Perhaps, but then couple a minimum wage with health care provisions, and is there not a great incentive for companies to automate to the greatest degree possible? Hence in the US, you now have credit card readers at gas station pumps and we pump our own gas, you have self-serve check-out counters at supermarkets and grocery stores, you have ATMs rather than bank tellers and electronic payments rather than letters mailed out or bills mailed in and all of this removes many of those entry-level jobs for the uneducated or less skilled, including the hundreds of thousands of jobs that the Post Office is shedding. Couple that with the massive automation in manufacturing and, perhaps, you will find that this really is about salaries and health care provisions and how they add to the final bill. Many companies would react sharply to correct a 3% rise in costs. So, I think that you may be mistaken about how minimum wage and other cost increases affect corporate behavior. Just a thought? There are already experimental measures in place to self order at fast-food restaurants; this, too, would require a completely cashless (although no doubt vending type machines could be installed) payment and then… take away the fast-food workers and where does the lower level of labor work?[/quote]
Actually, this is the kind of argument the Luddites used when faced with the industrial revolution taking away jobs from artisans and it’s really a false argument.
What you are suggesting is that we avoid increasing labor productivity by substituting cheap labor for automation.
Nice try. Again, for those who think that the minimum wage and expanding health care coverage are measures that are so good such no brainers that no discussion is required, I am merely pointing out that a 3% increase in costs at a corporation starts an accelerated process at reducing those costs. This OFTEN involves automation or downsizing or offshoring. And then, what about the people that the program was supposed to help? Yeah… good intentions have undesirable consequences… that is why there is an adage namely that the road to hell is paved with them…
Those costs were going to come out anyways thanks to the invisible hand. What I do propose is that we have a safety net to help people through these transitions because these transitions are inevitable and the employment market is far from a perfect one. Just read Yellen’s thesis on unemployment and wages. Good stuff!
Even the Victorians eventually figured out that a safety net and minimums standards were better than Ned.
My how the original point drifts… First, it was that anyone who questioned minimum wages was being ridiculous because people in Cambodia cannot work in our coffee shops, then it was that I feared technology and was equivalent to a Luddite for pointing out that there are consequences to minimum wages and now! Quel horror! I am someone who is against even Victorian Era safety nets? Okay, I think that we get the picture. Summary: There are issues that need to be addressed when looking at minimum wages. Raising minimum wages, no matter your views, almost always reduces total employment opportunities either through hiring freezes, automation, increased efficiency OR some other measure. This is so typical of would-be do gooders… But I feel that this is good ergo it is good and like that road to hell, so many of you have led to so many hellish conditions but since you “meant well” you should not be responsible for those actions? rather it should be the realists like me who point them out. It is because we are so hateful that bad employment conditions continue to exist. Reality is ugly. Let’s beautify it through loving imagination! Got it!
Not necessarily. When the antebellum South had slave labor, they had little incentive to industrialize or upgrade their agricultural techniques. Industrialization and automation are front loaded. Nobody goes through the expense and risk of putting in robots until they get really, really fed up with the unions.
The invisible hand works only on the problems at… uh… hand.
:roflmao: We who studied Economics salute you, spot on joke
I don’t oppose an adjustable minimum wage rate to reflect the current environment ( although I don’t think governments move nearly fast enough to adapt at an efficient pace ) Obviously in times of recession unemployment is high, but unemployment is really just a function of price. At 10$ per hour there may be 10% unemployment, but at 5$ per hour there may only be 5%. At a certain price there is full employment. There is no black and white answer as to what minimum wage laws should be. There doesn’t seem to be any escaping the double edged sword aspect of it which is why minimum wage discussions make Economists go off into 50 different tangents going further and further down the rabbit hole, never emerging with an answer. The ideal wage is almost arbitrary.
[quote=“rowland”][quote=“Elegua”]
Those costs were going to come out anyways thanks to the invisible hand.
[/quote]
Not necessarily. When the antebellum South had slave labor, they had little incentive to industrialize or upgrade their agricultural techniques. Industrialization and automation are front loaded. Nobody goes through the expense and risk of putting in robots until they get really, really fed up with the unions.
The invisible hand works only on the problems at… uh… hand.[/quote]
Errr…so what about that little piece of automation call the cotton gin? Yah know the one that, “saved”, slavery?
My how the original point drifts… First, it was that anyone who questioned minimum wages was being ridiculous because people in Cambodia cannot work in our coffee shops, then it was that I feared technology and was equivalent to a Luddite for pointing out that there are consequences to minimum wages and now! Quel horror! I am someone who is against even Victorian Era safety nets? Okay, I think that we get the picture. Summary: There are issues that need to be addressed when looking at minimum wages. Raising minimum wages, no matter your views, almost always reduces total employment opportunities either through hiring freezes, automation, increased efficiency OR some other measure. This is so typical of would-be do gooders… But I feel that this is good ergo it is good and like that road to hell, so many of you have led to so many hellish conditions but since you “meant well” you should not be responsible for those actions? rather it should be the realists like me who point them out. It is because we are so hateful that bad employment conditions continue to exist. Reality is ugly. Let’s beautify it through loving imagination! Got it![/quote]
But au contraire - so many employment studies say “Non” - it really does seem the price floor effect on employment is overstated because…maybe…drum roll please…the employer often has monopsony over the employee. That would imply that the market clearing price is artificially pushed too low…which makes sense since we have to import all these illegals for menial jobs since locals won’t work for such low wages. We can argue about whether illegal gets minimum wage. At least they get a free ride home.
[quote=“Elegua”]Err…why do I feel I have to keep repeating myself here…This is really only an issue for very small companies or labor intensive companies that want to keep employee costs at McJob level…like Dominos
I already have compliant insurance for my company…it didn’t cost anymore than normal. But, then again we buy proper insurance for our employees because they are skilled workers. Oh, this is across both Union and Non-Union plants.
I feel like I live in an alternate universe as compared to you folks.
Someone help me here…Please tell me about your US facilities and how you are handling this?[/quote]
Well, I don’t have any facilities in the US or elsewhere.
I dunno. But, that’s the Obama Justice Department asserting that the Obama Administration estimates that a majority of group health plans will have lost their grandfather status by the end of 2013.
I know the Obama Admin has been lying a lot, lately. But, shouldn’t I believe them this time? [/quote]
[quote=“Elegua”]Err…why do I feel I have to keep repeating myself here…This is really only an issue for very small companies or labor intensive companies that want to keep employee costs at McJob level…like Dominos
I already have compliant insurance for my company…it didn’t cost anymore than normal. But, then again we buy proper insurance for our employees because they are skilled workers. Oh, this is across both Union and Non-Union plants.
I feel like I live in an alternate universe as compared to you folks.
Someone help me here…Please tell me about your US facilities and how you are handling this?[/quote]
Well, I don’t have any facilities in the US or elsewhere.
I dunno. But, that’s the Obama Justice Department asserting that the Obama Administration estimates that a majority of group health plans will have lost their grandfather status by the end of 2013.
I know the Obama Admin has been lying a lot, lately. But, shouldn’t I believe them this time? [/quote]
OK. But, I didn’t post about the religious angle/angel? … I posted regarding the Obama Administration’s own estimate numbers of likely cancellations wrt employment-based plans. The estimates seem to be significantly high, per the Obama Admin.
OK. But, I didn’t post about the religious angle/angel? … I posted regarding the Obama Administration’s own estimate numbers of likely cancellations wrt employment-based plans. The estimates seem to be significantly high, per the Obama Admin.
No?
:s[/quote]
Yes, that seems to be something that many knew about, but few spoke about. It also seems a subject that has a bit of FUD involved as well.
[quote]Obamacare bombshell: IT official says HealthCare.gov needs payment feature
Another day, another big, bad black eye for HealthCare.gov.
A crucial system for making payments to insurers from people who enroll in that federal Obamacare marketplace has yet to be built, a senior government IT official admitted Tuesday.
The official, Henry Chao, visibly stunned Rep. Cory Gardner (R-Colo.) when he said under questioning before a House subcommittee that a significant fraction of HealthCare.gov—30 to 40 percent of it—has yet to be constructed.
“We still need to build the payments system to make the payments [to insurance companies] in January,” testified Chao, deputy chief information officer of the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, the federal agency that operates HealthCare.gov.
That so-called financial management tool was originally supposed to be part of HealthCare.gov when it launched Oct. 1, but officials later suspended its launch as part of their effort to get the consumer interface part of the site ready. The tool will, when it works, transmit the subsidies that the government is kicking in for many enrollees to offset the costs of their monthly premiums.[/quote]
“When” it works?? Isn’t that a little . . . optimistic?
… I posted regarding the Obama Administration’s own estimate numbers of likely cancellations