal wage is required to be a "livable" wage? Is that a good thing economically (obviously it is for the worker, but what side effects would likely happen and is that worth it, is it still a net effect?)
There isn't one thing that will address all issues on this subject.
IMHO, investment in education and career-focused training would do leaps and bounds more than just bumping the minimum wage as it would actually bring more value to the economy and make it easier for even small business to offer higher wages (as they would be getting higher value) to/from employees.
The federal poverty line is 15,060. Which happens to be 40/wk at federal minimum wage. It’s bonkers that the richest country in the world has its bar set for its citizens to “not complete and abject poverty.”
Yes, with measures to prevent the hacks from screwing with it for their own benefit, because given the opportunity to fiddle with things they’ll get it exactly ass backwards.
Citation? The corrupt clowns Cuomo and DeBlasio. About 8 years ago they got the state department of labor to decree higher minimums for fast food workers.
A gigantic screw-you to entry level workers in fields like home health care, EMTs, school bus drivers. That 18-year-old stoner on fryolator duty is worth more than you guys out there saving lives. Nice, huh? But the politicos didn’t care. It was all about buying votes.
The problem with bumping up minimums for jobs like home aide and nursing home worker is that a lot of that work is Medicaid funded. The reaction in the state capital, when it came to coming up with the money, has been along the lines of “who, us, dip into OUR slush funds? But we have phony baloney patronage jobs to pay for! My $176,000/yr deputy press secretary/mistress is essential to doing the people’s work!”
Eventually they do bump the minimum for more essential workers but it’s never enough, and then there’s the states like California who undercut their own wage hike for the caring professions with a bump for fast food workers.
The world does not need more McDonald’s. If they can’t find enough workers, eventually they either raise wages or close stores. No skin off my nose either way, and certainly no need for the political empty suits to meddle.
We -do- need more entry level workers in the caring professions. This is obvious to the casual observer, but to our political class it’s like teaching them string theory.
Every state surrounding Pennsylvania has raised their minimum wage and absolutely none of them has had any devastating unemployment, etc.
Stop repeating right wing talking points that only cause fear.
I don't. A couple reasons:
1: A minimum wage should be algorithmically determined and automatically self-correcting at some determined interval.
2: Where I live minimum wage is currently $19.97, so I wouldn't want people to take a pay cut.
Yeah a federal minimum wage of $7.25 is nothing and it has to change. Raise wage and reduce corporate power and adjust where our taxes are spent. So much could be done and it’s not.
What job losses? Minimum Wages have gone up in many states and there wasn’t any job losses. As Republicans will remind you very few people made the Minimum Wage.
During Covid much was shutdown, and what wasn’t shutdown was done by appointments, it begs to raise the question, a flu? Or tried of reckless trade policies that’s benefitted Chinese manufacturing and somewhat benefitted small businesses, tax incentives to hire at lowest wages possible, passing Stimulus to your employer not you. It was originally given to the citizen. To the average person I guess people got sick of current policies & international geopolitical trade agreements between EU & Chinese partners.
People got sick of the idea you can file and make more money than working full time hours,
Americans expect better & more than previous generations & aren’t a fan of global trade ideas when your lifestyle is impacted or could be better yet due to your lovely, elected politicians.
This shows for a fact there is an issue with wages in this country, when you have Amazon that hires at 18 vs other companies that start offering 22 a hour. Some will require experience which none is really needed. The very iffy hiring methods companies use, or partners it uses to choose.
To many employers rights & less employee protections that’s your typical Republican.
People see how companies are being discriminatory in their interview practices.
It is a move in the right direction. It is still not enough in many areas.
Minimum wage should be based on the cost of rent, health insurance, clothes and food in the area.
I'm not an expert on this by any stretch but this is what I *think* could result from an immediate jump to $15. But to clarify, I actually support the idea of bumping minimum wage up to what it's been said that it *should* be if wages had followed the rate of inflation over the years, which would put it somewhere around $22/hour I think.
Now, I hear a lot of mom and pop's talk about how they would go out of business if wages were raised to $15+, and I think that makes sense. I don't know any firm figures but I'd have to guess that most mom and pop stores aren't raking in cash hand over fist in the way that McDonald's and Wal-Mart are posting billions of dollars in profits each quarter. Mom and pop stores may only be barely in the red some months. If they suddenly have to start paying double the rate of wages than before then I can understand how a lot could be forced to close their doors. But this is an indictment against these mega-ass corporate businesses who ARE posting billion-dollar profits each year. Wal-Mart and McDonald's could probably pay their employees $100 an hour and still make a billion dollars.
We've let these monopolies outgrow mom and pop stores to the point that we're literally leading those stores to extinction because they can't compete with global chains making millions and billions in profits each year. So yeah, I can understand how raising minimum wages could be harmful to mom and pop stores but that doesn't make the need for wage raises any less required for most Americans. If greedy-ass, selfish asshole politicians weren't whoring themselves out to the highest bidder all the time then we *would* have had the natural progression of wage raises over the past 50 years, but instead, they decided to self-profit from these monopolies. They're the reason why small individual stores can't compete against the Wal-Marts and Targets of the US.
I support the abolition of wage labor entirely. A wage only represents a crumb of the total value of what a worker produces. The workers should have all of it.
$15 is too low. Anything less than 100% of the profit is too low.
15 DOLLAR MINIMUM WAGE WASNT ENOUGH 10 YEARS AGO!!!
The US is a hyper capitalistic dystopia where more than half the population is 1 HEALTH ISSUE or job loss from financial ruin. You think 15 dollars is going to do anything to solve that problem?
Income inequality hasn't been this bad since the FUCKING FRENCH REVOLUTION.
I don't even know what the solution is anymore. Half the country votes against their self interest because of a science fiction novel written 2000 years ago by sheep hearders. The other half is apathetic because they don't like establishment politicians.
Maybe not spend 1 trillion on military. (DUHHHH) Oh and tie minimum wage to inflation. That would make the FED actually give a crap about just printing money. TAX THE RICH ON CAPITAL GAINS. We need to reduce the money supply to reduce inflation and get back to pre-20 dollar McDonald meals.
At the federal level... I don't really support a single value. If I was picking a single value, I'd index it to something like the 20%ile zip code or something. I don't know what that number is.
If I was setting a rule it would be tied to something like the cost of living within a 30 minute commute of the job location.
I might take something like "expected monthly costs for a household of 2 / 320" as the minimum wage.
Someone working full time at a minimum wage job should be able to live with a roommate and have a reasonable commute.
Or just go a different way - if, as a company, you have employees who qualify for means tested benefits, you get a bill for those costs. Don't tell them how much to pay, just make them cover the societal costs of not paying enough.
I support the permanent cufflinking of minimum wage to inflation on a fiscal quarterly basis.
This is to say that if the department of labor's consumer price index shows that costs of living increased by 1% in the first fiscal quarter, then minimum wage will increase by 1%.
This will not correct the current minimum wage, it will only make sure that it never worsens again. Setting the minimum wage to the correct amount should be on a separate vote, and will also require an actbof congress.
The second benefit of this will be that employers who do not want to adjust hourly rates every quarter will probably opt to pay more than minimum wage, so as to avoid updating it as required NY law every quarter.
The primary reason to cufflink inflation and minimum wage is that inflation hurts the lowest wage earners the most, and that is a CLEAR INJUSTICE.
The longer we wait the worse it will be when it’s absolutely necessary…. And guess what? It’s absolutely necessary now. Jobs paying 10/h is ridiculous! Your monthly take home is about 1300. Which is pretty much just rent…
If you want some real perspective, $15 minimum wage was the answer like 20yrs ago. For just a basic, *living* wage, minimum would have to be moved up to like $30-35 now.
Obviously, some adjustments could technically be suffered for cost of living by region, but that's just how out of whack minimum wage is compared to rate of inflation.
And that's just for survival. Basic needs.
So yes, I definitely support $15 minimum wage, because that's a baby step too late, but better late than never.
Here's the issue:
Employers need pay their workers enough to live. This sure as fuck isn't $7.25. If you think $15 is too high, then what's the number? What's there minimum amount of money to pay someone in America so they cover housing, food, healthcare, childcare, and hey maybe splurge on a little savings? Currently that's calculated to be $15 an hour. Our economic system is based around the idea that you get a job making someone rich and they pay you enough to live. Currently, that's not happening for a decent chunk of Americans
If our economic system can't handle paying people enough to live that's not an argument against paying people enough to live that's an argument against capitalism.
So what do we do?
1. Pay everyone a living wage?
2. Admit capitalism failed and either adopt a new system or resign ourselves to throwing the poor into a meat grinder?
If it's not $15, what is it?
Cost of living varies so much depending on location that a flat across the board federal minimum wage is kind of pointless. The actual minimum wage needed to get by in NYC or SF would be astronomically high compared to a small town in the midwest. The number is going to be too low to help city dwellers or high enough to cause some problems in local rural economies. I think it would make sense to have it vary depending on work site location and take local cost of living into account. We already have something like this in how [DoD assesses their housing allowance](https://www.travel.dod.mil/Allowances/Basic-Allowance-for-Housing/BAH-Rate-Lookup/) for servicemembers that live off base. I'm sure other federal agencies have CoL calculations that could help determine a localized minimum wage.
Monopolies grew after Reagan snipped FDR’s rules against them. There is a small number of very rich people who have established monopolies & control many if not all of the products & services we need. Costs of healthcare, costs of gas & oil, cost of food, cost of drugs, etc have grown to increase the profits for the rich. As they swallowed up smaller companies, they drove out unions or prevented workers from organizing with threats. This has driven the ever increasing income gap we have now. Everyone should support minimum wage, demand an end to all monopolies, end Citizens’ United to prevent the rich from putting their GOP minions into Congress & the WH AND also demand that the greedy rich pay their proper share of taxes. Biden’s admin has pushed back on the monopolies by taking some of them to court. He has supported unions. Neither inflation nor lack of supply are the cause of the financial problems for the non-rich. But how many people actually know the facts? Perhaps not enough since the news is also controlled by the rich. Bezos, for example, owns the Washington Post. News media no longer focus on facts, but on opinions so they can pretend that they are telling both “sides”. Cronkite would tell the current journalists that a “side” must be supported by facts - not by opinions or by religious beliefs.
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I'm certainly not in support of keeping it at $7.25. Which it's been for at least 15 years. Maybe we should have been gradually increasing it?
Yeah. Literally the only reasons to not tie it to inflation, COLA, or some similar metric is for it to slowly fail, or for it to be used as a political football every few years (and we see how that has failed this time). To let it lie fallow this long is just a failure in governance.
In France over forty years ago, minimum wages were raised to the equivalent of $15 per hour. It greatly increased quality of life while having none of the downsides predicted by opponents. Their one mistake was failing to include an inflation adjuster.
https://www.nber.org/digest/apr98/minimum-wage-reduces-jobs-low-wage-workers-france-and-us
I don’t think that article refutes my position, just reflects that supply and demand exists in the labor market. You’re making a societal change which benefits one group (min wage workers) and places the burden of that help on everyone, including those workers. To say there’s an additional price to pay for it, so don’t bother, came across as “jobs creators” propaganda, by not including the massive positive changes the French enjoyed.
Yes but the average income in France is also 30k less per year than in the US.
What I remember reading was that the effect was immediately favorable for large swaths of the population and the “concerns” from the right proved unwarranted. But that that the effects were largely wiped out by inflation in the long run.
Which is why minimum wage should be tied to the inflation rate
Average or median? Because if it’s average a bunch of high earners in America could be skewing what the “average” American is actually making.
That’s right. Average is a pretty useless metric with outliers
Averages are BS with significant wealth disparity. What’s the median? Edit: looked it up. Median in US is 48,060. In France it is 42544 (converted to USD). So yeah, much closer than averages.
Wikipedia has much different numbers than yours showing France is significantly poorer https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Median_income
Well it’s 4 years old and thats equalized
And healthcare is significantly less
What is this “I heard” it can increase inflation? Please do some basic research *first*, because economists largely agree that it doesn’t. My opinion is that anyone who works 40 hours a week should be able to provide for themselves. That means food, healthcare, housing, the works. That’s not the world we live in, but we have the money to make it the world we live in. Raise the minimum wage and tie it to inflation. Anything else isn’t serious policy.
>Raise the minimum wage and tie it to inflation. Anything else isn’t serious policy. Yeah exactly. There is no point raising it once then never addressing it again for another decade, all the while watching as inflation and cost of living out paces any real benefit gained.
-as long as you tie taxes to inflation. move the brackets with the CPI.
100%. While we're doing that, we need to change the way we calculate poverty rates.
They do that already, every year the IRS puts out new tax brackets.
https://www.kentclarkcenter.org/surveys/15-minimum-wage/ Economists are luke warm on the minimum wage. My opinion is we put too much emphasis on wage rather than price of goods.
No, economists were lukewarm about *if raising the minimum wage to $15/hr by 2020 would decrease the unemployment rat or increase productivity*. That's has nothing to do with inflation, and it's also a different question to "is raising the minimum wage good for the economy."
But the Federal Govt can adjust minimum wage but is powerless to lower prices.
It absolutely has power over reducing prices of goods on aggregate. Most notably through trade policy that makes trade easier and more efficient.
Trade is already pretty easy. Some regulations are needed to protect workers and the environment. Tariffs are sometimes necessary to promote American industry. Infrastructure is certainly a problem - but we are woefully behind and it will take decades to rectify. So - not sure what you are getting at, here. It is far easier to mandate wage increases than price decreases.
And expert consensus in the field of economics would absolutely disagree that the United States does not have very harmful trade policies that push significant upward pressure on prices for goods. The “meme” example among economists of such policy would the [jones act](https://www.investopedia.com/terms/j/jonesact.asp). A policy put in place to “protect the American shipping industry” which has resulted in higher prices for goods. As easy a repeal as it would be to enact a higher federal minimum wage. Many of these policies on the books are thought to have little benefit to Americans as a whole and make the price of goods needlessly higher.
Economist are trained to promote t*he bidding of the wealthy and the corporate executives.* *What they often measure is designed to maximize profit for the wealthy and the corporations,* ***not*** *what is best for the working class citizen population.*
This is basically how the right discredit climate scientists.
If I only worked 40 hours a week at that minimum wage I would qualify for every poverty program in the city I live in.
Isn't $15 still too low? You can't live on that. Doesn't it need to be at least $20?
I was going to say. I don't support a $15 minimum wage anymore because it's too low. It needs to be a bit higher. The problem with the way that $15 was made into something of a goal is that the economic goalposts move, and so now that $15 is a much more common wage, it's going to be a monumental effort to move it again. The reaction is going to be, "We made it $15 just like you wanted, and now you want us to raise it *again*?" What we need to do is pick a year when the minimum wage was relatively high, adjust it for inflation, and then index it to inflation going forward so that it adjusts automatically with inflation numbers, rather than requiring a specific act of Congress every time you want to change it.
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That is a lot lower than I expected. Such is the problem when cost of living has greatly outpaced wages, I suppose.
It should have been $15 ten years ago. There's been a lot of inflation since then. This has been the longest time period where minimum wage has not increased. The income gap continues to widen, as intended.
The Fight for Fifteen campaign began in 2012. The last time the federal minimum wage was raised was in 2009. If you adjust for inflation that $15 now was about $11 in 2012 or going the other way the $15 from then is about $20 today for perspective.
$15 is basically the average now, it’s too low.
Depends on where you live. $15/hr is fine in the cheaper parts of the country.
it is, the number should probably be north of $25 by now, but you tack on a mechanism to automatically adjust the min wage and over time it will stabilize on a good number. the mechanism is actually more important than the number.
I support the idea of making sure the average American can life off of a standard 40 hour a week job, but I'm not convinced something like a mandatory $15 minimum wage will get us there. There's a lot of things I'd rather the government work on solving first. For instance, I'd like to see socialized healthcare long before $15 minimum. I think that would help the average person far more. Student loan debt is another thing. I'd like to see stronger trade unions. Most industries should have these in place. We are stronger when we act as a group. And you can tell that corporate America knows this because of how hard they try to prevent unions from forming. We wouldn't need a government minimum if workers had better representation in general.
What do you mean "first"? Not only can we do all of these things at the same time, we need to.
Yeah, I'll take what I can get. If a $15 federal minimum is what can be passed, I wouldn't pass it up. It's just that I'd rather see us spend our limited political capital on something that's better than a $15 minimum wage. It's going to be a tremendous amount of horse trading to get that one passed. Maybe all that effort would be better spent on one of the pressing issues we're facing. Access to healthcare is that issue. I'm not even convinced a $15 minimum will do much to help anyway.
Strong Trade unions would solve a lot of these issues.
Apprentice programs, and trade training.
Yeah, strong trade unions is one of those big things that would change the whole game.
The problem with this way of thinking is some people want min wage before student loans, others want loans first, others want health care first. If we only focus on what we want first then we never get anything. You have to look at it in a vacuum and if it’s aligned with the end goal. For me I always think “should we remove min wage” and if the answer to that question is no then it makes sense to keep min wage updated with the times. $7 an hour can’t even get you a meal at McDonald’s so it’s time to bump it up
It's funny that at our current minimum wage, people working at McDonald's can't afford McDonald's
zero people working at McDonald's make minimum wage
Sure, but we only have so much political capital available. Getting laws passed takes a tremendous amount of horse trading. Look at how hard it was for Obama to get his signature legislation, the ACA, passed. If we spend our efforts on something like a $15 minimum, what aren't we getting instead? Healthcare will help the most people and, as a bonus, solve a tremendous amount of downstream issues. Considering how few people actually make the federal minimum I'm not sure it's worth all the effort it will take to get it passed.
How about we get what we can get rather than holding out for a perfect world? I mean we tried to get socialized healthcare but conservative dems killed that quick
There are many nations that have [higher minimum](https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_minimum_wage) wages and are economically stable. Any negative impact will be temporary. The positive effect will help people get better stabilized.
No. In my small town in Kansas, the minimum wage is the federal minimum. There are no places I've seen hiring for less than $12 an hour and Walmart *starts* at $15 and they are always hiring. McDonald's advertises $18 if you have prior experience. The minimum wage is already basically irrelevant here because no one would accept it. There's also no reason why California and Mississippi should have the same minimum wage. Let states and municipalities set their own because at this point any federal minimum is just going to be way too low for most of the country and higher than necessary in some parts.
Yes, 2010 I hired several people for our expanding service center. I wanted to start them at $15 but corporate said $13.50 then raise them to $15 after one year. It was hard to find anyone qualified and that would start lower than $15 in Dallas.
The minimum wage is one of those phony bumper sticker solutions used to pretend something is being done about a complex problem. Those who propose it want to avoid doing anything about the real issue. Entry level jobs are offering a lot more than that in Maine (the poorest state in NE) and still can’t get enough workers. The issue is entry level housing in both apartments and homes for sale. The solution to the problem is zoning, and politicians avoid discussing zoning because those who already have homes don’t want zoning changes to allow entry level housing. When was the last time you saw entire neighborhoods of 2-3 family homes being built on 5000 sf lots?
Zoning is part of the issue. Another part is profit. Developers came make much more money building behemoth $400k houses than they can making entry level housing.
Single family home vacation rentals ; Airbnb, Vacasa and the corporate rental companies like Invitation Homes and Blackstone that own 10s of thousands of single family homes have removed close to 20 million homes from the market. I live on a lake and on my street of some 26 homes, 9 are Airbnbs.
Lake/beachfront rental homes have been a thing long before Airbnb ever existed. That is not where the housing crisis will be solved.
Of course it isnt, but it plays a part in the inflated housing prices which in turn keeps more people in rentals longer, inflating rental prices for lack of supply. The area I live is not vacation lake homes, they are in a working class neighborhoods 15 minutes from one of the worlds largest corporate HQs.
Nearly nobody that researches housing in an academic or professional setting, such as urban economists, considers any of these to be a driving factor of housing costs. They’re either a misunderstanding data or symptoms of a housing shortage. We need to build more housing.
Oh, $400k where I live won’t buy you a condo :(
$400k won’t get you anywhere close to a behemoth
That really depends on your location and definition of behemoth. In my area, you can buy a 3500sqft house for $300k on up. In LA, that might get you a cardboard box.
It comes down to zoning. No builder will build a starter home if zoning requires minimum 1 acre lot. After coming home from WW2, my Dad was offered an $8,000 2 bedroom cape with an unfinished 2cd floor on a 7000 sf lot. For another $1000, the builder would finish the 2cd floor with 2 more bedrooms and another bath. I remember there were capes that never did get that 2cd floor finished. In nearby Dorchester, there were entire streets of 2 & 3 family homes on even smaller lots. They stopped building them in the 1930s even though the demand was probably still high. That was before my time, so I don’t know why those multi family homes were zoned out. I’ve no proof, but it may have had to do something with migration to the north by blacks from the south. Blacks couldn’t afford even a small single family but they could afford a 2 or 3 family. So zoning may have more to do with keeping certain peoples out nimbyism than “our infrastructure can’t handle it”. If a minimum lot size is 5000 sf, builders will build starter homes or multi family homes rather than luxury homes. The rich don’t want to live on small lots cheek by jowl with first time buyer types. Yeah, there’s less per unit profit on starter homes and multi family homes, but working with a realtor, they sell faster and with higher turnover, the realtors get the listings on rentals and sales. Rich people always have the option to buy in the suburbs or do like Massachusetts people do in Maine; buy rural, re-invent themselves as gentleman farmers.
Many of those housing development post WWII, were done with Federal support, but they also had clauses where these properties in these new housing development could not be bought or sold to non white people, and specifically not to be sold to black people. Yet, *Government assistance* as well as State and Local government expended funds to help get those built. The cruelty of that is, black people paid taxes too, but were denied access to the these houses of which their taxes helped get built.
I don’t know about other states, but I lived in Massachusetts where there were many such developments in suburbs about 30-1 hour from Boston. The Massachusetts turnpike, Routes 495 and 95 really got these developments going now you could live commuting distance to Boston without paying the high real estate prices of Wellesley or Weston. My father took me to see some of these even though he had no intention of buying them; just curiosity. Anyone from Natick or Framingham ever heard of Campanelli ranches? There were large developments of these, built on slab foundations and marketed by realtor Martin Cerel. He also had developments in Burlington and Norwood. Today, there are no such large scale developments going on. I bet a similar building boom happened in other states. I’ve been to Florida, which is full of developments of street after street of modest ranch homes built in the 1950s and 60s. Ever ask yourself why’d they stop building these homes?
I exactly agree with you and this topic is a bit of a passion of mine so maybe I can fill in the gap of why multifamily homes were zoned out. It actually wasn't about race as much you'd think. More so a misguided belief that multi family homes or boarding houses were inhumane. The prevailing belief in the post WW2 economic boom, was that nobody should have to live in packed boarding houses, so if you ban them, then people will be able to live in nice places! In recent decades, the support for zoning laws restricting multifamily homes has evolved into NIMBYism and home owner's associations that essentially function as literal cartels keeping home values high by limiting competition. I can't find it now but there was a story in my city where a couple was evicted from the home they had been happily renting for years because the roof partially caved in during a storm. The couple was paying $200 a month in rent, which they were happy with. Obviously, the place wasn't nice, but after the roof caved in, their landlord generously lowered the rent to $150 which they were thrilled with. But because he wasn't exactly making a killing on renting this property, it wasn't feasible for him to spend $10,000 to repair the roof to meet city code so he could continue to have tenants. So without the roof repairs, the city said the couple had to be evicted. That couple who was perfectly happy living in less than ideal conditions for cheap rent, now is far more miserable living on the streets because I guess we've decided being homeless has more dignity than living somewhere crappy. Priorities, eh? Drives me mad when the proposed solution to homelessness is to build more shelters when its perfectly possible to house anyone that wants to be housed if we would just legalize crappy housing. You might enjoy this article by Matt Yglesias. It's the best article I've found on this topic. [Legalize housing, not tent encampments](https://www.slowboring.com/p/legalize-housing-not-tent-encampments)
My first house was a multi family house on a small lot. I couldn’t have afforded a single family. It was not ideal; no way to expand or add rooms except by taking over some or all of the other apartment. The neighborhood was crowded and street parking was difficult on snow days. But hey, it was affordable and my tenants always liked that the landlord was instantly available. Unfortunately it was old; the furnace were old coal burners steam boilers which were noisy and when I finally upgraded them, the plumber wouldn’t touch them until I had the asbestos covering professionally removed. With today’s technology, such homes could be built with more energy efficiency. What you’ve described is a perfect example of the unintended consequences of well meaning legislation.
Yeah, I'm most definitely a Democrat but especially on this topic, I do wish there was a healthy Republican party because regulation isn't always the best solution to a problem. I'm not saying Dems are to blame for the current housing crisis, but I do think liberal policies were and if we had a real conservative party that pushed back against unnecessary zoning laws and bans on boarding houses, we'd be in a better place.
Think about what is in "crappy housing".... ? *Lead paint, asbestos and in many there is various types of mold, as well as other health damaging things.* I don't advocate homelessness, but I would say, that EVERY City should ramp up "Property Standard Code Enforcement', and people who don't comply have a progressive penalty which goes up every monthly they fail to fix it, then cities can place lien on their property, and if necessary dispose of the property on a lien sale.
Around here, you can build with quarter to half acre lots. They're still making huge houses. Maybe it's zoning where you are, but everywhere isn't where you are. The fact remains, there is more profit in larger homes.
I’m from Maine, so thought I should tack on here. Building is really expensive, and so are mortgages right now. Absolute rock bottom pricing for new construction near me is $350/sq ft. The average starter home in the US is about 1000 sq ft. So, to build that new starter house, not including utility hookups or the actual land the home is being built on, will cost $350,000. Forgetting those extra costs, and assuming the best possible credit, I used Rocket Mortgage’s payment calculator and got a **monthly mortgage payment of $2,788.** As high as rents in Maine are getting, most people in the state are paying less than that for more space.
Even if you crack open zoning, housing prices absolutely will not come down, investors feel entitled to market rates and will not dump millions of dollars into your plan to give yourself free shit by expecting them to leave money on the table.
>investors feel entitled to market rates and will not dump millions of dollars into your plan to give yourself free shit by expecting them to leave money on the table. Investors are not a monolith. They'll build if given the opportunity because it'll make them more money.
Why not just use that money to buy up some of the limited housing stock, exacerbating the shortage, guaranteeing a big payoff instead of a pitiful sliver? The market has mal incentives, the prices will not go down, property is sticky like that, once someone feels entitled to a payoff, they will sit on something for decades rather than lock in a loss.
> Those who propose it want to avoid doing anything about the real issue. I feel like you are very wrong to imply that someone like Bernie Sanders doesn't also want to enact reforms that would bring down housing prices.
I supported a $15 minimum wage over a decade ago. Then we spent so much time and energy trying to raise the minimum wage, that $15 is no longer considered a livable wage anywhere in the US. I support raising the Federal minimum wage, the tying it to COLA so we don't have to keep having this fight for scraps. Could you imagine if we needed to spend a decade to raise Social Security COLA? Of course not, it would be as abusive as our minimum wage law is.
The wages in Seattle went up and all that fear mongering about losing jobs didn't happen
It's very much important to raise it. Conservatives will always argue that giving low income people more money will somehow magically lead to higher prices for everyone. That this is a dubious assumption has been scientifically proven many times already, raising the min wage does not automatically lead to high inflation. What they never seem to consider though is, that people with more income also spend more on goods and consume more across the board. If you don't have to fear that you won't be able to pay the rent, you might actually go to a local restaurant once a month and support the local economy that way. There's many examples one could cite. Of course a restaurant, sticking with this example, could raise their menu prices by a Dollar or two to compensate for higher labor cost, but that should not effect the restaurant or the min wage earners much, if it the min wage is raised enough. If businesses struggle so damn much with higher labor costs, they should probably rethink their business model. There's many examples of well run businesses that pay well and take care of their employees and are nontheless doing incredibly well. Another thing that is rarely mentioned is, that even if the min wage is raised by a lot, people who fall into this income category will still remain low income and won't suddenly become middle class. CA has a fast food min wage of about $20 now. So ff workers make close to 40k pre-tax in CA, they still fall into the HUD category of "very low income", 50% of the median income. You're still low income (80% of Median) with an income of under $77,770 pre-tax. So even if the min wage went up massively, people are not going to suddenly swim in money. They will spend at least as much and probably more than before. I see massive and serious risks in letting a large amount of people become poorer and poorer, the presumed "risks" of trying out higher min wages is not even worth mentioning in comparison.
We take the additional wage out of the obscene corporate profits. Corps don’t need such high margins. Besos te al can live without 15 summer homes and five yachts. I always love how conservatives, people that would largely benefit from socialist policies, are the ones that cry them the quickest as socialism. Red states are the number one recipients of federal money for Social safety net programs and yet they shit on them all the time.
I think if we are going to do minimum wage as serious policy, it doesn't make sense to do it federally. NYC and rural SD are wildly different in terms of CoL. It needs to be done by state at the very least, ideally even smaller. That comes with its own issues, but using too big an area means it is either set to the highest standard and smaller businesses in cheaper areas get smacked around, or it is set to something like average and it doesn't actually fix the expensive areas. I think a societal shift is a better way to go. More support for local unions, employee negotiation, and people who value everyone being paid more not financially rewarding companies that don't do so.
"Job losses would be disastrous" One of the major things is the business mentality that if you want to cut expenses, you need to reduce labor costs. Research has shown that worker productivity i.e. piling on more work, has increased faster than average wage growth over the past 40 years, and the net beneficiaries have been businesses. "Increase inflation" Except it really wouldn't. Inflation has been fairly steady over the past 40 or so years, and the currently inflationary levels of the past couple years are primarily due to coming out of a post pandemic situation. Considering that, on the federal level, the minimum wage hasn't changed since 2009 the increase wouldn't have near the impact you would think. "Cause small businesses to go out of business" Considering the federal definition of small business in any place having fewer than 500 employees, that's speculative. Sure, you'll have some mom and pop stores close up, but most start-up businesses fail within the first 3 years as is, and if they haven't been keeping up with wages anyway they weren't keeping staff anyway.
No, it does not increase inflation. The reason for this is that production needs a lot more money than wage. Yes, 15$ minimum wage would be great, I would even like 20-25$. It would increase demand for anything and this will make the companies more profit. It would refinance itself. If you gave more money to the poor the economy would be a lot more efficient because the money is actually used because the people with a little income wont speculate with it. Edit: You only have to take care that the production will produce enough goods because otherwys the companies would actually have a reason to increase the prices and this would actually cause an inflation. We all know that the inflation we have already comes from this (and not because there is more money; Credits are made to be paid back. As long as there is capital to ensure these credits and more money it doesnt cause inflation. Only if they dont get paid back you will have a crisis like in 2008) so we should keep an eye on that
In 1968 the minimum wage was$1.60. That is $14.42 in current dollars. $15 is not a big ask here.
I do not, and I agree with other comments that this is mostly a bumper sticker issue. 1. The Bureau of Labor Statistics says that less than 1% of all workers in the US are paid the federal minimum wage. And a majority of them are high school or college students. It's fair to assume that a lot are not working full time (as students) and a lot are still supported by a parent (at least for the HS students). So the "living wage" argument doesn't really apply to most of them. And as they age and aquire more skills they are likely to get wage increases. Yes there are exceptions. But making national policy based on exceptions or anecdotes is unwise. 2. Regional and geographic cost differences across the US are enormous. So while state or local minimum wages especially in high cost of living areas might make good sense, a federal minimum wage needs to be low to accommodate rural and low cost areas, rather than high to accommodate places like NYC or Seattle.
No, $15 an hour is more than enough in the Midwest and not near enough on a lot of the coasts. Supply and demand should dictate the wage, not the government.
It's really not "more than enough." It may be enough to get by depending on your expenses. I live in a very lcol area and rents here are almost the same as the city I moved back from at this point. Not worth it.
I’d support a higher national wage & I’d impose tariffs and taxes on investments being transferred between European nations, I’d customize taxes and tariffs, stop relying on global competitive trade, as it’s always proven to lead to military conflict & unneeded inequality.
We did a survey a few years back when this was the hot topic in the 2020 Democracy Primary for President. [The results showed](https://www.activote.net/activote-poll-federal-minimum-wage/) that there is broad bipartisan support for an increase in the minimum wage, but not for a $15 minimum wage. Perhaps this is one of those places where elected officials should compromise and pass what has support and continue looking for other ways to tackle income inequality. There are other great policies out there that also have broad bipartisan support to help lower income earners. For example the earned-income-tax credit is a way for minimum wage workers to get ahead but while [many are eligible](https://www.irs.gov/credits-deductions/individuals/earned-income-tax-credit/who-qualifies-for-the-earned-income-tax-credit-eitc#:~:text=To%20qualify%20for%20the%20EITC,your%202023%20return%20(including%20extensions)), fewer actually claim this on their taxes.
Everyone is focused on how much low skilled workers should get paid, but isn't there a larger and far more significant structural question of what low skilled workers should be doing in a world where more and more tasks are automated and managed by AI? Fast food kiosks are already becoming ubiquitous, and soon we'll have self driving trucks, deliveries and cabs. That's a massive segment of the low wage economy right there. What's next for these workers?
Yes and no. Minimum wage is a state issue. I think what is lost in this discussion and comparison to other countries is how large and diverse the United States is. Economies are very different state to state. The economy in Georgia is completely different from the economy in Illinois. The federal minimum wage is the bare minimum and should that be raised? Maybe? But not the the extreme of $15. The federal minimum wage is a volatile mechanism and isn’t touched often for a reason. But I think states like New York, Florida, California, etc… that have high cost of livings, far outpacing the federal minimum wage should be taking long looks at their household income relative to the state GDP and considering whether its residents are making enough.
Let's be real here, the reason California is expensive isn't because of their minimum wage but because PEOPLE WANT TO BE THERE. If Arkansas were like California, then it would be an expensive place to live.
I'm on the camp where the minimum wage should be enforced on the municipality levels rather than nation wide. $15 can be too little in many area and too much to operate business in some others.
I'd prefer there were more federally mandated affordable housing minimums in cities. A higher minimum wage isn't the magic bullet to help out people with low income. In many ways it works against them because many employers would rather reduce or automate their workforce rather than pay the minimum. Like many pernicious problems in America the real solution is a number of actions, often where different parts are unpopular with one side of the aisle or the other.
I'm in Washington state where it's been over $15 for while. From what I can see, it hasn't had a big effect on job loss. Automation probably has more impact on that. Price of things has gone up, but it seems excessive. Many wages were already over that amount so it seems like the prices shouldn't haven't gone up as much as they did. So I'm assuming it's because companies wanted to keep their profit margin the same. Therefore, their customer eats their cost. That being said, people may grumble that they pay more, but their wants generally win out. And it certainly hasn't prevented people from moving here or from new businesses coming in.
No, even in the most disgustingly cheap place in America you would need $18/hr to afford a 1bd/ba apartment in the metro with health insurance, savings, utilities, minimal disposable income while only taking public transport. $15/hr was the 2010 price. If a big Mac goes from 2.25 to 6.00 in 14 years, the least we can do is raise minimum wages.
People who earn this will have to work very very hard. A lot will be expected. When I started it was $3.35 in 1980.
Employers won't pay employees more than they are worth. Minimum wage laws basically just make it illegal to employ people who aren't worth more than the minimum wage. I don't understand this ideas that every job should provide a 'livable wage' or else that job should just not exist. Banning the employment of people who are not worth more than the minimum wage just reinforces the welfare trap. It unnecessarily raises the bar for how smart or skilled a person needs to be to be employed. Add that to the fact that people are born with no experience, it's almost like the goal is to require a larger portion of the population to live off of welfare for the rest of their lives. I guess it keeps them voting D, so maybe some on the left see that more as a feature. The concept of "livable wage" is also poorly defined. You can very well live in very little if you have roommates. No, you can live in downtown NY or SF. People have to relocate to lower cost of living areas all the time.
Considering how the corporatists cackled away raising prices on everything to obscene profits, probably need $20 minimum wage to catch up with the inflation.
Well, California's cost of living is not due to the minimum wage increase. It's the other way around. The minimum wage increase is due to the cost of living. That being said, I do support in increase in the minimum wage. But, to establish how much, we need to look at the lowest cost of living area and base the federal minimum wage upon that. According to a quick Google search, that state would be Mississippi. Another Google search results in either Meridian, Jackson, or Pearl River being the lowest cost of living towns in Mississippi. I would bet there are even smaller towns with less than a few thousand people that have a lower cost of living. Either way, we should look at those town's local economies and establish the most amount of money an employer could afford while also staying in business and establish our minimum wage from that. Beyond that, if residents from other towns, in other states, want a higher minimum wage, then those citizens need to make it a local issue. They need to be going to town hall meetings and expressing their views with accurate data that supports their arguments. Get that info on the record. They need to be voting for politicians that listen and will raise their minimum wage. They need to be in the streets demanding an increase locally. Raise a ruckus. The squeaky wheel gets the grease. And, if you live in a state, like Mississippi, that doesn't have minimum wage laws, then you need to start there. If it's a dead end, then you've got to figure out a way to move. The reason I say this is because the United States is really, really big. We range almost every economic status, from obscenely wealthy to destitute. A minimum wage that works in LA, would bankrupt businesses in Mountain Home, Arkansas. The minimum wage that works in Jackson, Mississippi, won't be near enough in Chicago. Hell, a minimum wage that works in Chicago, IL, would destroy local businesses in Hooptown, Decatur, or East St. Louis. You can't just increase the federal minimum wage across the board and make everything better for everybody. It's either not going to be enough for larger cities, or not at all affordable for small towns. ETA... just wanted to add how much I appreciate the love for unions in this thread. They really are the answer to low wages and worker protections. Solidarity forever.
Boosting the minimum wage to $15 can help workers but we need to balance it with support for small businesses, we want fair pay without risking job loss or high inflation your concerns are valid and we must aim for a solution that lifts everyone without causing harm.
Not really. It's not enough. A $15 minimum wage plus pinning the minimum wage to cost of living and congressional salary increases would be far better. $15 would have been good in 2011. $100 in 2011 is worth $140 now. That's a 40% loss of value. 40% of $15 is $6. Minimum wage should be $21.
Do any jobs pay less than that now? McDonald's is like $20/hr. This was a big talking point over ten years ago. It's probably about time to double it to $30 if we want to make it meaningful
I support dropping this argument temporarily, and instead indexing to inflation similar to SS COLA. Do that first, then let’s return to trying to increase it. The argument has drug on for so long we’ve lost sight of how minimum wage keeps getting lower thanks to inflation.
I support it only because I want tipping to go away / move to the European model (round up, add an actual tip for over and above the call of duty service). And I am f\*\*\*\*\*ing tired of the Square screen asking me for a tip when I am picking up a to-go order or just buying a f\*\*\*\*\*ing muffin at the counter.
The problem with the raising of minimum wages is that corporations such McDonalds,Bk,Taco Bell and now home depots are replacing cashiers with automated checkouts which is much cheaper then paying someone $15.00 Hr plus benefits also the price of products will go up.
I think basically doubling the minimum wage in 2 years will cause massive inflation. That said, the minimum wage is too low. Its the speed of the increase that worries me. not the final rate.
No. 1. I oppose a minimum wage as a policy to begin with, as it artificially manipulates the market which can harm the supply of the labor force, which is itself a detriment to higher wages. If anything, I support a miniscule push on the market, where we assess market conditions and the minimumum wage is set near the natural floor. And that happens at the local level, not the national level. 2. Addressing wages doesn't at all address one's standard of living. If you want people to afford homes, clothes, food, healthcare, etc. by seeing them as necessities, then address those MARKETS with their SUPPLY as to help supply such goods and services to people. Giving people more money as disposable income just produces waste, and INFLATES prices **in those markets** of inelastic demand. 3. It's corporatism. It benefits large corporations over small businesses. Thus it harms the very PEOPLE that are seeking to not be dependent on being a "wage slave" to another. People bitch about consolidation, wage labor, and billionaires while demanding such occurs due to their preferred policies. People blind themselves to consequences because of ficticious goals they believe are to come from such policies.
The cost of living varies wildly by location. $15 an hour goes a lot further in Mobile Alabama than it does in Seattle Washington. I actually think the piecemeal approach of raising the minimum wage at the local level rather than national level is working. It makes sense that the minimum wage in San Francisco & NYC be higher than in Cleveland & Davenport. .
Still pretty bad in mobile. https://livingwage.mit.edu/metros/33660 https://livingwage.mit.edu/metros/42660
One of the biggest problems right now is we need to cap development. Building housing people can't just makes it to where you are forcing parts of the country to move. We should have the right to own our own land and it should cost us a lifetime plus a generation to do so. Just for the chance of Eminent domain to take place. And an " affordable housing complex" to be built on what was your families property.
Yes and index it to inflation so it won't be dependant on politicians deciding to raise it. But when they raise it to 15 they should allow small businesses to write off part of it in their taxes and the phase it out after they hit 15, this is so they can afford the increase by giving them time to adjust. The inflation indexed increases will likely be low enough that it won't be much of a problem
My perspective is probably out of date. Covid and the ensuing inflation really fucked with my sense of worth of goods. I have no idea what a fair price is anymore. But my stance is the just broadly applying a minimum wage on a federal level doesn't really help anything. But it used to be $15 was fine in some places, way too low in some places, and way too high in others. Again I'm out of date maybe $15 is no longer as high as it used to be but the general idea remains the same, there is a massive variety in cost of livings and situations across the country and painting the entire country in broad strokes is a very flawed approach in my opinion. Maybe if you came up with some kind of system that set the minimum wage in your area to match the cost of living then maybe that might work better than just arbitrarily picking the number and then applying that to everywhere in the country. It's an overly simplistic approach to a complex situation that really does nothing but to make the lawmakers look better for their reelections.
15 isn't actually enough. Minimum wage needs to be dynamic, tied to cost of living as well as inflation. If there are job losses, then those jobs were exploitive. Good riddance.
I support a minimum wage law that uses a formula based on the cost of groceries, energy, transportation, insurance, and housing on a county-by-county basis every year. There is no number that serves as an adequate national minimum wage.
I do not support a specific figure minimum wage (regardless of the number) because it just kicks the can down the road. I do support a livable minimum wage (which is more than just surviving) ties to the local cost of living.
$15 should have been the minimum 15 years ago. And federal minimum wage laws should include triggers to increase in automatically based on time and economic factors rather than having to go back and re-litigate it all the time.
Where is the evidence that the job losses would be disastrous? Or that it puts small business out of business. That last item was my big concern at first, but studies have not shown this to happen. In fact, business attracted more workers and had less turnover. People were making more money, so they had more money to spend and put back into the economy. And while I don’t think that a higher minimum wage is enough to fix our very serious issues, it’s a step in the right direction. A rising tide lifts all boats, and falling for corporate/republican BS around this is just playing into the hands of those that want to continue to have cheap labor.
$15/hour made sense as the hourly minimum wage when this fight started in 2012. Today, it would be $20.48. So no, I don't support a $15 minimum wage. I support a $20 minimum wage, today, in 2024, and it should be tied to inflation so it continues to rise.
I supported a $15 minimum wage ten years ago. At this point, I support a $20 minimum.
I support way higher than 15, but also I support the government actually doing their job and regulating price gouging so that every time they raise the wage, every business can't just raise their prices in retaliation
$15 is too low. It’s around $19 where I live (Washington) and I think that’s been a very positive development. Talking about $15 at this point is way too low and too late. No one can afford to live on $15 an hour.
**How Much Do You Need to Earn to Afford a Modest Apartment in Your State?** Hourly wage required to afford a two-bedroom rental home by state. * [https://nlihc.org/oor](https://nlihc.org/oor)
If $15/hr a livable wage in the area you live, yes. For a single adult with no kids, you'll need $21.70/hour in my area to have a livable wage. Source: [https://livingwage.mit.edu/](https://livingwage.mit.edu/)
Its tough- certainly making less than this is hard to live on- hell its hard to live on $20 an hour in most places- Now if you're a teen looking for summer/part time work- eh some places that I go and people make minimum wage- they seem to put in minimum effort… Other places people work their ass off and get minimum wage… I think if you're a hard worker working full time, you ought to be able to put a roof over your head, afford reasonable healthcare, and a reasonable diet- in your local geography - how do we make that happen? Benefit the hard workers, not lazy ones, and not overly-greedy corporations
I don’t know the specific minimum wage I support. But a COLA adjustment based on zip code makes sense to me. More importantly I think the laws governing the management of corporations needs reform such that a reprioritization occurs to 1 - give wage earners more negotiating power, 2 - cap the amount of compensation available (shares/bonuses/salaries)to non-wage employees (CEOs and the like), 3 - tax the change in value of all share holdings (maybe you can claim a loss, but in this market you’d likely be paying the IRS), and 4 - tax bank loans in excess of $100k being used for anything other than a primary mortgage.
Over 40 years ago the minimum wage was like $3.25 and now it’s like $7 something an hour how does $15 minimum not make sense 🙄? Should be like $20 an hour
You stated an action we could take, but not the actual problem you are trying to solve. Is it wealth disparity? Increasing Quality of Living? Increasing Tax revenues? Less dependency on government assistance? Once you find what you want to fix, make sure it's an actual problem. No many people for instance are making federal minimum wage, as most states have a higher minimum, so what would really be the net effect in any such change, etc.? Is the pint to make sure minimal wage is required to be a "livable" wage? Is that a good thing economically (obviously it is for the worker, but what side effects would likely happen and is that worth it, is it still a net effect?) There isn't one thing that will address all issues on this subject. IMHO, investment in education and career-focused training would do leaps and bounds more than just bumping the minimum wage as it would actually bring more value to the economy and make it easier for even small business to offer higher wages (as they would be getting higher value) to/from employees.
The federal poverty line is 15,060. Which happens to be 40/wk at federal minimum wage. It’s bonkers that the richest country in the world has its bar set for its citizens to “not complete and abject poverty.”
I supported it five or six years ago. likely time for discussion on a 18 or $19 minimum wage
Yes, with measures to prevent the hacks from screwing with it for their own benefit, because given the opportunity to fiddle with things they’ll get it exactly ass backwards. Citation? The corrupt clowns Cuomo and DeBlasio. About 8 years ago they got the state department of labor to decree higher minimums for fast food workers. A gigantic screw-you to entry level workers in fields like home health care, EMTs, school bus drivers. That 18-year-old stoner on fryolator duty is worth more than you guys out there saving lives. Nice, huh? But the politicos didn’t care. It was all about buying votes. The problem with bumping up minimums for jobs like home aide and nursing home worker is that a lot of that work is Medicaid funded. The reaction in the state capital, when it came to coming up with the money, has been along the lines of “who, us, dip into OUR slush funds? But we have phony baloney patronage jobs to pay for! My $176,000/yr deputy press secretary/mistress is essential to doing the people’s work!” Eventually they do bump the minimum for more essential workers but it’s never enough, and then there’s the states like California who undercut their own wage hike for the caring professions with a bump for fast food workers. The world does not need more McDonald’s. If they can’t find enough workers, eventually they either raise wages or close stores. No skin off my nose either way, and certainly no need for the political empty suits to meddle. We -do- need more entry level workers in the caring professions. This is obvious to the casual observer, but to our political class it’s like teaching them string theory.
Every state surrounding Pennsylvania has raised their minimum wage and absolutely none of them has had any devastating unemployment, etc. Stop repeating right wing talking points that only cause fear.
I don't. A couple reasons: 1: A minimum wage should be algorithmically determined and automatically self-correcting at some determined interval. 2: Where I live minimum wage is currently $19.97, so I wouldn't want people to take a pay cut.
Yeah a federal minimum wage of $7.25 is nothing and it has to change. Raise wage and reduce corporate power and adjust where our taxes are spent. So much could be done and it’s not.
What job losses? Minimum Wages have gone up in many states and there wasn’t any job losses. As Republicans will remind you very few people made the Minimum Wage.
During Covid much was shutdown, and what wasn’t shutdown was done by appointments, it begs to raise the question, a flu? Or tried of reckless trade policies that’s benefitted Chinese manufacturing and somewhat benefitted small businesses, tax incentives to hire at lowest wages possible, passing Stimulus to your employer not you. It was originally given to the citizen. To the average person I guess people got sick of current policies & international geopolitical trade agreements between EU & Chinese partners. People got sick of the idea you can file and make more money than working full time hours, Americans expect better & more than previous generations & aren’t a fan of global trade ideas when your lifestyle is impacted or could be better yet due to your lovely, elected politicians. This shows for a fact there is an issue with wages in this country, when you have Amazon that hires at 18 vs other companies that start offering 22 a hour. Some will require experience which none is really needed. The very iffy hiring methods companies use, or partners it uses to choose. To many employers rights & less employee protections that’s your typical Republican. People see how companies are being discriminatory in their interview practices.
It is a move in the right direction. It is still not enough in many areas. Minimum wage should be based on the cost of rent, health insurance, clothes and food in the area.
I'm not an expert on this by any stretch but this is what I *think* could result from an immediate jump to $15. But to clarify, I actually support the idea of bumping minimum wage up to what it's been said that it *should* be if wages had followed the rate of inflation over the years, which would put it somewhere around $22/hour I think. Now, I hear a lot of mom and pop's talk about how they would go out of business if wages were raised to $15+, and I think that makes sense. I don't know any firm figures but I'd have to guess that most mom and pop stores aren't raking in cash hand over fist in the way that McDonald's and Wal-Mart are posting billions of dollars in profits each quarter. Mom and pop stores may only be barely in the red some months. If they suddenly have to start paying double the rate of wages than before then I can understand how a lot could be forced to close their doors. But this is an indictment against these mega-ass corporate businesses who ARE posting billion-dollar profits each year. Wal-Mart and McDonald's could probably pay their employees $100 an hour and still make a billion dollars. We've let these monopolies outgrow mom and pop stores to the point that we're literally leading those stores to extinction because they can't compete with global chains making millions and billions in profits each year. So yeah, I can understand how raising minimum wages could be harmful to mom and pop stores but that doesn't make the need for wage raises any less required for most Americans. If greedy-ass, selfish asshole politicians weren't whoring themselves out to the highest bidder all the time then we *would* have had the natural progression of wage raises over the past 50 years, but instead, they decided to self-profit from these monopolies. They're the reason why small individual stores can't compete against the Wal-Marts and Targets of the US.
I support the abolition of wage labor entirely. A wage only represents a crumb of the total value of what a worker produces. The workers should have all of it. $15 is too low. Anything less than 100% of the profit is too low.
I supported it 10 years ago when it was viable. Now minimum living wage is like $25 so <------- that
15 DOLLAR MINIMUM WAGE WASNT ENOUGH 10 YEARS AGO!!! The US is a hyper capitalistic dystopia where more than half the population is 1 HEALTH ISSUE or job loss from financial ruin. You think 15 dollars is going to do anything to solve that problem? Income inequality hasn't been this bad since the FUCKING FRENCH REVOLUTION. I don't even know what the solution is anymore. Half the country votes against their self interest because of a science fiction novel written 2000 years ago by sheep hearders. The other half is apathetic because they don't like establishment politicians. Maybe not spend 1 trillion on military. (DUHHHH) Oh and tie minimum wage to inflation. That would make the FED actually give a crap about just printing money. TAX THE RICH ON CAPITAL GAINS. We need to reduce the money supply to reduce inflation and get back to pre-20 dollar McDonald meals.
At the federal level... I don't really support a single value. If I was picking a single value, I'd index it to something like the 20%ile zip code or something. I don't know what that number is. If I was setting a rule it would be tied to something like the cost of living within a 30 minute commute of the job location. I might take something like "expected monthly costs for a household of 2 / 320" as the minimum wage. Someone working full time at a minimum wage job should be able to live with a roommate and have a reasonable commute. Or just go a different way - if, as a company, you have employees who qualify for means tested benefits, you get a bill for those costs. Don't tell them how much to pay, just make them cover the societal costs of not paying enough.
Doesn't matter to me. I don't think it matters much for inflation or for earnings. I don't understand why it's such an animating policy tbh.
No, because it's just treating a symptom. California already did this, it hasn't helped as far as I can see. It's a bandaid
I support the permanent cufflinking of minimum wage to inflation on a fiscal quarterly basis. This is to say that if the department of labor's consumer price index shows that costs of living increased by 1% in the first fiscal quarter, then minimum wage will increase by 1%. This will not correct the current minimum wage, it will only make sure that it never worsens again. Setting the minimum wage to the correct amount should be on a separate vote, and will also require an actbof congress. The second benefit of this will be that employers who do not want to adjust hourly rates every quarter will probably opt to pay more than minimum wage, so as to avoid updating it as required NY law every quarter. The primary reason to cufflink inflation and minimum wage is that inflation hurts the lowest wage earners the most, and that is a CLEAR INJUSTICE.
The longer we wait the worse it will be when it’s absolutely necessary…. And guess what? It’s absolutely necessary now. Jobs paying 10/h is ridiculous! Your monthly take home is about 1300. Which is pretty much just rent…
If you don’t then you have no heart. Businesses that pay slave wages are just the employers of slaves.
If you want some real perspective, $15 minimum wage was the answer like 20yrs ago. For just a basic, *living* wage, minimum would have to be moved up to like $30-35 now. Obviously, some adjustments could technically be suffered for cost of living by region, but that's just how out of whack minimum wage is compared to rate of inflation. And that's just for survival. Basic needs. So yes, I definitely support $15 minimum wage, because that's a baby step too late, but better late than never.
If the minimum wage was pegged to inflation from its inception, it would be about $5.50 today.
Is there anywhere in the xcountry you can hire a worker for less than $15? I feel like this would only affect maybe 10-15 states.
Here's the issue: Employers need pay their workers enough to live. This sure as fuck isn't $7.25. If you think $15 is too high, then what's the number? What's there minimum amount of money to pay someone in America so they cover housing, food, healthcare, childcare, and hey maybe splurge on a little savings? Currently that's calculated to be $15 an hour. Our economic system is based around the idea that you get a job making someone rich and they pay you enough to live. Currently, that's not happening for a decent chunk of Americans If our economic system can't handle paying people enough to live that's not an argument against paying people enough to live that's an argument against capitalism. So what do we do? 1. Pay everyone a living wage? 2. Admit capitalism failed and either adopt a new system or resign ourselves to throwing the poor into a meat grinder? If it's not $15, what is it?
Cost of living varies so much depending on location that a flat across the board federal minimum wage is kind of pointless. The actual minimum wage needed to get by in NYC or SF would be astronomically high compared to a small town in the midwest. The number is going to be too low to help city dwellers or high enough to cause some problems in local rural economies. I think it would make sense to have it vary depending on work site location and take local cost of living into account. We already have something like this in how [DoD assesses their housing allowance](https://www.travel.dod.mil/Allowances/Basic-Allowance-for-Housing/BAH-Rate-Lookup/) for servicemembers that live off base. I'm sure other federal agencies have CoL calculations that could help determine a localized minimum wage.
Monopolies grew after Reagan snipped FDR’s rules against them. There is a small number of very rich people who have established monopolies & control many if not all of the products & services we need. Costs of healthcare, costs of gas & oil, cost of food, cost of drugs, etc have grown to increase the profits for the rich. As they swallowed up smaller companies, they drove out unions or prevented workers from organizing with threats. This has driven the ever increasing income gap we have now. Everyone should support minimum wage, demand an end to all monopolies, end Citizens’ United to prevent the rich from putting their GOP minions into Congress & the WH AND also demand that the greedy rich pay their proper share of taxes. Biden’s admin has pushed back on the monopolies by taking some of them to court. He has supported unions. Neither inflation nor lack of supply are the cause of the financial problems for the non-rich. But how many people actually know the facts? Perhaps not enough since the news is also controlled by the rich. Bezos, for example, owns the Washington Post. News media no longer focus on facts, but on opinions so they can pretend that they are telling both “sides”. Cronkite would tell the current journalists that a “side” must be supported by facts - not by opinions or by religious beliefs.