Read the CATO Report on how welfare varies between states. In most states it pays more to be on welfare than minimum wage jobs with benefits! Click here to read the report.
Rank and State – #1 Welfare value #2 Increase or Decrease since 1995
1 Hawaii $41,910 now up to $49,175 an increase of $7,265
2 District of Columbia 34,368 43,099 8,730
3 Massachusetts 37,346 42,515 5,169
4 Connecticut 36,981 38,761 1,781
5 New Jersey 33,194 38,728 5,533
6 Rhode Island 32,549 38,632 6,083
7 New York 33,430 38,004 4,574
8 Vermont 28,338 37,705 9,367
9 New Hampshire 30,166 37,160 6,994
10 Maryland 29,448 35,672 6,224
11 California 31,259 35,287 4,029
12 Wyoming 26,866 33,119 6,253
13 Oregon 25,625 31,674 6,049
14 Minnesota 27,865 31,603 3,738
15 Nevada 27,887 31,409 3,521
16 Washington 28,301 30,816 2,514
17 North Dakota 25,403 30,681 5,278
18 New Mexico 26,243 30,435 4,191
19 Delaware 27,933 30,375 2,442
20 Pennsylvania 26,555 29,817 3,263
21 South Dakota 25,216 29,439 4,223
22 Kansas 25,214 29,396 4,182
Table 1
Comparing Welfare Benefits Packages, 1995 vs. 2013
5
Rank Jurisdiction
1995 Package
Adjusted for
Inflation ($) 2013 ($)
Increase
(Decrease) ($)
23 Alaska 40,569 29,275 (11,295)
24 Montana 23,895 29,123 5,227
25 Michigan 26,534 28,872 2,338
26 Ohio 25,009 28,723 3,714
27 North Carolina 24,187 28,142 3,955
28 West Virginia 22,971 27,727 4,756
29 Indiana 25,978 26,891 913
30 Missouri 22,819 26,837 4,018
31 Oklahoma 25,146 26,784 1,637
32 Alabama 20,878 26,638 5,760
33 Louisiana 24,615 26,538 1,923
34 South Carolina 24,105 26,536 2,431
35 Wisconsin 26,275 21,483 (4,792)
36 Arizona 22,366 21,364 (1,002)
37 Virginia 29,291 20,884 (8,407)
38 Nebraska 23,761 20,798 (2,963)
39 Colorado 27,889 20,750 (7,139)
40 Iowa 26,194 20,101 (6,092)
41 Maine 28,737 19,871 (8,865)
42 Georgia 24,788 19,797 (4,991)
43 Utah 26,954 19,612 (7,342)
44 Illinois 26,431 19,442 (6,989)
45 Kentucky 23,885 18,763 (5,122)
46 Florida 26,092 18,121 (7,971)
47 Texas 23,376 18,037 (5,338)
48 Idaho 25,730 17,766 (7,964)
49 Arkansas 21,287 17,423 (3,864)
50 Tennessee 22,034 17,413 (4,621)
51 Mississippi 19,693 16,984 (2,709)
“In most states it pays more to be on welfare than minimum wage jobs”
Ha! so that’s why the left wants to raise the minimum wage!
… which would seem to support the proposition that it is not possible to live decently on the minimum wage … which makes anybody who objects to raising the minimum wage look pretty shabby.
I also think it should be pointed out that ol’ Cato includes non-cash goodies like housing subsidies, medical care, daycare, job training, and all like that. The theory being that if we spend a little more, maybe they can come off welfare altogether. The trouble is that, regularly, a certain segment of our society succeed in cutting off said funding … and it’s back to square one.
So irritating.
I know there will be issue with any cato report as they only put together reports that further the corporate agenda.
Someone will read the report and state the issues and spin.
I find it amazing the statement is even made?
Welfare? Like subsidies congresspeople take, big ag farmers take?
Tax loopholes and a lower tax rate if you sit home and use other peoples money to make money?
Welfare like our soldiers who get food stamps to feed their families while on duty?
Bottom line Corporate welfare and tax loopholes are the problem.
No one wants to work above ground at min wage so welcome to the employment underworld where people trade, barter, and run small biz for themselves.
Keep bashing our soldiers and people like walmart workers who do not make enough to feed their families on the crappy pay and see how the next election runs!
another clown car report by the 1%, not worth reading as it will be certain they had the goal then found a way to get the numbers as usual.
Why not solve problems and help take down the corrupt politicians?
LOL The old America is gone. People who rant and rave whatever is fed to them have not a clue.
Ya know many of the companies who took our jobs overseas actually pay more taxs overseas? But they get that 28cent a week worker!
I am for the American Worker not bigger profits for those who have record profits
Feed our own people!
Tea Party is not for the American Workers!
Dewey, I think most Americans, given the choice, would rather feed our people first. They would rather our people have the opportunity to improve their lives first, collect tax money first, etc.,…but, that’s not what we’re talking about here Dewey. You are off on a rant again that has nothing to do with the issue at hand. That is is are we encouraging people to stay on welfare because it pays better than working! Clearly the answer is yes. Don’t bring up redherrings like well rice growers get welfare. We can talk about that in another article and actually we have already. We’re simply informing people that some states, no, make that a majority of states are making life on welfare way too easy, to the point there is no incentive to get off welfare and be a contributing citizen. I don’t know why you can’t focus on this? Are you hyper sensitive about people collecting welfare for some personal reason? Because that would be more logical that the diversions you have thrown at us.
Welfare currently pays more than a minimum-wage job in 35 states, even after accounting for the Earned Income Tax Credit, and in 13 states it pays more than $15 per hour.
Bingo!
That’s where the unions came up with their $15.00 minimum wage demand.
Only 2.6 percent of full-time workers are poor, as defined by the Federal Poverty Level (FPL) standard, compared with 23.9 percent of adults who do not work.
Even part-time work makes a significant difference; only 15 percent of part-time workers are poor.1
And while many anti-poverty activists decry low-wage jobs, a minimum-wage job can be a springboard out of poverty. (Welfare rarely is because it creates fear about giving up benefits and lacks provision for training to move people off the rolls)
Libby the thing that is odious about these programs is not that they provide a “safety net” it is that they are so generous that they don’t provide incentive to leave the programs behind!
That the left has chosen to promote these programs as “entitlement” and failed to incorporate training that would move people off the government rolls shows a lack of interest in seeing individuals improve their lives. It doesn’t seem to matter that these policies were particularly hard on black citizens and families that already faced barriers to entry into the work world. I would imagine the votes were/are more important to Democrats.
Opinion of interest at Acton.org:
I just discovered this site and it is a fabulous find.
See also this article on raising the minimum wage.
Back to Libby: “The trouble is that, regularly, a certain segment of our society succeed in cutting off said funding … and it’s back to square one.”
Here’s some more information from CATO:
The Washington Times reported in 2012 that Welfare spending has risen 32% under Barack Obama:
Clearly those who belong to that “certain segment of our society” who advocate for “cutting off said funding” have NOT succeeded as you said.
And the truth is those people you love depict as stingy and hateful are motivated and talk about cutting welfare because they would like to see people living more fulfilling and personally and financially rewarding lives.
Tina: “Ha! so that’s why the left wants to raise the minimum wage!”
Well, yes. I’m not sure why you threw in the “ha!” as if this is some kind of victory for you. The rational, humane response to discovering that welfare can sometimes pay more than a minimum wage job, is to realize that minimum wage jobs don’t pay enough, and that we need to do more to incentivize work.
The irrational, inhumane response is to say that this proves that “a majority of states are making life on welfare way too easy,” which is unfortunately the tack that you and Jack have taken.
Do either of you actually know any people on welfare? It is NOT easy. It sucks. The idea that people on welfare are living high on the hog or getting any sort of free ride is false, and based on prejudice and ignorance.
The idea that the solution to “welfare paying more than work” is to actually cut welfare programs, while doing nothing to incentivize work or help those who are working and still struggling to put food on the table, is monstrous.
This is especially true given that most recipients of welfare actually DO work, and this still is not enough. The welfare/work dichotomy is a false one.
The modern conservative movement seems desperate to draw a line between “welfare recipients” and “workers” in order to put these groups against each other and create resentment for the welfare class from the working class. Since we are now seeing such a huge overlap between those two categories, I highly doubt that strategy is going to work.
Dewey why don’t you quit yer bitchin, move to North Dakota, and get yourself a good paying job? Those big corporations are paying people very well:
North Dakota has a vibrant economy going on…the money just keeps flowing…in fact you might observe that the money manages to “trickle down” even to the lowly Walmart worker from all that big corporate activity. You might say that the corporation’s investment in oil provides opportunity not just for their employees but for the businesses and employees around them.
Capitalism works!
Big government control sucks the life out of the economy and blunts prosperity…it diminishes the opportunity for people to follow their dreams and create new things and JOBS!
Chris: “The rational, humane response to discovering that welfare can sometimes pay more than a minimum wage job, is to realize that minimum wage jobs don’t pay enough, and that we need to do more to incentivize work.”
That’s one way to look at it but if you are the owner of a fast food franchise in a poor town it can represent an awful burden that could eliminate jobs, shorten store hours, raise prices (that doesn’t help the poor folk)…worst case cause early retirement and closed doors eliminating all of the jobs.
Another way to look at it is that it does more to encourage dependency on government.
Another is that it will lead to higher unemployment for young people and particularly black men who really don’t need more hurdles to entry to the workforce!
Had you been a witness to the 1950’s and early 60’s before the LBJ Great Society you might have the experience to see that government regulations to control wages has seen a rise in machinery and loss of jobs for teens and entry level workers. You might see that it has contributed, along with the expansion of welfare, to the destruction of black entrepreneurism and black neighborhoods…also the black family.
Jobs have worth. A job is only worth what an employer can pay and a worker will accept. Before welfare people knew instinctively that if they wanted to get ahead they had to enter the job market and work to get ahead…and they actually did!
It is OBSCENE that we the taxpayer are footing the bill for people who are capable of working and don’t. Poor people have always had a hard time but they also have a free education in America to age 18 and that should provide enough of a start to serve anyone in any income bracket.
If welfare was the answer to eliminating poverty there wouldn’t be so many people willing to make it a lifestyle. I know you don’t like to hear that Chris because you have some romantic notion that all poor people are exactly the same and none would make a job out of beating the system. I’m not saying that to be mean to poor people…my parents were very poor, especially my mother. They were lucky enough to live at a time when being on the dole was still considered the last resort, something to invoke feelings of shame (Not because you were lesser but because you haven’t tried hard enough). Today a lot of people feel entitled…one young woman who was interviewed referred to her welfare check as her “paycheck”. This isn’t healthy. YOU have better values than that only because you have been taught better by your parents…some people never get that message. Our government has effectively crippled them. That’s very unfortunate.
And it really pi$$es me off that you refuse to acknowledge this part of the discussion…that you refuse to give it validation. You do it because you believe Jack and I are heartless and need to be made to understand. That’s BS, Chris. We understand better than you think because we have witnessed the destruction, the increase of entitlement mentality, the loss of opportunity for kids, and we can see there is a better way, a healthier way. We can see that the progressive argument isn’t about getting help to people as much as it is keeping people dependent on government and voting for Democrats.
The best way to ensure that your children do not live in poverty is to make sure they graduate high school and get and stay married. The private sector provides plenty of opportunity to begin in a low wage jobs and work your way to something better…at least it does under administrations that understand and value freedom and work.
“The modern conservative movement seems desperate to draw a line between “welfare recipients” and “workers” in order to put these groups against each other”
DON’T YOU DARE GO THERE! You support the party that is the king of class warfare, race warfare, gender warfare! The party plays divide and concur as sport!
“I highly doubt that strategy is going to work.”
There is no such strategy. But your comment certainly demonstrates how you, and the party you support, think.
You won’t engage in the arena of ideas. You refuse to discuss the possible value of eliminating the minimum wage. Instead, you deflect, you change the subject, you attack, you attack personally…you support the party that creates and promotes entitled classes and groups setting up division, resentment, and hate.
Why progressives are regressive morons from jackass hell —
CBO: Wage hike to cost 500K jobs
http://thehill.com/blogs/on-the-money/economy/198605-cbo-minimum-wage
Tina: “Another way to look at it is that it does more to encourage dependency on government.”
That doesn’t make any sense. A higher minimum wage would mean that working people don’t have to depend on government programs for money. Low wages are the primary culprit when it comes to government dependency. Why do you think 80% of Wal-Mart workers rely on government aid? Do you think that is a coincidence?
I’ve shown you evidence that raising the minimum wage does not cause an increase in unemployment, and you’ve dismissed it out of hand.
“Jobs have worth. A job is only worth what an employer can pay and a worker will accept.”
The problem with this logic is that today’s worker has little choice but to accept much less than s/he would in a healthy economy. In many cases workers are accepting less than they KNOW they are worth. Working a job with unfair compensation can feel just as degrading as being on welfare, Tina. More so depending on the way one is treated on the job. There’s a reason you hear so many horror stories from Wal-Mart. I was always treated well but that was because I was a cashier. Sales floor associates at my store were usually expected to do the job of two people in half the time it should take. This is not hard to verify. For managers, the name of the game is to cut hours as much as possible without cutting productivity. That’s why you can rarely find good service at Wal-Mart; there’s no one around to help the customers because the store doesn’t schedule enough people to get everything done. Then when one person doesn’t finish fourteen hours worth of work in an eight hour shift, they get coached.
North Dakota is paying higher wages because there is a lot of demand for workers. The higher wages then increase demand further for products. It’s a nice cycle. But in most parts of the country the cycle is going the other way. North Dakota workers can afford to negotiate with their bosses to ensure they are getting paid what they are worth; workers in most parts of the country don’t have that option. They are too afraid to ask for a raise because they know they can be fired any moment. They are expendable. This creates a predatory environment. That doesn’t make business owners and employers evil, it’s just a fact of nature that business owners will pay the least amount they can get away with.
The minimum wage is necessary to level the playing field between the employer and employee. In a truly free market, with no government benefits to business owners, this relationship would already be equal. But we don’t have one of those, and never have in this country. Republicans show no interest in reducing the imbalance of power between employer and employee; with the attacks on unions and now the very idea of a minimum wage, they are doing everything they can to give employers even more of an advantage. Maybe most of you truly believe this is what’s best for the economy, but you’re wrong. This decreases demand and ultimately hurts business.
“Before welfare people knew instinctively that if they wanted to get ahead they had to enter the job market and work to get ahead…and they actually did!”
Sorry, but no. The poverty rate before the Great Society was higher than it’s ever been since. Again: more people lived in poverty before the creation of the welfare state than after. Your nostalgia is misplaced.
“If welfare was the answer to eliminating poverty there wouldn’t be so many people willing to make it a lifestyle.”
“So many?” How many? Give me a number. Then give me evidence for that number.
The food stamp fraud rate is only 1%:
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/12/19/us/food-stamp-fraud-in-the-underground-economy.html
I don’t deny that scammers and people who abuse the system exist. I work in a public school, Tina; I’ve met these people. But they are FAR outnumbered by the truly needy. It is offensive when you essentially tell me “Oh, I don’t mean you; you’re the exception!” because I know that’s not true. The vast majority of people on these programs work and are doing the best they can to make ends meet. And while abuse of social welfare programs is a problem, it’s nowhere near the scale of fraud and abuse by the wealthy and powerful. I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: if you want to cut welfare, start with theirs.
“DON’T YOU DARE GO THERE!”
Why not? It’s true. I can show you dozens of examples of Republican politicians, FOX News personalities and talk radio hosts setting up a false dichotomy between workers and people on welfare. Heck, this very article implies such a dichotomy.
I won’t deny that the left engages in class warfare rhetoric as well. But there is a moral difference between class warfare tactics directed at the wealthy and powerful, and class warfare tactics directed at the poor and weak. You seem to think that the former is unacceptable and the latter is just fine. I couldn’t disagree more.
Pie Guevara: “Why progressives are regressive morons from jackass hell –
CBO: Wage hike to cost 500K jobs”
I love how you completely ignore the second sentence of the article. Here are the first two sentences:
“President Obama’s proposal to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour would cost 500,000 jobs in 2016, according to a report released Tuesday by the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office.
The report also found hiking the wage from $7.25 per hour would raise income for about 16.5 million workers by $31 billion, potentially pulling nearly 1 million people out of poverty.”
Now, I’m just a regressive moron from jackass Hell, but I’m pretty sure 1 million is still more than 500,000.
One needs only to look at what the Democrat’s big government knows best did to Detroit with the help of union thugs to see what failure looks like compared to the free market work force success of North Dakota.
Chris: “That doesn’t make any sense.”
Sure, because standing around waiting for the government to make your boss give you a raise is the very definition of an independent, self-motivating person, right?
“Why do you think 80% of Wal-Mart workers rely on government aid?”
Couldn’t be because Walmart has more low skilled work than other companies and employs, according to this article, 1.4 million people, or 1% of the nations employed.
You liberals will grab any old statistic and run with it without giving it any broad scrutiny. From the same article:
So Walmart isn’t the big scrooge it is made out to be after all. This is just another left wing straw man used to create an issue…higher wages…for the next campaign or to increase union membership…or to kill the opposition if you are a Costco fan or investor.
You might also want to read here and here to better understand another point of view.
“I’ve shown you evidence that raising the minimum wage does not cause an increase in unemployment, and you’ve dismissed it out of hand.”
That’s a lie Chris.
I showed you evidence and opinion that it does. But you like to pretend that you are right when in fact you are simply repeating what you have learned or read., In addition, you have no practical experience to back up or test what you have learned or read (as I have) so I suggest it is you who does the dismissing “out of hand”.
“The problem with this logic is that today’s worker has little choice but to accept much less than s/he would in a healthy economy.
Boo hoo, kid. Welcome to progressive hell. A lot of us went through it before during the Carter years. Businesses are experiencing Obama hell right along with you. Some advice…stop voting for radical progressive Democrats.
“In a truly free market, with no government benefits to business owners, this relationship would already be equal”
Dream on…there never will be a “truly free market” whatever that means to you. Few people are asking for a “truly free market” or expect one. If you have even the slightest hope for a vibrant and alive growing market I suggest you quit voting for radical progressive Democrats (QVFRPD).
“In many cases workers are accepting less than they KNOW they are worth.”
Yeah they spent the money and got the degree and now the working world is changing and the economy sucks and the jobs just aren’t there. this is a completely different subject…solution QVFRPD.
“Working a job with unfair compensation can feel just as degrading as being on welfare”
“I beg your pardon, I never promised you a rose garden”…pop music wisdom from a bygone era. That’s the breaks kid. Life can be hard. If you hate your job the answer is to look for a better job and in the mean time, QVFRPD.
“North Dakota is paying…can get away with.”
Chris it’s time to grow up. the realities of life are always going to be what they are. there is a whole world of thought beyond what you have been exposed to thus far…people with a lot of experience…people that have gone through what you are going through and found out how to make it work for themselves. I deplore the education system it has pretty much eliminated the most valuable lessons of life to teach what has been referred to as psyco-babble and junk…certainly very little that prepares you for work and for life. I encourage you to read everything you can from people who understand business and what it took for them to succeed. Most of the big lessons are the more uncomfortable ones.
“The minimum wage is necessary to level the playing field between the employer and employee. In a truly free market, with no government benefits to business owners, this relationship would already be equal.”
Where the heck did you get this idea? How could the “playing field” ever be “equal” for employer and employee?
The employee has three basic duties: 1. Be on time, 2. Work diligently, 3. Get along with fellow workers.
If he’s smart he will look for ways to go the extra mile but other than that he has no responsibilities.
The employer has more responsibility. He has to answer to everyone. He has to shoulder the responsibility for meeting/exceeding the bottom line, making payroll, getting the purchasing right, satisfying customers, employees, vendors, the state, the tax man, OSHA…paying the rent and utilities…trying to figure out how the latest changes made by government will affect his business, what he must do to comply and how much it will cost. So what playing field are you talking about?
“Republicans show no interest in reducing the imbalance of power between employer and employee”
Republicans know that this “balance” changes all the time and varies in different sectors depending on many factors. Stop thinking of it as an adversarial relationship and QVFRPD.
“with the attacks on unions and now the very idea of a minimum wage, they are doing everything they can to give employers even more of an advantage.”
You better hope they win or you may never see a time when there are fewer people looking for work in an environment with many jobs to fill…the playing field is set up that way at times too.
“Maybe most of you truly believe this is what’s best for the economy, but you’re wrong. This decreases demand and ultimately hurts business.”
Chris the min wage increase will not help anyone in any real significant way and in this economy it is one of the stupidest suggestions that could be made to improve the economy. It shows your side has no idea how to improve the economy (I doubt they have any real interest in any case)
“This decreases demand and ultimately hurts business.”
National Review:
The business world won’t be impacted…the economy won’t even hiccup…teens who want desperately to work for the very first time will!
“Sorry, but no. The poverty rate before the Great Society was higher than it’s ever been since.”
The poverty rate was in fast decline before the Great Society, See chart. It headed skyward under Carter, back down under Reagan, headed back up at start of Clinton then declined again after Republicans took the house and cut taxes and reformed welfare under Clinton. You can see it hit a low right at the end of Clinton’s second term…that was one of those peak opportunity moments for employees…then under Bush it started back up with recession and 911 then started back down until democrats took the House, after which it started back up again.
“Your nostalgia is misplaced.”
Your education was a joke! Tit for tat.
“I don’t deny that scammers and people who abuse the system exist. I work in a public school, Tina; I’ve met these people. But they are FAR outnumbered by the truly needy.”
Any idea how many of those truly needy are second and third generation welfare? Right now one third of the US population is receiving welfare (figure does not include SS/Medicare). That should be indication enough that the system is self perpetuating, that the people raised on welfare accept it as a way of life because they grew up in it…they have become institutionalized…condemned to a life in poverty with very little help or encouragement to escape.
“…it’s nowhere near the scale of fraud and abuse by the wealthy and powerful”
Oh? Now its your turn to show some stats to support this claim. This (red herring) argument is one that could be worthy of discussion but not here.
” I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again: if you want to cut welfare, start with theirs.”
You’ve not gotten much of an argument here. We are all for smaller government, simpler taxing methods, simple regulations that are easy to understand and enforce. this would clean up a lot.
“I can show you dozens of examples of Republican politicians, FOX News personalities and talk radio hosts setting up a false dichotomy between workers and people on welfare.”
Discussions? You’re going to show me discussions on radio and TV to prove that Republicans are going for the divide and concur strategy for winning elections? You’re going to need a lot more than that.
“But there is a moral difference between class warfare tactics directed at the wealthy and powerful, and class warfare tactics directed at the poor and weak.”
You just can’t help yourself! Can’t begin to think outside that box. And this is why:
“. You seem to think that the former is unacceptable and the latter is just fine.”
YOU don’t hear me. You miss out on most of the meat of any discussion because it all has to fit in that victim mentality box, that class warfare box, that down for the struggle box. You start with a false dichotomy. Business doesn’t exist to make life better for people. They also don’t exist to lord it over anybody, especially not the poor. Business owners have their own motivations and challenges. they have jobs to offer…that’s it. Your life is up to you…always has been…always will be.
You are no longer on the college campus. This is real life…the real world. All of us are just doing the best we can every day…the poor don’t have that market cornered, sorry.
Freedom is the most important leg up anyone has. It is something every American has. How a person chooses to take advantage of it will determine how well, or how poorly, he does. Every individual, in every single class, will face challenges along the way. Fairness counts for almost nothing in the game…certainly whining about things being unfair will not make any difference at all. Come on Chris, put down those weapons and just take the opportunity to learn something.
Pie have you noticed the left now has a “consensus view” on economic issues?
They never stop blowing smoke!
Did not ignore it, water boy. Raise income for less than one million, put 1/2 million plus OUT of work. Just the sort of moron from jackass hell policy and logic one would expect the water boy to champion.
Ann Coulter has an excellent take on the wage issue, but it is only for those non-morns who do not reside in jackass hell —
http://www.anncoulter.com/columns/2014-02-26.html
Lastly, the government salary outrages in DemoKKKratic party machine run California keep piling up. Welfare for fat cat government officials —
http://www.ijreview.com/2014/02/117923-watch-outraged-citizens-excoriate-city-school-superintendent-600000-salary/
I agree with you Peggy. One of the conservative GOP talking points should be “Remember Detroit”. If they are allowed to continue in the current direction the whole country will look like Detroit!
“We know of no more crucial civil rights issue facing Congress today than the need to increase the federal minimum wage and extend its coverage.
“We believe it is imperative that farm laborers, among the most abused and neglected of all American workers, be included at last among those who benefit from the Fair Labor Standards Act. We want coverage extended to include those millions in retail trades, laundries, hospitals and nursing homes, restaurants, hotels, small logging operations and cotton gins who still work for starvation wages.
“While we are mindful of the shocking fact that less than one-half of all non-white workers are covered by the Fair Labor Standards Act, we do not speak for Negro workers only. A living wage should be the right of all working Americans, and this is what we wish to urge upon our Congressmen and Senators as they now prepare to deal with this legislation.”
—Martin Luther King Jr, statement on minimum wage legislation, March 18, 1966
https://www.aft.org/yourwork/tools4teachers/bhm/mlktalks.cfm
Tina, your arguments contradict each other. First you said that the minimum wage will have a devastating effect on the economy and unemployment, then you said it only applies to 1% of the population and that “The business world won’t be impacted…the economy won’t even hiccup…”
How am I supposed to understand and be persuaded by your argument if you can’t even decide what your argument is?
Hey Chris, since you’re a teacher now what to you think about his high school superintendent’s salary and benefit package of over $600k? Do you think he should give some of his salary to lower paid teachers and staff and reimburse the teacher who’s been buying her own paper products? How about the $900k loan the school board gave him at 2% interest after he went bankrupt? Just wondering if you think that was a wise expense based on the high risk with his credit?
Can teachers in this district be compared to Walmart employees with salary and perk disparities with those of top CEOs?
I would think the outcry would be very high since this guy’s salary is from tax dollars and not earned profits from the sales of goods and services.
http://losangeles.cbslocal.com/video?autoStart=true&topVideoCatNo=default&clipId=9884268
Chris: “First you said that the minimum wage will have a devastating effect on the economy and unemployment, then you said it only applies to 1% of the population and that “The business world won’t be impacted…the economy won’t even hiccup…”
Thanks for asking for clarification. You said that raising the minimum wage would help the economy but this is a false argument.
Raising the minimum wage will not have a significant impact on the economy because buying power will not be significantly raised. The representative buying power would not cause the economy to hiccup…the argument is disingenuous. The newly found buying power of a few lucky people would soon be eaten up by rising prices or they would be countered by loss of hours for others. Raising the minimum wage will result in jobs losses and fewer hours at a time when entry level jobs, jobs in general, are sorely needed. The ACA has already caused loss of hours for some workers…this would make matters worse.
Higher prices at a time when the nation is already seeing higher prices for food and energy. So most likely buying power wouldn’t be strengthened it would be weakened
There is no conflict. The economy will not be helped enough, if at all, to make this a good argument and the lost opportunity is a lousy result for those most in need of a job. Bottom line its a bad idea.
Sadly, the things that would work are not being considered…a real shame.
OK, Tina. Thanks for clarifying. It might surprise you to find that I think that is actually a valid argument. And I’m sorry if I’ve come across as trying to deligitimize your basic belief that raising the minimum wage will be harmful rather than helpful. It is not a totally irrational belief.
That said, I don’t think it’s fair to say that I’ve dismissed the studies showing it will increase unemployment out of hand. In the past when you have linked to such studies I have tried to explain why I believed their methodologies were flawed, and why other studies which have reached different conclusions were superior.
You haven’t countered with a defense of your studies’ methodologies, instead appealing to your “real world experience” to prove the point. While I am sure your real world experience would be valuable in many respects, such as if I were looking for advice on how to open and run a business, I don’t think it’s very useful when discussing the economy as a whole. That’s not to disparage you, it’s just that personal experience is so subjective, and there are so many people who have had different experiences and use those to justify raising the minimum wage. I have used anecdotal evidence myself here when describing Wal-Mart working conditions. But for the most part, anecdotes just don’t make for good economic policy. The economy is too big and too complex for that. When discussing the economy as a whole, I do believe that properly conducted academic studies are superior to personal stories. And I think the studies which have found little to no unemployment increase are superior to those that did find a large one.
It should be noted that even the CBO report’s number of jobs lost is small–500,000 sounds like a lot, but it is only .3 percent of the workforce. It also found that overall income would increase by $2 billion. So even assuming that the CBO’s projections about unemployment are true, I think the benefits still outweigh the costs.
I apologize for my earlier tone, and on this issue I hope we can agree to respectfully disagree.