Quote :

"It's a pretty small percentage of folks and I figure by the time you factor in all the other taxes they're paying, then they're still getting fucked either way."

ah, so as long as there is some sort of "getting fucked" involved, some forms of redistribution are ok with you?

so if someone is "getting fucked" by, say, cancer, do you think it is fair to redistribute money to save their lives?

what's your moral line in the sand for what kinds of "getting fucked" matter and what kinds don't?

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 10:44 AM. Reason : .]

10/4/2016 10:44:07 AM

This is why I can't give y'all one damn inch.

Do I think EITC is ideal? Absolutely not. Do I think the government getting less money is good? Absolutely.

I'm not "OK with it", but I do think it's preferable to a minimum wage increase.

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:21 AM. Reason : Dh]

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:22 AM. Reason : This is why no one is willing to compromise anymore. ]

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:23 AM. Reason : That's what I get for trying to be reasonable and have a decent conversation ]

10/4/2016 11:17:46 AM

I agree tho, EITC > Min wage

10/4/2016 12:15:22 PM

what about my questions isn't reasonable and decent?

you made a compromise in your comment about EITC, which is a pretty big shift from what seems to be a fairly hard-line history you have on zero redistribution, zero taxes. and it's those "shifts" that are actually the compromises that all parties need to make to get the government working.

I'm unclear as to why you think my asking where else you'd compromise is anything but reasonable. i think it's well within the realm of discussion to ask if you think there is any room to compromise on redistribution to save lives.

the only reason I can think of you believe you should not have to compromise any more than you want to

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 3:42 PM. Reason : .]

10/4/2016 3:37:39 PM

i do not think it is ever morally acceptable to use violence or threat of violence to take money from one person and give it to another. the only exception would be financial reparation to one party for a violation of property rights committed by another party (the most basic function of government).

with that said, i am willing to take any steps that move us closer to liberty. so if you think of a road with totalitarianism on one end and anarchism (not chaos, simply a lack of goverment) on the other end, i'm willing to do anything that takes us towards the anarchism end. i'm not sure where we should stop the car along that road, but i know what happens if we keep going the other way. tax cuts move us towards liberty, so i'm good with them, even if they are only for a select group. i'll take whatever i can get. i even supported a negative income tax as a replacement for the welfare state in another thread.

hell, i would probably vote for a progressive like jill stein if it came with a guarantee of a 10% cut in government spending. at least she wants to audit the fed. not as good as ending it, but it's a good start.

10/4/2016 6:09:33 PM

Quote :

"i do not think it is ever morally acceptable to use violence or threat of violence to take money from one person and give it to another."

has an IRS collector threatened to kill you if you don't pay taxes or something?

10/4/2016 10:29:29 PM

what happens if i don't pay my taxes?

10/4/2016 10:34:23 PM

you get physically assaulted? just like if you get caught doing 90 in a 35, right?

10/4/2016 10:48:24 PM

everyone knows they will come and point guns at you and take your shit. don't play dumb.

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 10:50 PM. Reason : government is by definition violent and coercive]

10/4/2016 10:49:20 PM

Quote :

"anarchism (not chaos, simply a lack of goverment)"

The loaded word there is "simply"

In the absence of any government, you don't think chaos is the obvious result? I'm sure in your Neverland it would be great to own a fuckload of land (/private property rights), and defend said fuckload of land (/private property rights) and associated interests with your hired private police force, but what about the 40% of our population who don't own land, and don't have the resources to hire private security to defend their private property rights?

Quote :

"government is by definition violent and coercive"

Which definition is that exactly?

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:11 PM. Reason : also do you actually want to farm out the duties of the EPA, the FDA, the DOD, the USDA, and the VA to the free market?]

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:12 PM. Reason : Wait, scratch the VA. I guess we're going back to "private" militias ]

10/4/2016 11:08:50 PM

not dealing with your first statement. volumes upon volumes have been written about it. if you actually want to learn about it, i will be glad to point you to some literature.

as for your question, how do you define government? what makes a group of people a "government"?



[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:22 PM. Reason : i think we should just see how little government we can get along with]

10/4/2016 11:17:38 PM

i've mentioned more than once (and at least once while addressing you, specifically) that i don't think we should have no government. i think we should have a lot less than we have now. how far we go towards the anarchy side of the continuum, i'm not sure.

for the US, i think holding the federal govt to the enumerated powers and letting the states handle everything else would be a really good start. the states are free to try out whatever policy they want. the cream would rise to the top and other states would adopt the policies that work.

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:34 PM. Reason : o]

10/4/2016 11:28:47 PM

you have the same problem as the politburo had - a lot of literature and little reality

10/4/2016 11:30:13 PM

ok

10/4/2016 11:36:29 PM

I'm not convinced there's a stable form of a technologically and scientifically advancing America that has a gov that's not approximately the size of our current gov.

We don't allocate our budget optimally, our tax brackets need tweaking, but our tax rates are favorable compared to our peer countries, who are beating us in different areas.

10/4/2016 11:41:15 PM

you might not like it, but it's true. you have a different utopia from their socialist version of it, but it's an unobtainable one just the same. the only difference is your is driven by an irrational belief in your own self worth where as theirs was driven by an irrational belief in the government's self worth. success lies in the middle, not as you approach the limits.

10/4/2016 11:42:38 PM

Quote :

"you have the same problem as the politburo had - a lot of literature and little reality"

Yes. I'm asking what NRR is *actually* advocating for here, via policy, without him continuing to deflect to literature and the cop out of "I'm not sure."

Quote :

"not dealing with your first statement"

Except you've said government should be replaced by a system of private property rights, and spoken in favor of "private police" vs our current policing system, hence said first statement.

[Edited on October 4, 2016 at 11:51 PM. Reason : and I'm not so interested in what's a "good start" but rather how you think things should be in the end, which is why I asked for specifics]

10/4/2016 11:49:35 PM

i wish i had an answer for you.

10/5/2016 12:50:58 AM

The problem with the libertarian utopia vs the socialist one is that even in the best case scenario, I'm still stuck having to work for a living.

10/5/2016 8:44:35 AM

There are scalability issues with a lot of forms of government. I don't think anyone could rationally argue that our current system is the optimal system for a group of 350 million people unequally distributed across a land mass of 3.8 million sq miles.

Our system has a lot of the same flaws (and forgive the overused comparison, but it's apt in this case) that the Roman system did as it grew from a smallish city state to a far flung empire.

Socialist systems work wonderfully amongst small, self-selected groups. There are plenty of successful communal farms, kibbutzes, and the like. Libertarian communities are less common (not surprising given the individualist bent of most libertarians) but have worked well on occasion.

We don't really have voluntary systems of government. If you're born here you are a citizen and subject to the laws of the city, county, state, and nation whether you like it or not. People who do self select to live here are wonderful. I've never met a person who became a citizen after moving here who wasn't orders of magnitude more patriotic and optimistic about the US experience than the average citizen.

I don't think it's a viable solution yet, but I see somewhere in the not too distant future a breakup of the US or a diminishing of it's importance in people's identities. It seems counter-intuitive since we seem to be moving towards a more global society in broad terms, but I think we'll see a period of a return to tribalism and isolation until the really marginal beliefs lose in the market place of ideas and secular western style values win out. I'm just fearful that the relative pacifism of the people who believe in free association, have a laissez faire take on issues of religion and speech may lose even if not worldwide, at least in some parts of North America.

10/7/2016 12:38:41 PM

^the biggest schism in the US, in regards to ideology/tribalism, is easiest to predict based on age. After Boomers die out, Gen X and Millenials are gonna be mostly secular, more likely to support civil rights, more anti-war, more tolerant of people that are nothing like them etc etc etc. the nation will be more diverse than ever but it's political bent will be mostly moving in a classically liberal direction. The exception will be economic policy where there will still be heated arguments I'm sure, but I hardly see those difference being as significant as say, when Pinkertons were cracking laborer's skulls in the street.

What trend exactly are you basing the coming breakup of the US on?

10/7/2016 1:16:51 PM

Quote :

"The exception will be economic policy where there will still be heated arguments I'm sure, but I hardly see those difference being as significant as say, when Pinkertons were cracking laborer's skulls in the street. What trend exactly are you basing the coming breakup of the US on?"

You kind of answered your own question. The difference in economic and governmental ideals is going to be a huge driver. I think you're correct in your assertion that socially there is more and more of a trend towards secularism, but there are vast disparities in economic ideals and the proper role of government. I don't think our current system is sustainable when half the population wants to move more towards a large european style welfare/social safety net style and other portions want to move in the exact opposite direction.

Furthermore from a purely practical standpoint the trajectory of government spending, growing debt driven by entitlements is unsustainable. SS is going to change in some significant manner very soon. Either much smaller payouts or a substantial increase in the tax, serious means testing, maybe denial of benefits for people born after a certain date, etc. Medicare is likely to undergo some kind of reform as well.

Mandatory spending now consumes all of the collected tax revenue annually while discretionary spending depends on additional debt. There's going to come a point where we can't kick the can down the road anymore and will have to make changes to our current tax policies and/or our entitlement programs. When that happens it may result in significant schisms.

Couple that pending event with people's ability to self-select their tribes and find ideologically similar groups via the internet/social media and things like geographical location become less important as a prime identifier.

I don't think it's coincidental that movements for things like segregated dorms in college are gaining in popularity driven more now from the left than in the right. It's an odd phenomenon though not totally surprising. The ability to find like minded people is moving us back into a weirdly parochial mindset in a lot of ways. Even as the world opens up people are often simply walling themselves off into comfortable bubbles intellectually and based on identity. It's a pendulum effect that will swing back, but I think it's going to result in some splintering before ultimately seeing some real border dissolution.

It may not even mean the US falls apart, but you could well see even more fierce regionalism. While there are a lot of "purple states" it's also true that in a not insignificant number of places red states are getting redder and blue states are getting bluer.

10/7/2016 1:39:46 PM

https://www.journals.uchicago.edu/doi/abs/10.1086/697477

Could possibly apply to minimum wage, basic income, or EITC:

Quote :

"Using 4 decades of variation in the federal and state Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), we estimate the impact of exposure to EITC expansions in childhood on education and employment outcomes in adulthood. Reduced-form results suggest that an additional $1,000 in EITC exposure when a child is 13–18 years old increases the likelihood of completing high school (1.3%), completing college (4.2%), and being employed as a young adult (1.0%) and earnings by 2.2%. Our analysis reveals that the primary channel through which the EITC improves these outcomes is increases in pretax family earnings."

8/1/2018 7:27:04 PM

https://www.theatlantic.com/business/archive/2018/07/are-stock-buybacks-starving-the-economy/566387/

Quote :

"The new Roosevelt Institute and NELP research examines public firms in three major but notoriously low-wage industries— food production, retail, and restaurants—weighing buybacks against worker compensation. Unsurprisingly, Tung and Milani found that companies were aggressive in purchasing their own shares. The restaurant industry spent 140 percent of its profits on buybacks from 2015 to 2017, meaning that it borrowed or dipped into its cash allowances to purchase the shares. The retail industry spent nearly 80 percent of its profits on buybacks, and food-manufacturing firms nearly 60 percent. All in all, public companies across the American economy spent roughly three-fifths of their profits on buybacks in the years studied. “The amount corporations are spending on buybacks is staggering,” Milani said. “Then, to look a little deeper and see how this could impact workers in terms of compensation, was staggering.” How much might workers have benefited if companies had devoted their financial resources to them rather than to shareholders? Lowe’s, CVS, and Home Depot could have provided each of their workers a raise of $18,000 a year, the report found. Starbucks could have given each of its employees $7,000 a year, and McDonald’s could have given $4,000 to each of its nearly 2 million employees."

8/3/2018 7:45:06 AM

^ I'm rather doubtful of these numbers. They probably left out a big chunk of the workforce to get such large per-worker numbers. Most of those are retail establishments, which means you're leaving out the factory and transport workers whose labor was integral to the final product but don't collect their wages directly from the retailer. Had they been included, the numbers would have been quite a bit smaller.

Also, how does redistributing corporate profits to the workforce help those that work in industries that aren't so profitable? Many companies loose money every year.

Historically, all "profits" usually constitute somewhere around 10% of GDP. You're not going to revolutionize the lives of 90+% of the workforce with only 10% of GDP to throw around. What you would do, however, is render the entire economy dysfunctional, collapse would rule the day.

8/7/2018 7:53:10 PM

Did you read the article? The paper isn't calculating the total redistribution of all profit across the economy to all employees. Its calculating an individual company's stock repurchases redistributed to an individual company's employees.

Your post is still wrong, but it also doesn't really address the argument the article is making.

8/8/2018 7:42:17 AM

Quote :

"“Workers around the country have been pushing for higher wages, but the answer is always, ‘We can’t afford it. We’d have to do layoffs or raise prices,’” Tung said. “That is just not true. The money is there. It’s just getting siphoned out of the company instead of reinvested into it.”"

This. These corporations can totally afford to pay higher wages, they just choose to pay shareholders instead.

8/8/2018 11:55:19 AM

If a company were stupid enough to sink all their stock buyback money strictly into employees, investors would flee immediately and those employees would soon be looking for another job as the company tanked. Money goes where it's treated well.

8/8/2018 1:04:20 PM

employee-owned companies are better for everyone. the stock market is a scam.

https://www.forbes.com/sites/darrendahl/2016/07/19/are-employee-owned-companies-the-best-investment-around/#e5f9b1f50bee

8/8/2018 1:41:33 PM

^^close to 80% of total market cap is owned by institutional investors. While I’m sure some of their trading is relatively short term, a vast, VAST majority of it is owned for 6 months and much of it even longer than that. Do you really think they base buying decisions on whether a company missed its stock price projections by a dollar in Q2??? Or do they base it on the fundamentals of a company and the projected future value of a stock?

Stock market INVESTING will be just fine without stock repurchases (see America pre-1982 for an example). Speculative trading, well, that might take a hit (bye!).

Quote :

"Money goes where it's treated well."

Buying back stock when stocks, in general, are nearing all-time highs and possibly nearing the end of a business cycle is the definition of dumb. Unless you’re a CEO that is paid partially in stock or your pay is based on meeting speculative earnings projections, in which case it makes sense (selfish, but it makes sense.)

8/8/2018 4:59:09 PM

again, institutional investors would see the stupidity of dumping good money into marginal employees like those hired by McDonalds. They would take their money and run for the hills if they saw the company being run that way.

Quote :

"Buying back stock when stocks, in general, are nearing all-time highs and possibly nearing the end of a business cycle is the definition of dumb. "

most companies bought back stocks at the end of 2016 when they realized a market correction was about to take place; that was the perfect time to be buying back stocks. McDonalds has been buying back stocks and taking on debt to do so for the purpose of fending off corporate activists that might try to swoop in during a period when customers and revenues were dwindling quickly.

8/8/2018 5:50:10 PM

Quote :

"again, institutional investors would see the stupidity of dumping good money into marginal employees like those hired by McDonalds. They would take their money and run for the hills if they saw the company being run that way. "

good? the stock market shouldn't exist.

8/8/2018 6:05:32 PM

^you don’t think we can make the stock market work for the greater good?

^^Mcdonalds should invest in future growth if that makes more sense for them. Automation, 3d printed burgers, Expanding markets, whateves.

Quote :

"that was the perfect time to be buying back stocks. "

Ok, but that doesn’t explain why companies are announcing $400 billion right now. Or the 100s of billions they’ve spent in the last decade that weren’t in 2016.

https://money.cnn.com/2018/07/10/investing/stock-buybacks-record-tax-cuts/index.html

[Edited on August 8, 2018 at 6:37 PM. Reason : corporate activists? *shakes fist at sky*. SSSOOOORRRRRROOOOSSSSSSS]

8/8/2018 6:34:41 PM

Quote :

"^you don’t think we can make the stock market work for the greater good?"

you mean a publicly traded market, right? how and why? monetary value of a product is not always a great determiner of its use to society.

8/8/2018 6:57:32 PM

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=gGeevtdp1WQ

8/9/2018 12:26:14 AM

Quote :

"corporate activists? *shakes fist at sky*. SSSOOOORRRRRROOOOSSSSSSS"

not social activists, corporate activists - the people that come in and tell McDonalds that they should sell all of their real estate to an REIT and pay rent back on their locations or make drastic changes to their menu to attract a different target audience.

http://fortune.com/2015/05/18/mcdonalds-hedge-funds-activists/

8/9/2018 10:03:27 AM

https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2018-10-24/what-minimum-wage-foes-got-wrong-about-seattle

Quote :

"The dire warnings about minimum-wage increases keep proving to be wrong. So much so that in a new paper, the authors behind an earlier study predicting a negative impact have all but recanted their initial conclusions. However, the authors still seem perplexed about why they went awry in the first place."

Ahahaha, nothing better than watching a "conservative economist" trying to force every piece of empirical data and case study through their supply side wringer. At least these were willing to recant their study and admit they got it wrong.

How is supply-side economics not totally dead yet? I feel like rational people have been dunking on this shit since the Bush tax cuts didn't pay for themselves.

11/6/2018 12:29:52 PM

Because the people in charge aren't rational (in terms of economics that are beneficial to the average person) and are completely willing to lie and deceive in order to build increasing amounts of power.

11/6/2018 12:37:43 PM

^^ That the economy is sufficiently complicated to bury the effect of a minor policy change doesn't negate the effect. When prices rise, people find ways to use less of it. That a minimum wage increase did not result in sufficient dislocation to measure doesn't prove the minimum wage never results in dislocation. As the author says:

"Now of course, we should consider the argument that Seattle’s economic growth has been so strong that it overwhelms any negative effects from the higher minimum wage. No one should ignore that possibility and we will be among the first to acknowledge that this could be the case. We may never know for sure, because in economics you don’t get a chance to run control experiments; you only have the facts at hand."

We have no credible theory to suggest that Seattle's low-wage employing industries are cartelized to the point of enabling a city wide monopsony, so we have no theory to explain why wages going up wouldn't lessen employment opportunities. However, we do understand well that strong demand can easily hide those losses, and we do know Seattle's economy is growing fast enought do that. Seattle's economy won't be booming forever, and the poorest among us will eventually miss these opportunities.

11/8/2018 12:39:11 PM

Quote :

" That the economy is sufficiently complicated to bury the effect of a minor policy change doesn't negate the effect. When prices rise, people find ways to use less of it. That a minimum wage increase did not result in sufficient dislocation to measure doesn't prove the minimum wage never results in dislocation."

2 things

-Employment effects weren’t just negated, employment increased in the respective low-wage fields. THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF WHAT CONSERVATIVE ECONOMIST PREDICTED WOULD HAPPEN.

- I wish you could have come to a “minor effect” conclusion circa 2013. It would’ve saved me a ton of typing:

Quote :

" So, it is far better for them to die now homeless on the street from unemployment than suffer the indignity of a hard life?"

https://www.thewolfweb.com/message_topic.aspx?topic=638672&page=5
That was the dichotomy you were serving up back then. Coming to a minor effect conclusion is an improvement though, so kudos.

Quote :

"so we have no theory to explain why wages going up wouldn't lessen employment opportunities. However, we do understand well that strong demand can easily hide those losses, and we do know Seattle's economy is growing fast enought do that. "

It’s because wages going up leads to increased demand which leads to employers hiring people to fill increased demand.

I think I’ve mentioned it ITT and maybe the fast food workers unite thread linked, but you increase demand in the economy by increasing the velocity of money throughout the economy. You increase velocity by accessing the most pent up demand in the economy. In our current state, with the status of stagnating wages, that’s working and middle class folks. Their super high propensity to spend means that extra money is gonna boomerang throughout the economy IMMEDIATELY and lots of people can get rich off it. Employers keep hiring to fill demand.

[Edited on November 8, 2018 at 8:33 PM. Reason : IMO, supply-side is dead]

11/8/2018 8:13:40 PM

Quote :

"-Employment effects weren’t just negated, employment increased in the respective low-wage fields. THE EXACT OPPOSITE OF WHAT CONSERVATIVE ECONOMIST PREDICTED WOULD HAPPEN."

Well, they were wrong with their magnitudes. The counter is that "Well, employment would have been even higher were it not for the minimum wage increase."

But it will happen. Eventually, Seattle's economy won't be worker starved (supply constrained). Low wage workers need to survive the bad times too, not just the current boom times. So yea, the current boom is delaying the "homeless in the street" stage till later, but it will occur. The Trump Boom won't last forever, so we shouldn't make policy assuming it will.

That said, I did call it minor. It really was minor, for Seattle, since the minimum wage was already so high in a city where the cost of living in also chronically high (although improving a bit lately, shockingly). But yes, making life purposefully harder for the most marginalized among us is never minor, so I do retract that usage.

Quote :

"It’s because wages going up leads to increased demand which leads to employers hiring people to fill increased demand. "

Interesting theory. It makes some sense. However, minimum wage workers usually represent a tiny percentage of the population. Therefore, the majority of any low-wage employing business's customers will not have seen any effect on their own wages, so they're not going to spend any more. Similarly, the people that are earning more tend to spend that marginally higher income on luxuries such as a car or better housing, things that are not usually minimum-wage employing industries.

So, I don't buy it. The math just doesn't work out. Especially when we have a readily available explanation: employment and wage growth of non-minimum wage workers has continued apace and we should expect ample spillover effects, especially as the recent loosening of restrictions against construction (and the onset of falling rents) means that the population itself is growing more now than before the policy change.

Quote :

"I think I’ve mentioned it ITT and maybe the fast food workers unite thread linked, but you increase demand in the economy by increasing the velocity of money throughout the economy. You increase velocity by accessing the most pent up demand in the economy. In our current state, with the status of stagnating wages, that’s working and middle class folks. Their super high propensity to spend means that extra money is gonna boomerang throughout the economy IMMEDIATELY and lots of people can get rich off it. Employers keep hiring to fill demand."

That is simply not true. A law requiring everyone to immediately spend what they earn would not make us better off. "Printing" more money is a readily available substitute for money velocity. Yet we have ample evidence that inflation is a hindrance to demand/production. If we want higher wages, or, more accurately, if we want wages to buy more stuff, then we need to increase productivity. But not this way. If the economy is booming and there is insufficient low skilled workers to go around, wages would rise and productivity would be increased to economize on the employee shortage. While it is true that a minimum wage increase would similarly increase productivity, it does so at the expense of the employment of workers that are not actually in short supply. So, yes, they're employing more than they were, but fewer than they would have been.

[Edited on November 8, 2018 at 9:57 PM. Reason : .,.]

11/8/2018 9:45:15 PM

Quote :

"Well, they were wrong with their magnitudes. The counter is that "Well, employment would have been even higher were it not for the minimum wage increase." "

That ain't nothing but pure speculation. You're trying to make the evidence fit the hypothesis, and you can always play that game in any situation...But it's not scientific.

11/8/2018 10:53:57 PM

Quote :

"However, minimum wage workers usually represent a tiny percentage of the population. Therefore, the majority of any low-wage employing business's customers will not have seen any effect on their own wages, so they're not going to spend any more. Similarly, the people that are earning more tend to spend that marginally higher income on luxuries such as a car or better housing, things that are not usually minimum-wage employing industries. ]"

A minimum wage increase will cascade upward through the economy. For instance, in NC if we raised the min wage to $15 tomorrow, people currently making $15 are gonna go ask for $20,etc. that effect will peter out somewhere in the managerial class, right in the middle class! It will effect far more people than just those currently making min wage.

Quote :

"Especially when we have a readily available explanation: employment and wage growth of non-minimum wage workers has continued apace and we should expect ample spillover effects, especially as the recent loosening of restrictions against construction (and the onset of falling rents) means that the population itself is growing more now than before the policy change."

“Ample-spillover effects” = trickle down. That’s not an explanation at all to me.

Quote :

" That is simply not true. A law requiring everyone to immediately spend what they earn would not make us better off[]"

And no, printing money isn’t a direct analog to money velocity. Velocity is trade (domestic or international) and trade almost always represents real gains in the economy.

11/8/2018 11:01:48 PM

Quote :

"That ain't nothing but pure speculation. You're trying to make the evidence fit the hypothesis, and you can always play that game in any situation...But it's not scientific."

It fits what we know better than proclaiming that just because the data doesn't show an effect this time, that there is never an effect. Absence of proof is not proof of absence. We have evidence from other times this experiment has been run that show convincingly that higher minimum wages are strongly correlated with higher teenager and minority unemployment. That this news article proclaims that a higher minimum wage seemingly had little visual effect upon overall employment growth is really missing the point entirely.

Quote :

"A minimum wage increase will cascade upward through the economy. For instance, in NC if we raised the min wage to $15 tomorrow, people currently making $15 are gonna go ask for $20,etc. that effect will peter out somewhere in the managerial class, right in the middle class! It will effect far more people than just those currently making min wage."

That is just not how things work. Employers are in competition with each other for workers. They're not going to pay more just because their employees feel entitled to get paid more. They'll only pay more if those employees could find another employer that does actually pay more. And there is nothing about "Well, my son in high-school is now getting $15/hour, I deserve at least $20!" that actually increases your productivity to $20+ an hour. And no one is going to pay you $20/hour when you only produce $16/hour for them.

Now, this doesn't apply entirely to the minimum wage, because worker productivity there is largely determined by prices. If the minimum wage is $15/hour, ignoring illegality, consumer prices will rise to cover the imposed cost of production, which is now the legally mandated $15/hour. The purchasing power of everyone not getting a raise to $15/hour is being made poorer to accomplish it. This includes the unemployed, unemployable, retired, disabled, self-employed, absolutely everyone can now buy less with whatever money they have.

In-so-far as there is spillover effects, it is only because workers previously working $15+/hour at stressful/tough jobs will now have the option of taking a $15/hour job in customer service that is in some way easier and less stressful (displacing low skilled workers to die homeless in the street) and therefore their prior employers would have to pay more than the $15 to compensate for the hardship. But, that is an uncommon effect. Most high skill jobs are actually more comfortable than low-skill jobs, especially now that low-skill employers can treat their workers as harshly as the law allows since the minimum wage law reduces their competitive pressure.

[Edited on November 12, 2018 at 9:20 AM. Reason : .,.]

11/12/2018 9:20:19 AM

Quote :

"We have evidence from other times this experiment has been run that show convincingly that higher minimum wages are strongly correlated with higher teenager and minority unemployment."

Only if you ignore the times that it doesn't, like you're doing right now.

Cherry picking isn't scientific, either.

11/12/2018 12:07:50 PM

I mean, is your theory even falsifiable, LoneSnark? You're prepared to rationalize any counter-evidence away, so I think not.

11/12/2018 12:08:56 PM

^ Which theory? That humans at least sometimes respond to incentives? No, I don't see how that could be falsified. That's like asking how much proof would it take before I rejected the theory of gravity.

Now, to narrow it down more. You could provide proof to demonstrate why raising the minimum wage in Seattle would never result in lost employment opportunities. You could prove that Seattle's labor markets were cartelized between a tiny handful of players which were exhibiting unassailable monopsony power. Such setups exist in some regions of the planet, and the burden of such proof is not very high at all. However, we have no such evidence to suggest such exists in Seattle.

Terds theory that "rising wages among the poorest results in increased productivity for the whole of the workforce" is wishful thinking at best, nonsense most likely.

11/15/2018 10:07:29 AM

you're admitting your theory is non-falsifiable?

i suppose the debate has been settled then

11/15/2018 11:37:08 AM

^^The theory that raising the minimum wage always costs jobs and harms the economy.

I'm curious: Do you think eliminating minimum wage and allowing sweat shop wages in America would boost the economy?

11/15/2018 12:14:07 PM

Quote :

"Terds theory that "rising wages among the poorest results in increased productivity for the whole of the workforce" is wishful thinking at best, nonsense most likely."

You admitted that the price of labor is not the sole determining factor of employment rate. Now I just need you to admit that worker productivity is not the sole factor determining a worker’s compensation.

11/15/2018 12:27:58 PM