Comment by DanHulton
20 days ago
> That just makes those people unemployable, and will need food stamps even more.
This doesn't actually bear out. Minimum wage increases really don't have a history of making minimum wage employees unemployable, or destroying the companies affected. In fact, the opposite tends to happen, as these businesses tend to be frequented by other minimum wage employees as customers, so it ends up being a rising tide that lifts all boats.
> Do you want Big Tech to be American companies, or foreign companies?
I'd argue that you can't just airdrop these companies into another country and have them be as successful as they are. Even with much stricter monopoly laws, there is a LOT about America that incentivizes these companies to locate there, and frankly I'm not convinced they'd move.
And as a Canadian, I don't even want Big Tech to be American. =) The US is only part of the world, as you said, but your lax and corrupt legal system is polluting the world with these dangerous megacorps.
Don't get me wrong, we're none better, our system would allow for nearly the same abuse, were it not for the fact that our whole country is smaller in population that California. But the point remains that there's a lot of the world that is looking on in horror at these rampaging monster companies and is not in any way assured by the "at least they're American" defense.
> This doesn't actually bear out. Minimum wage increases really don't have a history of making minimum wage employees unemployable, or destroying the companies affected. In fact, the opposite tends to happen, as these businesses tend to be frequented by other minimum wage employees as customers, so it ends up being a rising tide that lifts all boats.
It's not nearly that settled
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wvr0NhYfkO4
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8H4yp8Fbi-Y
It's not "settled" not because it isnt true - Dube, Lester, Reich proved that conclusively that it is.
It's "debated" because raising the minimum wage hikes usually come out of profit margins: https://cepr.net/documents/publications/min-wage-2013-02.pdf
If there's one thing the business community and the econ think tanks it funds can all agree upon it's that any policy that involves sacrificing profits is Bad. Global warming denial and this both come from the same source.
it's debated because it's impossile to settle. Otherwise set the minimum wage to $5000 per hr. See how it works out
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I'll give you the economist as an acceptable source... but reasontv has a habit of omitting easy to access data that's detrimental to the argument they started with. While that lack of candor might not be disqualifying, it's dishonest when you also present yourself as a journalist.
>as these businesses tend to be frequented by other minimum wage employees as customers, so it ends up being a rising tide that lifts all boats.
Then why not just make minimum wage $100/hour?
Because among other things that would make the oligarchs sad and trigger massive capital flight. Whether the emotional and financial well-being of the richest 150-ish people on the planet should be a credible concern is TBD.
No, it’s because it would mean restaurants would cost $400 to eat at for a basic sit down meal which would drive them all out of business.
There are tons of things people will just immediately stop doing if the prices go up to support labor that expensive.
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That's absolutely nothing to do with it. The problem with it is it would just cause massive inflation, driving up prices, and cut any jobs that aren't absolutely essential.
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