Why The Minimum Wage Wins

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Increase the Minimum Wage - Support Senator Kennedy's Bill to Increase the Minimum Wage:

http://oneamericacommittee.com/action/increase-the-minimum-wage/

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Why The Minimum Wage Wins
Froma Harrop
April 13, 2006

Froma Harrop is a nationally syndicated columnist .

Congress is apparently too busy tending to the highest-income Americans to pay much attention to the lowest-income Americans. Washington Republicans are now hard at work extending investment tax cuts that will enrich folks making more than $10 million a year by an average $500,000. They have no time for raising the minimum wage –– in addition to having no interest in it. At $5.15 an hour since 1997, the federal minimum wage lingers at a 50-year low when adjusted for inflation.

So the job of maintaining a basic level of decency in the labor market falls to the states. Some that have long mandated higher minimum wages are raising them still more, while other states that have relied on the federal government’s sorry standards are taking matters into their own hands for the first time. Right now 18 states and the District of Columbia have minimum wages above the federal level, and that list is sure to grow as the public demands progress.

(snip)

The political ramifications go beyond setting a wage floor. Putting such bread-and-butter questions on the ballot could help progressive candidates by bringing more liberals to the polls, as well as low-income voters, who, sadly, often bypass elections. Such a turnout might be especially helpful to Democratic candidates for governor in Arizona and Ohio.

(snip)

The cheap-labor people, led by chambers of commerce everywhere, never admit that their motive is to beat down the wages of their lowest-paid workers. Their voices drip with concern as they warn that any increase in the minimum will cost the jobs of the most vulnerable, especially black, workers.

Continued @ http://www.tompaine.com/articles/2006/04/13/why_the_minimum_wage_wins.php

[Commie Pinko Dirtbag]

1. Actually, I think they HAVE an interest in the minimum wage

They'd set it to 10^{-18,752,936,517,825,962,349,875,602,435,627} dollars per eon if they could.

[Warpy]

2. Conservative businessmen always shriek about any rise

in the minimun wage, promise that they'll have to fire half their employees, moan that they'll be driven out of business and into the poorhouse.

Then their business increases to both offset the puny wage increase and to give them record profit and they shut up.

Then somebody proposes another minimum wage hike and they start to wail again.

The best thing to do is let them scream. Raise the minimum wage to a living level and then enforce it. Eliminate any benefits in hiring illegal workers. Then watch how fast they shut up as their business skyrockets.

[RaleighNCDUer]

5. And when we do raise it, tie it to inflation

so we don't have to go through this every few years.

[JohnnyRingo]

3. The whine from the right is that if small businesses have to pay

their 10-15 workers an extra buck an hour, they'll have to fold up shop and go out of business.

Let's see...15 workers at 10hr a day.....
That's $150 extra a day....
320 days a year....is $19,000 total

If the owner has cut the profit margin that close, he's in the wrong business.
I imagine a sucessful businessman that employs 10-15 workers makes 10 times that ammount for himself.

[SoCalDem]

4. 15 workers x $10 hr X 10 hrs = $1,500.00

$1,500 x 320 = $480K


That seems like a pretty big payroll for a small bnusiness.. I'm glad now that I don;t run a business :scared:

:hi:

[JohnnyRingo]

6. I was figuring what an extra dollar an hour would cost per year

I typo'd it wrong, I'll try to edit

I estimated an additional $19,000 a year for a pretty good sized small business.
That shouldn't be a crippling raise overhead, but to hear compassionate conservatives cry, it's the difference between success and failure in this Buxh economy.

If that's the case these big shots shouldn't vote republican.

[SoCalDem]

7. I caught that, but is i/2 a mil even doable for a true "small business"?

and that's not including rent & utilities & stock.. sheeeeez.. louise...My guess is that most ture small businesses are family run, and no one gets "paid"..:)