Seattle Becomes First American City With Absolutely No Fucking Problems At all

[Rotalihinna]

The science is not 100% behind the republicans on this one as you guys are claiming. There are actually some theories out there that up to a certain point higher minimum wages can boost the economy.

Remember. For people working at Walmart and McDonalds the government is already paying huge amounts of money in terms of food stamps and other subsidies. Increasing the minimum wage might act to transfer some of that burden from the state to the companies, as it should be.

Another route would be to remove those subsidies altogether, which would make living out of a Walmart paycheck (or salary walmart gift card, lel) totally impossible and at some point Walmart would have to increase the salaries itself.

 

[Eldarion]

Was hoping this was an onion video.

 

[IceToEskimos]

It would be interesting to research about how true this is. I think more employees would do it than they do currently if it wasn't for certain company secrecy regulations, IP laws, recognition of corporations and other laws discouraging them or making it extremely hard for them to do so.

I am pretty sure this would make for a good research subject.

Obviously, depending on the product and the relationship of the workers to their former employer(s), IP law could pose a barrier here, but my point was that the socialist dream of labor-controlled means of production can actually exist WITHIN a capitalist system, and the main reason it doesn't has to do with the mindset,values, and desires of "labor" itself and not some grand conspiracy to keep the working man down.

 

[IceToEskimos]

The science is not 100% behind the republicans on this one as you guys are claiming. There are actually some theories out there that up to a certain point higher minimum wages can boost the economy.

Oh no?

The demand for a good or service is inversely propoprtionate to it's price. It's called the "law of demand" , and unless you are going to argue that the services offered by minimum wage workers qualify as Veblen goods, the only "boost" the economy will see from this is a dog and pony show as wealth is forcibly redistributed by bureaucrats as they scurry around downtown trying to impress their constituents.

I have zero doubts that this will be held up as a "triumph" in the very near future, and that all sorts of wonderful data will emerge to show how great the wage hike actually turned out to be.

The problem is, all of that bullshit is just a big long broken window con-job.

 

[Rotalihinna]

Obviously, depending on the product and the relationship of the workers to their former employer(s), IP law could pose a barrier here, but my point was that the socialist dream of labor-controlled means of production can actually exist WITHIN a capitalist system, and the main reason it doesn't has to do with the mindset,values, and desires of "labor" itself and not some grand conspiracy to keep the working man down.

Oh there's no fucking question about that IMHO. Lots of people complain that there's a big corporation conspiracy to take over everything and keep them down. There's no fucking conspiracy, you're just too lazy to do anything.

In this age this is even more true. What's keeping anyone from setting up a website and fucking DOING SOMETHING? Other than being lazy? Write some shit. Have nothing that you can write about? Then go fucking read and learn. Or sell something. You don't even need to come up with a product. Sell someone else's.

Whenever I see people on Reddit complaining about how much student debt they are in, how they can't find a job, how everything's rigged against them I want to punch them in the face.

Fucking asshole, who told you to borrow 100,000 dollars from the government to get a shitty degree that no one cares about? Who told you that was the only way to do things? You could have started a business right out of high school with zero investment thanks to the internet. An opportunity that the generations before us sure as shit didn't have.

But no you had to go and get yourself in debt because your image of yourself would have taken a big hit if you didn't have college education, because you're too dumb and lazy to be anything else. At least with an English degree you can now feel entitled to a high paying job and blame everyone else for your numerous failures.

The funny thing is even at that point no one's holding you from not getting that day's Frappuccino and putting that money into a shitty Hostgator account and a domain and fucking attempt to do something for once.

 

[Rotalihinna]

Oh no?

The demand for a good or service is inversely propoprtionate to it's price. It's called the "law of demand" , and unless you are going to argue that the services offered by minimum wage workers qualify as Veblen goods, the only "boost" the economy will see from this is a dog and pony show as wealth is forcibly redistributed by bureaucrats as they scurry around downtown trying to impress their constituents.

I have zero doubts that this will be held up as a "triumph" in the very near future, and that all sorts of wonderful data will emerge to show how great the wage hike actually turned out to be.

The problem is, all of that bullshit is just a big long broken window con-job.

Here's how shit works. Living costs money. You are supposed to work for someone (well most of the population), do something for them, and get paid in return to be able to buy the things in order to live a regular life.

The problem with the minimum wage in the US is that because of food stamps and other subsidies for the poor, the government is paying for a lot of the living costs of those people who work at Walmart. So if it costs $100 a month to live a minimum life, Walmart pays $60 and the taxpayer pays $40 (I'm making up the percentages.)

So unless you're a socialist who thinks people who can afford to pay tax should be paying for other people's living expenses, you can't possibly be rooting for the status quo here.

You can remove those subsidies altogether. This will make it impossible to live on a Walmart paycheck and will make a Walmart job much less attractive (yeah it's possible). Fewer and fewer people will want such a job. So Walmart will have to buckle and raise wages to acceptable living wages. Their profits are going to take a hit but if they want to be able to operate their stores, they'll have to do it.

This is the way it should be done, but in the meantime so many fucking people are going to suffer that it's political suicide to attempt to do this.

What you can do instead is to propose a higher minimum wage - to a level that people will be able to live off of it without taxpayers having to give you money. This will have a similar effect to above, but will be much faster and only Walmart will suffer, which is obviously politically acceptable.

But yeah. Raising minimum wage in this scenario means that taxpayers won't have to pay as much to feed poor people. I'd rather just remove the subsidies if I was Dictator of America, but with the current political system it's absolutely impossible.

 

[blank_czech]

It seems like a lot of people who are for this type of thing use the terms living wage and minimum wage interchangeably, like they're the same term, and the other side is saying the minimum wage is the lowest amount of money you are legally allowed to pay someone. If that's the case, why not separate the two terms to make the arguments more clear? I get confused and have to try and figure out what people really mean whenever this subject comes up.

 

[zejayes]

I used to get down about this, thinking they were stupid.

Then I realized that they aren't neccessarily stupid, they just like getting elected and being in power, so they do whatever they need to do to make that happen.

That's when I realized they were essentially evil people who pretend to be doing a "service" for their neighbors in order to justify their ceaseless pursuit of unearned (read: bestowed by ballot) power over those same neighbors.

This point boils down to: Voters are stupid. Voters want this $15 min. wage and the politicians are just there to execute based on whatever the voters demand. We'll never have smart policies because average joes who don't know jack shit about anything make up the majority of the votes.

Just like a bell curve, the smartest people are the most rare....and voting is a numbers game. Majority rules, as does mediocre intelligence. It makes me not a huge fan of democracy. I don't even vote its such a shit show.

 

[jacky8]

Obviously, depending on the product and the relationship of the workers to their former employer(s), IP law could pose a barrier here, but my point was that the socialist dream of labor-controlled means of production can actually exist WITHIN a capitalist system, and the main reason it doesn't has to do with the mindset,values, and desires of "labor" itself and not some grand conspiracy to keep the working man down.

Yea I get what you mean now.

__

I think there's a growing number of people who believe minimum wages should be slashed big time and there should be a guaranteed minimum income for every citizen instead. So, one could choose to live like a peasant and pursue non-profitable / charitable / intellectual work than just slave away whole life for earning money.

I think a certain guaranteed minimum income for everyone is fair considering there are people profiting off our air, aquifer, earth, ocean riches which are certainly nobody's god given property.

Guaranteed minimum income - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

I have skimmed this wikipedia article and it is similar to what I'm saying.

 

[Unarmed Gunman]

What you can do instead is to propose a higher minimum wage - to a level that people will be able to live off of it without taxpayers having to give you money. This will have a similar effect to above, but will be much faster and only Walmart will suffer, which is obviously politically acceptable.

Why would Walmart suffer? It's in their interest not to suffer, so they'll just cut workforce and raise prices. Problem solved.

So now we have even more people that need food stamps since they're unemployed and shit costs more than before. Bang up job.

 

[Rotalihinna]

Why would Walmart suffer? It's in their interest not to suffer, so they'll just cut workforce and raise prices. Problem solved.

So now we have even more people that need food stamps since they're unemployed and shit costs more than before. Bang up job.

lol no. Walmart needs people to be able to operate their stores. "Cut their workforce" doesn't work like that easily.

 

[Unarmed Gunman]

lol no. Walmart needs people to be able to operate their stores. "Cut their workforce" doesn't work like that easily.

 

[Fierce]

Many people called Henry Ford stupid when he started paying people a much higher rate than was necessary at the time. Productivity went up and people really wanted to work hard to keep the job. He only went on to create once of the biggest automobile companies in the world. A race to the bottom isn't always best for people

 

[IceToEskimos]

Many people called Henry Ford stupid when he started paying people a much higher rate than was necessary at the time. Productivity went up and people really wanted to work hard to keep the job. He only went on to create once of the biggest automobile companies in the world. A race to the bottom isn't always best for people

When is this leftist revisonist history fabrication finally going to DIE?

Leave Ford out of your agenda, please, the facts don't support it.

 

[Jimmy Clayton]

Many people called Henry Ford stupid when he started paying people a much higher rate than was necessary at the time. Productivity went up and people really wanted to work hard to keep the job. He only went on to create once of the biggest automobile companies in the world. A race to the bottom isn't always best for people

Read this book...

The People's Tycoon: Henry Ford and the American Century
[ame=http://www.amazon.com/The-Peoples-Tycoon-American-Century/dp/0375707255/ref=sr_1_6?ie=UTF8&qid=1401908295&sr=8-6&keywords=henry+ford]The People's Tycoon: Henry Ford and the American Century: Steven Watts: 9780375707254: Amazon.com: Books[/ame]


Then come back.

 

[Jimmy Clayton]

It makes me not a huge fan of democracy. I don't even vote its such a shit show.

Well, compared to the alternatives, it's the least shitty way of choosing leaders...

 

[Fierce]

When is this leftist revisonist history fabrication finally going to DIE?

Leave Ford out of your agenda, please, the facts don't support it.

You read forbes, that rag of shit. Whoever said he did it so they could buy Ford products? Your writer has the wrong interpretation. This was back in a time where people would walk in and out of factories with no loyalty. So he wanted to retain people and to do that, paid them a wage it was possible to live on.

 

[IceToEskimos]

You read forbes, that rag of shit. Whoever said he did it so they could buy Ford products? Your writer has the wrong interpretation. This was back in a time where people would walk in and out of factories with no loyalty. So he wanted to retain people and to do that, paid them a wage it was possible to live on.

He certainly did raise wages, but he didn't give a shit about the idea of a "living wage", he wanted to cut down on employee turnover, and he did.

I take serious umbrage with leftists trying to appropriate HF to fit their shitty narrative, and ascribing his wage policies to some sort of social justice bullshit.

It's shitty. There are no liberal tycoons. Just get the fuck over it already.

 

[Fierce]

He certainly did raise wages, but he didn't give a shit about the idea of a "living wage", he wanted to cut down on employee turnover, and he did.

I take serious umbrage with leftists trying to appropriate HF to fit their shitty narrative, and ascribing his wage policies to some sort of social justice bullshit.

It's shitty. There are no liberal tycoons. Just get the fuck over it already.

Let's just skip 10 more posts pointlessness: Go suck a cock! :love-smiley-083:

P.S You should get over sticking a label on people, that's your bullshit way of trying to make yourself feel superior - not all ideas are black & white.

 

[IceToEskimos]

Let's just skip 10 more posts pointlessness: Go suck a cock! :love-smiley-083:

P.S You should get over sticking a label on people, that's your bullshit way of trying to make yourself feel superior - not all ideas are black & white.

Jokes on you, I'm already sucking a cock.

I don't think I labeled anybody though, I mean plenty of people self-identify as leftists, and the "Henry Ford Champion Of The Workingman" meme has been widely disseminated by left-leaning media outlets.