Minimum Wage

Damn, Thomas. Why sugar coat it? Just give it to him straight.
Don't worry Okie, I'm sure he has a sheepish smile on my face saying "By the way, I don't mean this in an aggressive way".

Whos the idiot here making accusations or statements without any evidence?

OCCOM BILL wrote:

Damn, Thomas. Why sugar coat it? Just give it to him straight.
Don't worry Okie, I'm sure he has a sheepish smile on my face saying "By the way, I don't mean this in an aggressive way".

I know he thinks its fun to needle an "okie." Thats alright, we're used to it, but I gave his head back to him on a platter anyway with that last answer.

By the way, OB, you must know everything there is to know that matters about the green card and guest worker programs, so you can explain it all to Thomas.

Thomas wrote:

okie wrote:

Thomas, the silent majority in this country, including Democrats, agree with me on this issue. The point is why have laws and borders if they are to be ignored?

I've been arguing the whole thread that there isn't much of a point to them, that they should be abolished, and that America should go back to the kind of free immigration it had between 1776. I don't agree with you about much, but I do agree these laws are pointless.

So you don't believe in nationhood anymore?

What difference does it make whether its a machine or a Mexican who disemployed him? It would make a huge difference for more than one reason, one important one being if his employer trains him to run the machinery, in which case he makes more money and has an easier job, and might raise the productivity of his employer's operation.

Thomas wrote:

okie wrote:

By the way, what has happened with the work programs for people with green cards?

What work programs for people with green cards?

Whos the idiot here making accusations or statements without any evidence? All I said was that there is such a thing as a green card and existing guest worker programs, enabling people to come here and work for a period of time, which I think is fairly common knowledge here. If you want to find out more information, do the search yourself.

This is like so totally weird; I am sitting here in agreement with both OBill and Thomas (actually I like both OBill and Thomas) I can only assume that Georgeob will show up and I will agree with him as well (even though he is catholic, but then so is my friend Walter) I am, however wondering if Lash will show up. I also wonder if I am capable of introducing irony to this venue. Oklahoma as long as the grass shall grow.

Saw a discussion about it on TV a while ago, and thought I would ask -

Is there any actual historical evidence that raising the minimum wage leads to a loss in low-income jobs? I haven't been able to find that anywhere.

IIRC, Florida raised the minimum wage a few years back and you heard screams of how it would ruin the economy, which all turned out to be untrue.

Here's an article on it, in fact:

http://nitpicker.blogspot.com/2006/06/www.risep-fiu.org/reports/%20Florida_Minimum_Wage_Report.pdf

Quote:

The Florida Retail Federation claimed that "Jobs will be lost - devastating our strong economy." Rick McAllister of the Retail Federation claimed a state minimum wage "could have a billion-dollar inflationary effect on the state of Florida." The Orlando Chamber of Commerce predicted that the new minimum wage would lead to outsourcing, "many good Florida jobs will be shipped over seas", and even cautioned that more "lawsuits will result. The amendment will create new opportunities for trial lawyers to make money by suing businesses."

Some public officials actively opposed the measure. Senator Mel Martinez claimed the law would cause job loss, and Governor Jeb Bush also opposed it. Darrell Kelley, president of Enterprise Florida, claimed the raise could result in a decline in health benefits coverage. Finally, national opponents chimed in. Grover Norquist claimed that "Florida cannot afford the economic pain of job losses compounded with the inevitable increases in the costs of essential goods and services."

[snip]…One year after the Florida state minimum wage took effect, there is no evidence to support the dire predictions levied by critics of the measure. Far from having a devastated economy, Florida continues to experience record job growth. Instead of businesses leaving the state, the number of private employers in Florida has grown substantially in the past year, and the state is a national leader in the insourcing of jobs from overseas. Far from workers losing their jobs and being worse off, more of them are working and wages across the state have risen. However, far from wages rising sharply across the pay scale, Florida continues to be a low-wage state, and many workers have a hard time supporting their families on what they earn, even with the new state minimum wage. All available data suggest that the critics of the state minimum wage were wrong about the law's effects.

Is there any data which shows real-world examples of problems with raising the minimum wage? Or is this just more 'voodoo economics?'

Cycloptichorn

This is like so totally weird; I am sitting here in agreement with both OBill and Thomas (actually I like both OBill and Thomas) I can only assume that Georgeob will show up and I will agree with him as well (even though he is catholic, but then so is my friend Walter) I am, however wondering if Lash will show up. I also wonder if I am capable of introducing irony to this venue. Oklahoma as long as the grass shall grow.

(1) There's another rhetorical question to substitute for an answer. (2) The USA were a nation from 1776 to 1920. They also had virtually unlimited immigration during this time -- exceptions being a pre-1865 restriction on naturalizing blacks, and a post 1865 policy of excluding Chinese immigrants. Other than that, very few restrictions, certainly no quotas. So I don't see what your rhetorical question implies.

okie wrote:

What difference does it make whether its a machine or a Mexican who disemployed him? It would make a huge difference for more than one reason, one important one being if his employer trains him to run the machinery, in which case he makes more money and has an easier job, and might raise the productivity of his employer's operation.

The same is true if the employer hires an immigrant instead of buying a machine. If he trains the American worker to manage immigrants, the worker makes more money, has an easier job, and might raise the productivity of his employers operation. Different training, same result.

okie wrote:

Thomas wrote:

okie wrote:

By the way, what has happened with the work programs for people with green cards?

What work programs for people with green cards?

Whos the idiot here making accusations or statements without any evidence? All I said was that there is such a thing as a green card and existing guest worker programs, enabling people to come here and work for a period of time, which I think is fairly common knowledge here. If you want to find out more information, do the search yourself.

No, that's not what you said. you said "work programs for people with green cards". The work programs you now talk about are for guest workers without Green Cards. Green Cards are for permanent residency. Programs for people with visas allowing them to work in the US for a limited time aren't Green Card holders by definition.

Not equivalent, Thomas. There is no need to create another layer of management over the immigrants that will be doing the same job as the current legal employee that is already being managed to do the same job.

Glad you cleared up the details, which wasn't the point. The point was that there are already programs to do the agricultural work that OB was talking about without hiring illegals.

This is really digging up the past, but remember poor Elian Gonzales. ...

This is really digging up the past, but remember poor Elian Gonzales. The poor kid whose mother died getting him here, to escape repression to a better life here, but Janet Reno felt so strongly that he should go back to Castro's Cuba that she took him at the point of a gun. It was so important to send him back to Castro and a dad that seldom saw him before, but millions of illegals and drug dealers coming across the border werre not a problem. Does that not say it all about the liberal lunatic fringe in this country?