[quote=bigTlilODD;851644]
You can look at it from the opposite view: If you pay very low wages people won't have any money to buy, if you pay higher wages people will accordingly buy more, which means companies sell more.

The US and no other developed country can even compete remotely with china or india when it comes to labor costs, so your cheap labor work will go off shore anyhow, you can't prevent that. You'de nearly have to adopt slavery in your country to stop that development.

I don't think that's even close to what I said. I said we as a society have decided that anyone who works for a living will receive in exchange some minimal level of economic well being. Where does "deserve" come into this discussion?

Because deciding that as a society, and supporting that decision, is implying the the person deserves it. Why else should a person get that amount at the expense of forcing the business to hand it over when he clearly could not have earned it, resulting in the company's giving it to him voluntarily for his deserving work.

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If a neocon whines about big government wealth redistribution, just ask him what he thinks about the portion of that big government that sends aid to Israel.

We as a society make rules to decide how we will live together. Some of those rules are applied to companies who want to use our society to make a profit.

Yep, but you appear to support the decision of the government to hurt companies with environmental regulations just because it gives a worker "a break."

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If a neocon whines about big government wealth redistribution, just ask him what he thinks about the portion of that big government that sends aid to Israel.

There are rules for living in a society. Individuals must follow them. Certainly an artificial construct like a corporation must do the same. Without our society there is no corporation and there is no profit. In exhange for being allowed to exist and make a profit, companies follow the rules of doing business. One of those rules is paying a minimum wage. Because our society has decided that anyone who works for a living will receive some minimum level of economic well being.

And you think it is just to pass legislation which disallows workers to work for an amount that they and the company agree to if it is less?

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If a neocon whines about big government wealth redistribution, just ask him what he thinks about the portion of that big government that sends aid to Israel.

Of course it is. Why in the world wouldn't it be? Is there something sacred about that particular transaction that makes it different from every other facet of public policy?

So you think that third parties should have a say in transactions between two other people that don't influence the third party? So, if you want to have sex with someone, and both of you agree, I should be able to step in and say "no" because I don't think it's fair?

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If a neocon whines about big government wealth redistribution, just ask him what he thinks about the portion of that big government that sends aid to Israel.

So you think every interaction between human and corporation deserves the same protection as our sex lives?

The claim that the transaction does not influence the third party (who is us) is false. As a society we have decided that everyone who works (you know the rest). When someone tries to subvert that intention we are influenced by that attempt.

Paying taxes is one thing, but being forced by the government to only work for a set price is quite another. One influences how much of the money you earn goes to the government, the other changes what you can and cannot work for. So, for instance, let's say I am a hard worker and want to work for $4.00 and hour, and some lazy bum can't work for any less than $6.00 per hour. Why should both of us have the same chance to be hired, assuming the minimum wage is $5.50.

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If a neocon whines about big government wealth redistribution, just ask him what he thinks about the portion of that big government that sends aid to Israel.

If the bum won't work for less than $6 then you get the job at $5.50. Problem solved. The minimum wage, just like every other regulation or tax on business activity, is the price a business pays for being allowed to use our society to make a profit. In this country we value work. That means we value the worker. That means we demand that anyone who wants to profit from that work provide a minimum reward for that work. For some reeason it bohters citizens in america to see the families of working people starving or cold or living on the street. Go figure.
This is such a simple concept I really don't understand what the problem is.

And if he works for 5.50 and I work for 5? Then I'm out of luck and can't compete because of artificial government regulations.You act as if the government owns the people and they need to ask its permission to work with other private entities. A tax allows a government to function, a restriction on wages harms both the business and worker (at least the ones willing to compete) at no benefit to the government.So let the hard-working worker compete with the lazy bum.They can simply ask for more money, and if refused, they can refuse to work. I don't see why the government needs to step in. If a business charges me money for a TV and I think it's too much, should the government step in and force them to lower the price?I guess they should stop working for company's who pay them such low wages and either work for other companies, start their own business or don't work until the company is forced to either close down or increase wages so people start working again. Companies only lower wages when they see that people are willing to work for less and less. It is the fault of the worker for agreeing to work under conditions which he or she does not accept.The problem is that you are setting a limit on the prices for which products and services can be sold. I can sell you gum at $5 or $10. If demand goes down, I'll lower it to $4.00. The way restrictions on labor work, if the demand for workers is high, I can lift the pay from $10.00 an hour to $15.00. If demand is low and I have a lot of workers, they are not allows to sell their services to me for $4.00 even if they want to.


Transactions work both ways. Nobody is forced into them and nobody deserves to participate. Nobody is forced to start business or work by law. What the minimum wage does is it forced companies to not hire employees for less than a certain amount, and it disallows employees from setting any price they want on their services. It is no different than forcing business to sell you TVs for no less than $10,000.00, even if the buyers are not willing to pay that much.

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If a neocon whines about big government wealth redistribution, just ask him what he thinks about the portion of that big government that sends aid to Israel.

If you're willing to work at 5, but minimum wage is at 5.50, you get an economic surplus of 50¢ an hour, and so long as you produce more marginal revenue then 5.50 an hour you'll be hired by the company.

Now if you produce $4 and the other guy produces $6 then of course he's going to be hired over you.

But for minimum wage workers the companies have almost all of the market power.

Look up statutory rape.

Nonsense. if you are a harder worker and capable of the work you will have a job while others do not. And is there such a thing as a "natural" government regulation? For that matter what is more artifical than a corporation?

Exactly wrong. I am acting like the government IS the people and they decide what rules we will all follow.
are you completely unfamiliar with even the most basic civics concepts or are you just yanking my chain here?

This statement just makes no sense at all. I've already explained how everyone is affected by businesses who want to pay abusively low wages. Your argument that already poor people are harmed by not being able to make less than they make now does not even pass the giggle test. Your contention that people can start their own business is silly. Obviously 99% of the pepole in the world are not interested in or capable of of owning and running their own businesses. And it's very generous of you to offer people the chance to not work at all while they wait for comapnies to cave in and pay a livbing wage. I suppose you will offer to feed those people while they wait? Trying to frame this requirement as hurting workers becase they're not allowed to be even poorer than they are now makes it clear you are not really interested in examining the issue rationally but only in putting across some dreamlike open market scenario you read somewhere. Either that or it just angers you beyond reason to see low paid workers able to support here families in a decent manner at the expense of corporate profits.

So what? I don't see why this is a problem. Once again I will ask you is there something so sacred about this ability to profit from someone elses work that we as a society should not be able to set limits on it?

That's just nonsense. Our society has a right to decide that we don't want to see working people starve. We have a right to make demands of corporations who want to use our society to make a profit. Obviously the potential rewards of being allowed to do business here far outweighs the costs imposed by our rules for doing so.