More States should reject the $300 unemployment boost

[bave]

Yup, but not for a minimum wage job

I challenge you to go out and hire someone even at what the left has called a minimum wage job, $15hr. You can't do it.

 

[Bucky]

Fyi people in the hospitality industry make minimum wage but make a decent living through tips. Bottom-tier candidates would not survive in this industry.

 

[bullseyelqcs]

First off, I have no problem with someone claiming benefits if they are legitimately unemployed and seeking work. At some point standards have to drop for what people want vs what they are getting offered. However, none of this is what we are talking about. We are talking about people *choosing* to sit at home for $18-20/hr in welfare rather than work because they prefer that over working for $14/hr. That's just a definition of a welfare parasite.

Why is it that its always the worker who has to settle for less money? Yes, the average person is going to choose to make 18-20 bucks an hour over 14 an hour, regardless of the work needed to get it. That they can do it by NOT working over WORKING is the sad part. I hardly ever see anyone advocating that if a business owner wants to hire people that they drop thier standard in regards to profit and pay more than what they were originally willing to pay. Some people seem to think that seeking work should inherently mean taking whatever work is out there, regardless of the pay.

I don't think you understand how PPP loans work or their purpose. It wasn't a handout from the feds to businesses, it was the Feds asking employers to keep people on payroll since their UI system couldn't handle the volumes. So instead they just paid employers the same it would cost the Fed to lay them off. Hardly a windfall.

True....but there were lots who applied for the loans and then ended up laying people off before they had exhausted all of the funds anyway, thus turning it into a windfall of sorts.

Yea, too damned picky to not want to hire drug abusers and felons..... holy shit.

Yea....not sure where they were going with this one....

 

[bullseyelqcs]

The problem is the definition of "living wage".

Basic necessities paid for.

Classic point, real median household income in the US is *up* since they started tracking the figures at BLS (late 70's). Why is it that the median household today just can't get by on the same or more spending power than they did 40 years ago? What changed?

You literally answered your own question while asking it and didn't even recognize it.

What changed is the spending power. Everything has gone up in price almost exponentially, but household income hasn't risen at the same rate. So that means even though they are making more money now, they are spending the increase and then some compared to the late 70's.

<snipped because it had nothing to do with me>

 

[bave]

Why is it that its always the worker who has to settle for less money? Yes, the average person is going to choose to make 18-20 bucks an hour over 14 an hour, regardless of the work needed to get it. That they can do it by NOT working over WORKING is the sad part. I hardly ever see anyone advocating that if a business owner wants to hire people that they drop thier standard in regards to profit and pay more than what they were originally willing to pay. Some people seem to think that seeking work should inherently mean taking whatever work is out there, regardless of the pay.


True....but there were lots who applied for the loans and then ended up laying people off before they had exhausted all of the funds anyway, thus turning it into a windfall of sorts.

1) They don't have to settle for anything, until you ask for public assistance. You shouldn't be able to choose to be a ward of the society (aka: a parasite) because you prefer it. People should be required to support themselves to the best of their ability first and foremost. The overriding issue here is that if you force every low level job to be a $20/hr+ job then it is going to accelerate offshoring, automation, and black market labor pools even further. All counter productive.

2) Again, not sure you understand how the PPP loans work. If you didn't spend all the money, in approved ways, and maintained your payroll levels then the loan was not forgiven and you had to pay it back with interest. Hardly a windfall.

 

[bave]

Basic necessities paid for.

You literally answered your own question while asking it and didn't even recognize it.

What changed is the spending power. Everything has gone up in price almost exponentially, but household income hasn't risen at the same rate. So that means even though they are making more money now, they are spending the increase and then some compared to the late 70's.

<snipped because it had nothing to do with me>

1) The definition of "basic necessities" has changed dramatically. Look at the discretionary spending that is now labeled necessary today compared to 1980 for instance.

2) Again, I don't think you understand. When the word "real" is used in economics parlance it means "adjusted for inflation" or "purchasing power parity". So yea, the question stands.

 

[bullseyelqcs]

1) They don't have to settle for anything, until you ask for public assistance. You shouldn't be able to choose to be a ward of the society (aka: a parasite) because you prefer it. People should be required to support themselves to the best of their ability first and foremost. The overriding issue here is that if you force every low level job to be a $20/hr+ job then it is going to accelerate offshoring, automation, and black market labor pools even further. All counter productive.

2) Again, not sure you understand how the PPP loans work. If you didn't spend all the money, in approved ways, and maintained your payroll levels then the loan was not forgiven and you had to pay it back with interest. Hardly a windfall.

Alright, before this goes any further, I have to ask a question.

Would you be opposed to the minimum wage being raised to, say, 12.50 an hour?

 

[bave]

Alright, before this goes any further, I have to ask a question.

Would you be opposed to the minimum wage being raised to, say, 12.50 an hour?

I don't think it is relevant honestly. I am not trying to avoid the question, but I tend to look at the statistics.

In the early 80's you had a large portion of the population earning minimum wage, something like ~20%. Today it is something like 3%, of which it is almost entirely tipped employees (ie: bartenders/waitresses etc). So I just don't see the real issue to be honest. As a business owner I can tell you that I can't even think about getting a decent unskilled employee for less than $13/hr to start, in a low cost of living area. The labor pool that is willing to work for less are totally unreliable, criminal records, drug problems etc. I wouldn't hire them for $1/hr.

Now, if you try and force the market to pay, say $12/hr in your example, for that otherwise very undesirable labor set then you are going to see a larger push towards automation. Think about these jobs, they are largely fast food/lawn service type jobs. Both of them are easily automated/productivity enhanced to simply displace large numbers of actual laborers.

Back to my initial point, if you truly look at and understand the economic numbers they paint a very different picture than the left would have you believe on cost of living, hourly wages, taxation etc. The problem is a very small minority of the world actually wants to understand and source their own data and look at it. Instead they listen to sound bites and take them as gospel.

 

[rickc]

So people won't go back to work because they make more money in unemployment.

Reality you would have to be stupid to work for less money.

Unemployment pays more than working? So if employers want them to go back to work sounds like they need to raise wages.

Or the republican solution. Cut off the money and keep the low wages.

America should just go on strike till wages are raised across the board!

 

[bave]

One of the driving problems in today's culture is a lack of shame. People have no shame with their appearance, their behavior, their entitlement etc. When I was younger there was deep societal shame involved in being on welfare programs, now people are proud of it.

 

[j brown's body]

One of the driving problems in today's culture is a lack of shame. People have no shame with their appearance, their behavior, their entitlement etc. When I was younger there was deep societal shame involved in being on welfare programs, now people are proud of it.

I never realized how bad this was until Covid hit and I've seen so many of my fellow Americans utterly disregard safety precautions and skip getting vaccinated. Their sense of entitlement at the expense of public health is mind boggling.

 

[bullseyelqcs]

One of the driving problems in today's culture is a lack of shame. People have no shame with their appearance, their behavior, their entitlement etc. When I was younger there was deep societal shame involved in being on welfare programs, now people are proud of it.

I dont know if proud of it is what I would call it. Maybe more of a happy to be able to make ends meet.

That said, I totally agree with going back to shaming people.....starting with publicly shaming business owners who have full time employees that are still on welfare.

 

[Questerr]

The problem is the definition of "living wage".

Classic point, real median household income in the US is *up* since they started tracking the figures at BLS (late 70's). Why is it that the median household today just can't get by on the same or more spending power than they did 40 years ago? What changed?

Btw, how are you calling yourself a libertarian while supporting a living minimum wage? That's like saying you are a pro-choice abortionist or a pro-gun regulation member of the three percenters.

What I really support would be workers seizing businesses from capitalists and running them as worker coops with all the profits going back into worker hands, and therefore having no need of minimum wage laws, but since that's unlikely to happen, supporting workers against the coercive power of capitalism requires a minimum wage.

 

[bave]

What I really support would be workers seizing businesses from capitalists and running them as worker coops with all the profits going back into worker hands, and therefore having no need of minimum wage laws, but since that's unlikely to happen, supporting workers against the coercive power of capitalism requires a minimum wage.

Ok, so you are in support of violent revolution, seizure of property, and the violation of almost every law of the land. Got it.

How in the holy hell do you have "libertarian" in your bio. This is the furthest thing from libertarian ideals I have ever seen. So are you being funny with that bio or ignorant?

 

[Questerr]

Ok, so you are in support of violent revolution, seizure of property, and the violation of almost every law of the land. Got it.

How in the holy hell do you have "libertarian" in your bio. This is the furthest thing from libertarian ideals I have ever seen. So are you being funny with that bio or ignorant?

It would seem you are ignorant because you have no knowledge of Libertarianism, how the word came to be, or what it meant prior to Murray Rothbard stealing it and turning it to mean “anarcho-capitalism”.

Here’s a clue: “Libertarian” is a word invented by Anarcho-Socialists.

 

[NotreDame]

If they are making more on unemployment then maybe he should pay his employees a living wage instead.

Perhap the “living wage” is in excess of the labor to be performed.

 

[NotreDame]

Republicans: cut off the money and make those sorry workers go back to work for cheap wages where we can increase our profits

Democrats: let's raise wages to a living wage as an incentive to go back to work

Cheap wages? What is a cheap wage?

 

[NotreDame]

If your business cannot compete with unemployment UI, then that’s just the market telling you that your wages are garbage. Unemployment UI ends, and it provides no health benefits. These jobs are either a) completely undesirable due to garbage pay/benefits; b) in areas/industries that have had poor records of protecting their employees from covid.

What? No way! The government isn’t the “market.” The market isn’t communicating the message you attribute to it. Rather, the “market” has sent a message the wages are X amount, and government unemployment is higher in some instances.

 

[Variant]

What? No way! The government isn’t the “market.” The market isn’t communicating the message you attribute to it. Rather, the “market” has sent a message the wages are X amount, and government unemployment is higher in some instances.

The cost of living has gone up while wages remain rather stagnant so, the market might be signaling this regardless of government unemployment.

I suggest people consider this a preview.

 

[NotreDame]

If a business pays so poorly that an extra $300/week makes unemployment more desirable than their shitty ass job, it's their own fault.

I have yet to see real evidence that the enhanced unemployment is a causal factor for these businesses having trouble finding workers. Occam's Razor would suggest their jobs simply don't hold enough value.

Nice for you to just tell parents everywhere to piss off and not take care of their children. GET BACK TO WORK! YOUR KIDS ARENT IMPORTANT, THE STOCK MARKET IS!!! LMAO

Does the $300 weekly mean “jobs simply don’t hold enough value” and the job is “shitty”? How exactly do you leap to such conclusions?

 

[NotreDame]

The cost of living has gone up while wages remain rather stagnant so, the market might be signaling this regardless of government unemployment.

I suggest people consider this a preview.

Might? So, you don’t know.

The media, some economists, some professors, some researchers, etcetera, have been arguing wages have been “rather stagnant,” haven’t kept up with inflation or only minimally kept ahead of inflation, since the middle 70s, late 70s, or early 80s. This was true, some argued, right up until the pandemic consumed American life. The market didn’t “signal” wages were “garbage” during this time frame did they?

 

[Variant]

Might? So, you don’t know.

The media, some economists, some professors, some researchers, etcetera, have been arguing wages have been “rather stagnant,” haven’t kept up with inflation or only minimally kept ahead of inflation, since the middle 70s, late 70s, or early 80s. This was true, some argued, right up until the pandemic consumed American life. The market didn’t “signal” wages were “garbage” during this time frame did they?

It was already a problem before the pandemic.

Top 4 Reasons Why Employers Can't Find Skilled Workers

As the US job market continues to rise, the demand for skilled workers has become widespread. Read these 4 reasons why employers can't find skilled workers.

eliteforcestaffing.com

American businesses can't find workers

Labor shortages in the United States are getting worse, according to a report from the Federal Reserve.

money.cnn.com

Right now we are blaming the unemployment benefits because they exacerbate the problem that corporations feel they can keep wages stagnant forever.

I predict that the problem will remain after the benefits are removed, because the jobs in question are riskier due to covid and a reasonable person can do a cost benefit analysis for a low wage job.

We're also on the cusp of some major inflation spikes so I expect the cost of living is about to increase a bit.

 

[Checkerboard Strangler]

If you want for example a pizza place to pay a "living wage" they will need to sell those pies for $30-50 each.

In business, you have something called margins.

Sorry but increasing minimum wage doesn't result in massive price increases or shorter margins.
If that were true a Big Mac in Europe would cost 30 to 35 bucks.

 

[NotreDame]

If your business can't afford to pay someone enough to feed and house themselves, it is by definition a failing business and we shouldn't be stealing MY TAX DOLLARS to subsidize YOUR failing business.

If people are unwilling to pay enough for a service to exist, they don't deserve to have that service. That's just basic economics. You want the ability to pull into a drive through at 1am and be handed a hot cheeseburger within two minutes, you need to pay for that service to exist. This includes feeding and housing the human beings who provide that service. Don't want to pay? You don't get a burger.

Subsidizing the profits of a failed business model by taking more from the labor of the line workers and making up the difference with my tax dollars isn't any more moral than a failing construction business subsidizing itself by stealing lumber.

Basic economics have anything to say about demand for a service also affects the price of the service? And at some point a service is too much that demand evaporates, and with it, the jobs that provided the service along with the businesses providing the service.

The cost of a service is more nuanced than you summarily declaring, out of thin air, what the cost of the service is to be in accordance to your personal beliefs and principles.

And what moral code are you invoking? Are you a relativist? Non-cognitivist? A Cognivist? What?

 

[NotreDame]

It was already a problem before the pandemic.

Top 4 Reasons Why Employers Can't Find Skilled Workers

As the US job market continues to rise, the demand for skilled workers has become widespread. Read these 4 reasons why employers can't find skilled workers.

eliteforcestaffing.com

American businesses can't find workers

Labor shortages in the United States are getting worse, according to a report from the Federal Reserve.

money.cnn.com

I predict that the problem will remain after the benefits are removed, because the jobs in question are riskier due to covid and a reasonable person can do a cost benefit analysis for a low wage job.

We're also on the cusp of some major inflation spikes so I expect the cost of living is about to increase a bit.

Well, the second article doesn’t give a cause. The first article lists four possible causes, none of them necessarily mutually exclusive of any other, and addresses specifically skilled labor.

The scholarly articles I’ve read included some asserting low wages singularly is the reason. Other articles I’ve read do not rule out low wages as a cause but questions it’s prevalence and argue there’s multiple explanations. From these articles, the author(s) question lower wages as a cause because of a lack of a strong safety net (this is pre-pandemic) but do not deny it plays a role, in their estimation a small role.

Right now we are blaming the unemployment benefits because they exacerbate the problem that corporations feel they can keep wages stagnant forever.

I’m not sure what you mean by “stagnant.” In these dialogues, I’ve encountered some variations in the meaning. What is your understanding of the meaning of the word “stagnant” in relation to wages?

Moving past that though for the moment, you infer the unemployment benefits reflect the wages are too low. How exactly do you make this deduction based on the unemployment benefit amount?