The Minimum Wage

Doing what I do I am privy to industry messages inside the business community.  This one comes from the National Restaurant Association, not the gun enthusiasts.

Survey says...

NRA poll: Wage increase not the best way to reduce poverty A federal minimum wage increase ranks a distant third, behind post-secondary education and job training opportunities, as a factor that stands to significantly reduce poverty in the United States, according to the results of a recent National Restaurant Association poll. Three of four respondents said ensuring that more young people complete high school and have an opportunity to acquire some form of post-secondary education would have a very significant impact (49%) or fairly significant impact (20%) on reducing poverty in the U.S. The poll, conducted in late January by ORC International on behalf of the NRA, asked 1,003 adults for their opinion on whether three factors—increasing the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour, ensuring that more young people finish high school and have an opportunity to acquire post-secondary education, and providing more opportunities for job training for the unemployed and under-employed—would have a significant, fairly significant, or somewhat of an impact on reducing poverty. Read more. Tell Congress that increasing the federal minimum wage will reduce jobs, not poverty.

My drop in a bucket comments:  Off course the NRA wants to oppose any increase in the minimum wage.  The giant corporations that run the spew of fast food and homogenized dining experiences at every interstate exit use the federal minimum wage as the forced maximum they have to unfortunately relinquish for the disposable humans that wash dishes, tote plates, heat chicken, and flow consumer cattle through table tops with touch screens.  The minimum wage is a restrictive check and balance that exists because without it disposable humans will accept a nickel a day over nothing in times of economic desperation.

This poll starts with a false economic premise.  It juxtaposes the idea that the waiter, line cook, or clean up artist is some current student or drop out and that higher education would resolve the toil.  It does not address the reality that humans require a spectrum of low, moderate, and high wage compensation variables for our macroeconomic equation to balance.  Right now it does not balance.  The major reason it does not is because the top end hoards the preponderance through dividends, high-end management compensation, and an escalation of commitment compensation routine where those getting paid millions begin to over-associate their contribution to the business’s profit.  (I.e.  I paid out this bonus to me, we’re making money.  If I left the profit would go away.  I am an indispensable human. )

To do this the minimum wagers in third world and in the United States become blank-faced replaceable bodies to churn the factory whether it be a restaurant or Wal-Mart.  This is why the minimum wage is so crucial.  The minimum wage is the reluctant share given for a unit of cog-labor in America.  The country’s political lobbying groups will repress this wage as long as possible. 

This is why we see statistics about job loss and how the money the increased minimum wage “costs” would be better spent elsewhere.   Some humans have an intelligence quotient or a desire where minimum wage is all they can or will do in this life.  The minimum wage means if a firm could pay you less it would.  Applying a theoretical college degree to this population is a false solution to a full economic spectrum reality. 

Most min-wage workers are adults, parents, family providers and the percentage is growing, not declining.  The economy is us as a nation, not the stock market.  When compensation is diverted from the firm owners to the bottom rung, even in such tiny amounts as the minimum wage, that money gets circulated in our economy at a much higher rate than as a stock dividend.  That helps the federal treasury and creates consumer spending, which is the number one driver of a healthy economy.  Increased minimum wage workers have a better shot at home ownership, automobile ownership, lowering financing charges and other fundamental variables that can assist in elevating humans into the middle class. 

The idea that firms will cut people because the minimum wage increases requires the precursor question: what are the profits of that company?  What do the 10K's say?  Where do those profits go to?

Look at the stock market, look at the lines of industries opposing the minimum wage and you will begin to understand why increasing the minimum wage to a reasonable amount around $10 an hour is vital, healthy and a major step in our economic recovery.