The Minimum Wage Is A Poverty Wage

[signalmankenneth]

Imagine trying to live on pay of $7.25 an hour. Even if you managed to workfull eight-hour days, you'd be making only about $58 a day, $230 a week, or a measly $12,000 a year. And out of that would come taxes and other deductions.

According to the standards of the federal government, you'd be living in poverty. Yet $7.25 an hour is the federal minimum wage set by Congress.State legislatures can and do set state minimums higher than the federal rate, but never lower, much as some would like to.

Far too many workers have no choice but to take minimum wage jobs, no choice that is, but to live in poverty. New research out of Columbia University's law school lays out the sorry details of the minimum wage workers' very serious situation, one that should never be tolerated in a country with such riches as ours.

In many states, the minimum wage laws are but barely enforced, in part because there's little or no money budgeted for enforcement. But it's also because the government agencies charged with enforcing the laws are clearly not much interested in carrying out their mandate.

Equally at fault are the governors and state legislators who've done virtually nothing to try to help their state's neediest workers earn adecent living. They have to be aware that no one can make a decent living at the current minimum wage rates.

The government officials who have been ignoring the problems could at least try to make sure that employers pay workers the legal minimum, however inadequate it might be. And the government officials could apply effective pressure to raise the minimum. They could, but given their record in such matters, that's most doubtful.

Congress could raise the federal minimum, but having just recently raised it, that's extremely unlikely, even though it should be obvious to everyone that a higher rate is needed to effectively help the many working people who badly need help.

It may be hard to believe, but despite the great need of workers and despite the widespread violations of the minimum wage laws, five states - Alabama, Florida, Georgia, Louisiana and Mississippi have no agency assigned to enforce the minimum wage laws and other laws designed to protect workers rights.

The researchers also found that a majority of states do not fine or penalize employers who violate the minimum wage laws and other wage and hour laws. Which means that employers "have little or no incentive to obey wage and hour laws if the only repercussion for violating them is to have to pay wages owed in the first place."

The report warns that "without meaningful enforcement by state regulators,some employers will simply disregard their legal obligation if doing so allows them to save time, money or effort, putting the majority who wish to abide by the law at a significant competitive disadvantage, This creates a regulatory race to the bottom by states as they seek to compete to attract businesses."

Most important, it denies workers the basic rights and protections the law promises them but often fails to deliver.

By DICK MEISTER

[Cancel 2018. 3]

minimum wage is a joke

and what constitutional authority gives congress to set a federal minimum wage?

[cawacko]

Did you see the guy's name who wrote the article? Is this thing for real Ken?

[Cancel 2018. 3]

Did you see the guy's name who wrote the article? Is this thing for real Ken?

anthony weiner's cousin

[SmarterthanYou]

the idiot should learn math first. 7.25 an hour is not 12k, but 15 k a year. not that this changes a lot of the scenario, but if he can't get one simple fact right, the rest of his article should be crap.

[christiefan915]

Did you see the guy's name who wrote the article? Is this thing for real Ken?

He actually lives in your stomping grounds.

Dick Meister is a San Francisco-based freelance columnist who has covered labor ad politics for more than a half-century. Contact him through his web site, dickmeister.com.

[Rationalist]

This article fails miserably. Nobody expects a grown adult to survive on minimum wage. That's why people develop a skill, trade, or attend college. If they didn't because they expected to get paid $25/hour flipping burgers, that's their problem.

How much should we raise the minimum wage? To $15/hour? Why stop there, why not raise it to $40/hour?

Economic illiterates such as Kenneth and the President are the reason we're still in a recession.

[cawacko]

He actually lives in your stomping grounds.

Dick Meister is a San Francisco-based freelance columnist who has covered labor ad politics for more than a half-century. Contact him through his web site, dickmeister.com.

Interesting, I've not heard of him. I'll have to check him out.

[RockX]

Dick Meister is another big pro union liberal writer paid for by unions.

[/MSG/]

Raising the minimum wage raises the cost of doing business which raises the prices on goods.

[Good Luck]

The problem with raising minimum wage too high is it will result in lost jobs. There is a point in every industry where the cost of using technological labor-saving devices is surpassed by employment costs. In amny places we have already passed that point. At that point, people lose their jobs to automated machinery. We are seeing it daily. Grocery stores are installing more and more self-check aisles because the wages demanded by clerk unions are now more expensive than the cost of buying and maintaining self-check stations - and that includes the inevitable losses from people who "accidentally" skip scanning a few items in their basket. The auto industry has gone to a high percentage of robot manufacturing because it is less expensive than paying the wages demanded by auto unions. In short, people are pricing themselves right out on the street.

The fact is there are certain jobs which just plain are not worth even current minimum wage, let alone an increased minimum wage. Low paying, minimum wage jobs are good for youngsters, to help them develop a healthy work ethic, teach them something real about the value of earned money (something modern liberals seemingly will never grasp), let them develop basic jobs skills - not specific skills like salting fries which can be done by a trained monkey, but rather generalized work-place skills, like working together as a team to get 100 orders out in under an hour. Anyone who think entry-level jobs should command a livable wage is way too dependent on mind altering drugs.

If people want a livable wage, they need to develop a skill that is actually worth a livable wage instead of simply demanding a livable wage just because they exist. Society does NOT owe anyone a living simply for existing.