I am gonna call bullshit here. That analogy is not related enough. Cancer implies a disease that came on due to no fault of the individual, unless we're talking about cancer related to the individual who smokes a ton. In that case, golly, in either case, they are still paying for a service to be treated and they do pay for it. It aint a free mandated service. Sure, you'd be dumb to not seek help, but it's not required that a doctor try and cure every cancer patient that may exist.

This is my point I tried to make before. It's an assumption that minimum wage is the cause of some greater good and really helping out those poor impoverished people, but it appears to be more of a reason for them to never go anywhere beyond where they're at. "Why get a new job when I know in a couple years MW will go up to 12 bucks, or I may just get free healthcare becase I am in such a low tax bracket?" It perpetuates the same mentality and it solves nothing.

My kid is crying because I won't give him this tootsie roll. Well, I guess since crying is associated with bad, I should just give him the tootsie roll. AHHHH, much better.

Ok, you're quite right. The analogy doesn't hold very well at all.

The point I'll still hold on to is that to predicate service to the bottom by what the middle has is problematic.

See... Liberals are reasonable.

However, let me also call bull excrement when it is shoveled. No MW worker is going to wait for a legislated raise in the minimum wage and let that be their ambition for anything better. That's crazy talk.

Consciously, no. I agree. But i guess my point really is that I think continual increases in MW especially by significant amounts subtly communicates that to the masses, intentionally or not. At least that's what it seems like to me.

Look, not everyone can have a high-paying white-collar job. There are tens of millions of jobs that need to be done that don't pay very much, but the people that do the work deserve to be paid at least a wage they can live on and receive free health care regardless of their income. That's not too much to ask for in the wealthiest country in the history of the world.

As for the minimum wage, once it gets to around $8 it's simply keeping up with inflation. I don't know anyone who's proposing that we should raise the minimum wage to something ridiculous like $20-30, not even my boyfriend Ralph Nader.

You're right. I just don't want to see the price of my much needed double whopper with cheese go up to 5 bucks.

In all seriousness though. What are some of these jobs that "need" to be done that pay minimum wage besides the fast food industry, stockboys at the local grocery store, and the mindless customer service rep at the bath and body works? Let alone the tens of millions of them.

depends on yr definition of need but tons and tons of warehouse, sanitation, assembaly line, etc workers make minimum wage.

source? in my experience those jobs pay terrifyingly well for jobs that require zero education.

The payscale at many jobs like this are based on the MW, so entry-level workers might make 20 cents above minimum, while a 5-year employee might make 2.00 above minimum. Raise the minimum, and everyone bumps upward.

This was how Walmart worked back when I worked there, years ago. And $2.00 more doesn't seem like much, but to a MW worker it is a huge raise, and worth putting up with amazing abuse for, expecially in smaller communities where jobs are scarce, and the option to hop to another isn't viable. Shit - I went from dayshift to midnights for a lousy 50 cent bonus. worked out to an extra $40 a paycheck, $80 a month - a huge raise for a small family. I think that was the day we finally stopped buying the generic foodstuffs from the black-n-white aisle.

Its a difference in philosophy for sure, but, personally, I just don't trust big business to police themselves.

You want to go back to a time befiore wages and working conditions were regulated, you go back to a time of sweat shops and child labor. I'm sorry, but if the past is any indication, letting businesses operate unchecked does not bring about this utopia where everyone works hard and gets what they deserve as the market balances out. It has just never happened that way. And, today, with conservatives having more and more power and regulation over private enterprise diminishing, we see the wage gap between the rich and poor widebnibg at unpresedented rates.

And, no people aren't hopeless, but it is getting harder and harder to work yourself out of poverty. I originally went to college on a Pell grant myself, before getting assistantships for grad school, so I guess I am a bit prejudiced about the idea that government help can make a difference in people's lives.

Not that college is the only way. I said most here went to college and thus would not have to worry about minimum wage, and that is completely true. Few college grads make minimum wage, usually they make much more. Saying that does not mean that I think non-college grads are unable to make a decent living. I had a union card for a while and my family has all been blue collar and many of them still made fine livings and a couple ran their own businesses.

But, it is getting harder and harder to find jobs outside the service industry out there. Those decent paying, easy-to-find factory jobs are a thing of the past considering we don't manufacture crap in this country anymore, and thanks to anti-union policies, construction jobs are going to low-paid illegals more and more. Getting a job with health benefits, and a livable wage is very difficult for many people and there are far more people out there looking for that dream than spots available.

As to how people should work hard to get ahead...this is a minimum wage, not a hand out. You have to be working to derive even a hint of a benefit from it. So, if you really want people to work hard to get ahead, how about rewarding the work they do.

well..ya know, I was just grabbing stats tossed up in this thread. Don't really feel like spending the time to look them up for a quick discussion on a music message board. If you've got more time on your hands, feel free.

Never said raising it would end poverty, just provide a little boost to those at the very bottom rung of a society that gives so much to so many. If that's too much to ask, perhaps you need to examine your ability to comprehend the world you live in.

Oh yeah...and go fuck yourself. I'll argue a point if you want because unlikemany people today I do believe that there can be multiple points of view without having to believethat anyone who disagrees with me is simply stupid. But, if you just wanna toss around insults, I'd rather just leave the plolitics out of it and go straight for fucking your mother.

Pennsylvania rasied the minimum wage to $7 something last month.

And this is what "liberal" means. That sweatshops, dead-end poverty, children eating diets that impair their physical development actually should concern me and that collective effort, i.e. government, needs to happen to address these issues. Conservatives (William Bennet and 36% of this board) think that somehow hunger, poverty, public ill-health is somehow a moral deficit: the poor deserve it because they don't do anything about it. And if anyone with power attempts to ameliorate suffering, well they actually are perpetuating the suffering because they are "rewarding" poverty and underminding the poor's agency. The marketplace, left untampered with, will solve the issues.

Well, the "evidence, reasearch-based" invective of the rightist policy makers have no evidence of this moral position... and arguing with them is like arguing with someone who says Jesus died for our sins. The true-believers in the marketplace won't budge.

And in truth as "the marketplace" has had less and less "interference" since the Reagan years, the poor are exponentially more poor, and the rich are proportionately much, much richer. For conservatives, that's ok. For liberals, it's not.

The sentimental idea of a free marketplace supporting human freedom (Adam Smith) hasn't been true since about 1829. And increasingly the "marketplace" in a neo-liberal, supra-state, globalized techno-capitalist hegemonic deathstar environment... is killing us. C.f. Bush and Big Oil's response to sciene and global warming. Our children are dead, crispy, meat so that Marsha and John can build 8,000sf houses on the outskirts of Houston and kids in that central city learn how to be poor because of their own moral lapses.

I am going to vote HARRY this november.

If I just write in "Harry from Obner" do you think it'll work?

Does it make you feel better that there are less poor people as a percentage of the population then there were 20 or 30 or 40 yrs. ago?

How's about people who were really poor 20 years ago and are now really rich?

Also, with less than 5% unemployment (which is technically 0% unemployment since its generally considered that there are at least 3-5% of able bodies folks who just dont want to or dont have to work), i'd say its pretty possible that one can find a job for higher than minimum wage. Most chain restaraunts (Outback and the like) pay their dishwashers more than this and start out cooks with no experience (and no green cards either) at the $9-$10 range.

I dont begrudge helping out the poor in the least. I just think that a lot of the stuff you are throwing out there is bullshit.

What evidence do you have that there are "less poor" out there?

Most data show that the bottom three quintiles are less well off. The center has not held, and as union jobs descrease, and offshoring soaks up manufacturing, the jobs available are flipping burgers, not assemblying toasters. Assemblying toasters gave people living wages. Flipping burgers does not. Tell me statistics that refutes this.

And buddy, what you call bullshit is what I call important stuff... what is our country going to be about, what are our principles, and will the species survive? Dramatic language for dramatic times.

Take a look HERE at the current and historical unemployment rates. To say unemployment is no longer a problem in America is bullshit.

Still, even if 5% of the adult population wouldn't work, even if a good job were available, this doesn't take into consideration UNDERemployment. As I mentioned earlier, I worked for almost 2 years for chickenfeed at Wallyworld - not because it was a great job, but because it was the ONLY job in my area that offered steady hours and (minimal) health bennies. I didn't complain, and yes, I eventually got a better job, etc... But it sickens me to think that people who are in that situation today are being payed the same thing I earned TEN YEARS AGO. It was (barely) enough for me then, but I have few illusions that, if I were in that same position now, I'd be able to "escape poverty" as easily.

Man...lots of heat about minimum wage, but almost nothing about repealing the estate tax (please...don't call it the death tax--everyone will experience death, but only some minute fraction of the wealthiest of the wealthy will be subject to estate taxation). This, my friends, is the most egregious catering to the upper echelon out there.

And yet, if you were to ask a supporter of this legislation for an example of the impact of this legislation, they won't identify your typical billionaire in Manhattan. They will scour middle America for the one multi-millionaire farmer that will find some "relief" from this legislation. "See, here, a family man. Hard-working. Honest. A regular Joe with a net worth of ***mumble, mumble***. Why should we tax his farm when he dies?"

Makes me sick, it does. Just like "tax relief" in the form of higher IRA contribution limits. Yeah, that works great for all those people who have already maxed out their 401k's and IRA's and still have extra money to stock away. Those people sure need tax relief.

Actually, if you'll read my post, I said there was a lower percentage of poor people. To clarify poor people (which to be honest, I did not) I was speaking of people living below the poverty line. Those stats are readily available from the US Census Dept.



You do have a point in the reduction of manufacturing jobs and while I agree that that's a problem because those jobs are going elsewhere, I dont begrudge that the lost jobs are union jobs because I dont believe in unions. Also, people might want to get used to the fact that those jobs arent coming back and get into something else like the construction trades that are now being dominated by latinos. Thats real work for real money.

The reality is that people only made a living wage building toasters as long as it was profitable for Ed's Toaster Company to pay them to do that. But the market dictates that people want, need and demand cheaper toasters so thats what they get and now those toasters get built elsewhere. Know why? Because individuals dont take all the risks and gambles of starting and operating a business for charity. They do it to provide a better life for themselves, their families and their workers.

And yes, some people have fallen through the cracks and that sucks for them. But instead of crying, people are gonna have to face up and move on with their lives. Sorry.



see, then you throw in this horseshit and destroy your whole argument.

will this species survive? jesus christ man, lets talk about affordable health care or more job training or yes, even raisng the minimum wage (all things I support by the way) not the survival of the species...sheesh.[/quote]

Ha. Look back in history at years like 1983. Good times, Bubba. Ho ho..



probably not with that negative attitude.



you should be proud of yourself, not whining like a little bitch.

[/quote]

My point is that "union jobs" was a break on the unfettered appetite of capital for more capital which is having a destructive, not developmental, impact on how we live in the current environment. I am not defending unions per se. Most "growth" that the right quotes as proof of the efficacy of the marketplace is modernization, not development. And that distinction is carefully ignored by the elite, who benefit from the kind of growth we have. Growth which consumes more of our resources in destructive ways.

Which leads to the argument that really annoys you: Global warming is threatening, and it's time we are not afraid to seem too dramatic about this. Short-sighted free-market profiteers have resisted the science, to our peril. I truly think if I could sit with you for a few hours to talk this through you wouldn't think it is horseshit... although I totally agree that reading some of the hyperbole on a bulletin board like this makes this look like crackpotism.

I don't think we are that far apart in concept.

Oh, I'm totally on board with you on the global warming thing--I've been at least partially interested in that since the late 80's. I also think that a lot of the things that came out DID reek of crackpotism and that's why they were easily dismissed by those who are more savvy, even I developed doubts despite the screaming of my greater inner angels.

For what its worth, I do think that even big companies are starting to realize that there are problems in that area.

And i didnt mean to chastise you on the mumbo-jumbo; you should have said that thats what you meant in the first place.