The Minimum Wage Destroys Jobs

Some really interesting posts here. I wish all threads (at least in PP) could be this cool and productive without having to resort to name calling lol.

Anyway, my opinion is similar to that of Crash's, but BlueMikey makes some good arguments as well (particularly his first line).

I remember reading something a few months ago from a border patrol agent, who said that there's no job an American would do if the pay was higher. Fact of the matter is, minimum wage jobs don't make enough to give you a decent standard of living (and if you disagree, go to a "ghetto" area near where you live, and look around), and when that guy who's been working in the factory for 18 years gets laid off, and can't afford to go to school to learn new stuff (cause he probably has a family to support, and big bills to pay off, so college might be a bit out of his league at that point in life), what about him (and don't say he's an exception, because of all these layoffs we keep hearing about on the news, he's going to be more of the rule than exception).

Unfortunately, there is really no easy or cheap solution. I can't think of anything atm either (if that was my job though, I sure as heck would research it like mad).

I remember something one of my professors taught me, I think it was called the "Principle of Less Eligibility". What this means basically is, poor people can't have any accomodations that are better than what someone working minimum wage could afford. For example, don't expect to go to a homeless shelter and expect beds that are hotel-quality, or meals that look like you could serve that in a rich-person restaurant. I never quite understood why things were like that until recently, cause if a poor homeless person can get something that is better than what that minimum wage person could reasonably afford, why should they bother working?

Of course, this isn't to say that I don't see the business owner's point of view either, who's only real objective is to have the highest profit margin as possible. And it's even worse if it's a corporation, because lower profits is kind of hard to explain to shareholders, who only want as much money as possible too. And when management has to say something like "well, we had lower profits because we had to pay our employees more, and give them more benefits.", you can bet they'll be out of the job shortly after (so what they do is probably just so they can continue having a high paying job).

Heck, at my Home Depot, they're now starting to cut people's hours (that aren't full time anyway), because it's starting to get cold, so not as many people are shopping there. It's kind of funny too because just a month ago, they were hiring people like mad because customers kept complaining that there weren't enough people on the floor to help them (it's true, I even had to help some customers find things that aren't in my department, and when trying to find an associate for a specific department, I couldn't find anyone who worked there either). I suppose the solution in this case would've been to hire people in the springtime, so they could actually be around when customers needed help, then let go of the ones who aren't cutting it in the fall, rather than the "recruit like mad then not give anyone enough hours". Since I need this job atm, I can't do much because if I complain too much about it, then next thing I know, I'll be out of the job completely (although for me it's not as big a deal cause I can get another job. The main reason I like Home Depot is because I can get medical benefits as a part time employee. Good luck getting that at most other places as a part-timer).

The more I think about it, the more I also begin to wonder how this current president is willing to spend gobs of cash overseas, but isn't as willing to devote that much energy to domestic issues (like part of his solution to illegal immigrants was to build a large fence, instead of hiring more border agents and enforcing immigration laws). It's too bad Lyndon B. Johnson wanted to help America, but because of Vietnam he had to divert all his resources to that. I wonder if this is what's happening today again.

I'd say if anything, force companies to pay illegal immigrants the same wages as Americans. That way, you destroy the incentive of hiring them in the first place (cause they're willing to work for less, lest the company rat them out and they get sent back). At the same time, I suppose they could grant amnesty to all illegals that are here now, but as part of that amnesty, they have to friggin learn English and study US history as well (it's kind of dumb if you live in a country, and don't know about its past at all), and work towards becoming a US citizen.

Sorry if I seem to go all over the place with my post, just wanted to rant stuff before school

Jam it back in, in the dark.