Forum Post: A minimum wage of $1-2/hour would eliminate all the Chinese advantage and bring JOBS back to the USA - who is with me?
Posted 12 years ago on Nov. 4, 2011, 7:38 p.m. EST by VladimirMayakovsky
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This content is user submitted and not an official statement
We need jobs, not slogans.
What is the point of a job if it doesn't even pay enough to buy food or housing. And what about the people you take those jobs away from. Will they have to work for even less to get it away from you again?
People don't need jobs to survive. They need food, housing, healthcare. Find a way to provide people with the necessities of life and you won't have to worry about artificially creating jobs.
Shouldn't the people find their own way?
what do you mean?
I mean, whose responsibility is it to make sure that everyone is rich?
In a sane society it's everyone caring for everyone. If you benefit from me, then that's also in my best interest. As a whole we are stronger then in competition against each-other.
So why not help the poor Chinese with the jobs they got by displacing American workers?
I don't know. I don't accept borders :p
I'm with you! The 11 year old girls that earn $1.80 per 12 hour day working for Freeport MacMoran in Indonesia are easy competition. Let's take 'em on! Let's get mining in this country back to what it used to be: For the extremely poor!! Really, anyone in American manufacturing should make 'Sanford and Son' look like the 'Kardashians' - let's get competitive America! Go USA!
Minimum wage is communism!
Three hots & a cot is the new minimum wage!
Support your local private prison-industrial complex!
Slavery is freedom! Poverty is wealth!
The BOP is the new HUD!
Scroll down and learn about the new 2012 St. Raygun Parchman Plan!
Patriotic Capitalists such as yourself can truly appreciate the genius of my Parchman Plan!
USA USA USA USA
Minimum wage in Indonesia is higher than $1.80 dollar per 12 hour days.
You're not suggestion that Freeport is breaking the law are you? Oh well, at least it helps keep the price of canned soda down.
Yes. The Freeport subsidy is the highest tax payer to the Indonesian government. I wouldn't be surprised if the government lets them do whatever they want.
So to be competitive we need to be lower.
Let us use those pesky tools called tariffs, quotas and barriers. [ WTO terminology, the subsidies allotted for the agriculture are divided conventionally into three groups: the green, yellow and red baskets.] Or we can use these tools too. http://cesd.az/new/wp-content/uploads/2011/05/CESD-Azerbaijan%E2%80%99s-Accession-to-World-Trade-Organization-WTO.pdf
That caused the Great Depression with 40% unemployment.
so says the right wing echo chamber.
The left wing Democrats also agree that the Tariffs were a mistake that made the great depression far, far worse and prevented recovery (because european markets were closed-off to us).
The same democrats that were for slavery. The Nullifiers. So you support the ideas of the slave owners.
Actually nullification is a reserved power in the Constitution (amendment 10). AND it was used by the FREE states to kill the Fugitive Slave Act, thus giving blacks safe asylum in the north. So yes of course I support it. Without nulluification there would have been no place for Harriet Tubman and others to escape too.
I am a black man Yeah I supported having my great-grandparents enslaved. /end sarcasm. Stop being so insensitive and non-PC with your remarks. Such comments are uncalled for.
This is what I was referring to:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nullification_Crisis
That was only one state & they were roundly criticized by the other southern states.
Plus you ignored my point about how the ~10 Free states of the north nullified the Slave Act and provided asylum to my ancestors. Nullification has done more to benefit blacks than to harm them. Nullification is also benefiting pro-marijuana persons. See California and other states.
If you follow the thread, you will see my comment was directed to Vlad, the guy who would like us to work for 1$ an hour and was in reference to tariffs. To those of us who are familiar with tariff history, "The Nullifiers" is not ambiguous. It was an attempt to show Vlad that he was aligning himself with the same a-holes that enslaved your ancestors. Not about the general concept of nullification, but "The Nullifiers". Did you really think I was advocating slavery?
So? Vlad was correct. Tariff protection failed back in 1930. That's why neither the D or R party will support it.
No Vlad was not correct. The idea that protectionism failed is revisionist history. The reason neither party will support it is more likely due do the big money corporate interests that like to be able to access the cheapest slave labor, anywhere in the world, with no penalty for bringing it to the US market. This has also eliminated millions of American jobs, and depressed wages for jobs that remain. http://economyincrisis.org/content/impact-smoot-hawley-tariff-great-depressionhttp://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UJThSA59uqI
Look, just sending the illegal immigrants home has caused the apple harvest to fail this year. What will Americans do when they can't import stuff? Make it themselves? That would push up prices so much that the hordes of people shopping at WalMart will be instantly destitute. You want that? High prices when there are no jobs?
if you lower the minimum wage, will that lower mortgages for all the people who are renting their property out to make a buck? no. That just means welfare will have to go up to help subsidize the workers who are now making 1.50 an hour. they will have to work longer, which will leave kids without parental control. More renters will lead to bigger ghettos, higher crime. Good people will turn to crime if they can't provide adequat subsidence for their families. It would be a boom to the prison industrial complex, though. and those are just the unattended consequences i thought of off the top of my head.
Minimum wage is communism!
Three hots & a cot is the new minimum wage!
Support your local private prison-industrial complex!
Slavery is freedom! Poverty is wealth!
The BOP is the new HUD!
Yes, standard of living will drop. But at least having a job is better than having no job, right?
Look, I feel for your apples, but how about these apples. The minimum wage being lowered without dealing with the income gap does not fix the problem. it just makes the rich richer and the poor second class citizens. if the income disparity is fixed and lowering the minimum wage is part of the solution, then so be it.
What's the issue with income disparity? As long as you have a job, why do you care how much someone else has? Jealousy is never pretty.
god that is so simple minded. do you realize that the government is subsidizing that gap that you can only see from your point of view. Middle class America is paying for the lack of leadership in Washington. Your taxes plus the money that is borrowed from China provides food stamps, health benefits and all the other things that insure working class people can stay working. higher the minimum wage and those benefits are no longer needed.
Actually I think it's a good question. "As long as you have a job, why do you care how much someone else has?" Why do I care if Bill Gates, Michael Moore, and other top 1% make $350,000 and up?. It doesn't affect my or my neighbors' salaries.
I have no problem with those benefits. Like I said, I don't grudge the poor or the rich. As long as I am doing well I am fine.
I guess the ME generation will never be able to fix the problem then. Where do I sigh up for food stamps?
What, precisely, is the problem? I just see that you are jealous of the rich because they have money, and the poor because they get food stamps. So you want the wages to go up so that the poor don;t get foodstamps any more, and the rich have lower profits. You don;t seem to understand that this will cause major job loss. That's very selfish.
Minimum wage is communism!
Three hots & a cot is the new minimum wage!
Support your local private prison-industrial complex!
Slavery is freedom! Poverty is wealth!
The BOP is the new HUD!
They will have greater job opportunities. We've been over this. We did make it for ourselves in the past. It worked out just fine.
Better then fine... My neighbor made sausages for a living. He owned a home and sent his kids to college
70% tax rate for the rich at that time. No one was complaining and anyone that wanted a job had one.
Like a job making sausages.
What happened to that America?
It was outsourced.
Yup, I am in IT. My field has been heavily outsourced. I'm lucky enough to be in a niche that can't be. But I have seen the devastation caused by it.
I have friends whose engineering firms were shut down and moved to India.The list goes on and it's getting worse daily.
Why should our kids go to school and study Computer Science, Engineering, Biology, etc.. if the jobs waiting for them upon graduation are in Calcutta.
This outsourcing has to stop. Our economy can not consist of 300 Million people flipping each others burgers and cutting each others hair.
Just so these corporations can squeeze every last bit of profit... in the short term. In the long term it is suicide. China can not over take us as the consumer capital. They don't buy IPADS at $600.
Quite right. For decades now, we have been told the free trade lies. It must end. Over 5 million jobs have been lost. And no China is not a market for our manufactured goods.
How about just force the unemployed into work gangs and make being unemployed a crime. Its called slave labor. Oh yea right.
This is a free country. If people don't want the jobs they can stay unemployed. But they can't then complain about it.
Rather than lowering our minimum wage we should tax imports by a tariff equal to the cost differential between our minimum wage and the amount paid to people in China, etc. Same with the savings corporations get by manufacturing where environmental laws do not apply. Yes it would slow down trade, but it would also level the playing field otherwise it is a race to the bottom for wages, health and the environment.
Rather than lowering our minimum wage we should tax imports by a tariff equal to the cost differential between our minimum wage and the amount paid to people in China, etc. Same with the savings corporations get by manufacturing where environmental laws do not apply. Yes it would slow down trade, but it would also level the playing field otherwise it is a race to the bottom for wages, health and the environment.
minimum wage should be 15 - 20 an hr by now to keep up with inflation, they will spend it and the economy will grow and people that are unemployed by choice will go back to work. Its a win, win, win
LOL!!!
Were you paid by Rick PArry to post this?....You know some people live from their kids working part time minimum wage jobs (barely maybe albeit) from their kids working part time jobs. You bring down minimum wage, and those kids and parents suffer. Because you could bring down minimum wage but you can't bring down the cost of rent and food.
Onshoring is already happening.
We can put you to work first, Vlad! In fact, we should hire every "supply sider" for two dollars an hour, although it's more than you're worth.
I am paid much more than that in the free market so I won't need to take that job.
Alternatively, people could simply EXERCISE their power as consumers and VOTE for the corporations who adhere to their values. See http://occupywallst.org/forum/the-power-of-the-people/
what's with this guy? pure troll or what?
I am absolutely with you that is to eliminate minimum-wage standards for small businesses. I am saying let the employee and employer (agree on wage) based on company performance. so it could be $2/Day on some occasions and if company makes money it could be as higher has what the company can afford to pay. We also need employees and employer to work on same footing, that means employee cannot sue employer for frivolous reasons. This will give confidence to employer to start hiring without having to worry about getting sued by its employees.
Here is the issue: Inflation and housing needs to be affordable. If we pay $2/hr , that translate to $16 per day and $64/Week. It is nearly impossible for anyone in usa to survive with this pay. The rent needs to go down to $100/Month and groceries should go down (eliminate corporate groceries stores) encourage local-farm-groceries to make this happen.
People need to work more than 8 hour days. Bankers routinely work 16 hour days. Life is no picnic, and if husband and wife are both working 60-80 hour week you have $500/month or so. There has to be some EITC and Welfare, and subsidized community housing (no suburban homes) but overall it will be doable.
we need resources not jobs
I'm in! Great idea!
Here is one of ways out, I think. Just abolish the greenback. Do your job as volunteer for a while. At least while the rest of the world will be collapsing from dollar become totally worthless. Hey, your all debts will disappear! And all those rich and politician thief become immediately equal to honest working Joe. And there will be no way to create some scheme again till they will come up with some other way to keep themselves above 99%. A lot of worms and parasitic activity will shrink! Ha-ha!
You want jobs?
Our infrastructure is falling apart. Roadways, bridges, aqueducts, dams, power lines, and even most homes are decades old.
We need new infrastructure, built with updated technologies.
Make life livable at 1-2 dollars an hour and then we'll talk. Also I think most people would rather they didn't earn 8-16 dollars a day for back breaking work.
You live within your means. It is not the job of others to make your standard of living comfortable. If you don;t want a back breaking job get an education and become a banker. It is that easy.
Lol, so how does someone eat?
"Oh! It's not our business to care if our workers are fed enough to work! Quickly, man servant! Give me more pie!"
Unless you've never shopped a day in your life you would know that 16 dollars doesn't even pay for a weeks worth of the cheapest shittiest groceries. Lol you're either a troll or completely out of touch with reality.
Once again I ask, how do illegal immigrants do it? They even send money home.
Also, I would suspect 0 dollars from wages would buy less than $1-2 in wages.
They make at least $8 hr in my part of the country.
Have you lived with an illegal immigrant? Do you know what their quality of life is like?
Also, the immigrants are leaving because it fucking sucks to work here. Mexico has a significantly lower unemployment rate than us. Lowering the wages are going to suck even more.
this one is from August, so it's not exactly out of date: http://caffertyfile.blogs.cnn.com/2011/08/03/illegal-aliens-leaving-u-s-returning-to-mexico-for-better-life/
America is no land of opportunity anymore, and if you take away the minimum wage you're going to get a very violent reaction from the legal citizens that work here. Also, if you don't like your precious tax payer money put to use on anyone but you, you'll be very unhappy with the amount of people living on welfare at the rate of 1-2 dollars an hour.
Do you even read what you post? Mexico has lower unemployment rates because wages are lower there. The quality of life is also lower, but hardworking illegal immigrants care about having a job more than the quality of life based on govt handouts. Unlike Americans.
I am all for safety nets. I think we need low cost housing, food stamps, soup kitchens, Medicaid for all, etc. But the days of having a suburban home while working unskilled jobs is long gone. Americans have to deal with that. We need highrises that can house many poor families.
So you speak for illegal immigrants? You know how they feel.
I am not arrogant enough to claim that I speak for anybody, far less the 99%. I only speak for myself. When it comes to others, I only present facts.
"...but hardworking immigrants care about having a job more than the quality of life..." How do you know that? I think they would like a decent quality of life as much as anyone.
Otherwise they wouldn't take the back breaking jobs that they do.
If your choice is backbreaking work or starve, you take backbreaking work.
I am an American and I have picked oranges with the mexicans when I was much younger. I have great respect for those that do hard labor. One should avoid generalization fallacy.
So encourage the unemployed to take these jobs.
Precisely my point. Americans however wouldn't do that. I have far more respect for the illegal immigrants.
Also, nothing in my post said unemployment was down because wages were low.
So we should be at a point of constant poverty?
If you have decided to not better yourself above the level of unskilled labor, sadly yes. The sooner you understand and accept that reality the better. Go to a community college and get a degree in something that is attracting a lot of jobs. Otherwise you will be destitute for life.
I have a bachelors degree and 2 associates and I work at a security monitoring company : |. I'm speaking for others who have been less fortunate than me. Just because I'm not left destitute doesn't mean I can't care about the people who are.
You are a perfect example of how someone can do better without whining. Encourage others to do the same.
Ha-ha! Anybody who want to win competition from chinese should learn about China. They did not even to start working at full speed, and they employed only several millions. A few billions are still looking for job. Ha-ha!
Exactly. So wages are going to keep going down, not up. There is huge excess supply of human capital. Now the nice liberals on this board would love to see those excess billions starve instead of taking jobs from overpaid US workers, but then they are selfish hypocrites with a colonial attitude, which is not surprising.
Sure, Vladimir! Everybody in this world is getting what he deserves! Difficult to cheat everybody! Especially with all this internet communication. Instead of waisting money on wars and super expensive military US government should invest in medicine, education, innovations and create products chinese and the rest of the world can't live without. Apparently americans reveal they are not smart enough for all this. They choose stupid president who put US so much down. Well you know what comes before the fall?.... Pride.
Look, the reality is people in India can do the same research and at far lower salaries. Why should corporations keep the R&D jobs in the USA? People here are super overpaid. In every way. And people have a super entitled attitude as well, as is clear from this thread. So yes, I agree that corporations should invest in innovations, and they are doing that. just not in the USA because it is too freaking expensive here. Bring wages down to world levels and there will be jobs. It's just that simple. Now if the American Govt wants to subsidize US labor through social safety nets that's fine.
Vlad the economist. you're a funny guy. The US is broke. read a newspaper watch a news report. The US can't afford to subsidize workers while dealing with a massive trade deficit. If US consumers are starved, as things stand China will crash. Economists should be paid 25 cents an hour, but only if they go to their corner and shut up.
USA is broke only because 1) we fought two ridiculous wars and spent a shitload of money that we don;t have, and 2) we cut taxes while fighting those wars. Bring back the policies of the days of Clinton and we will be fine. Stop all wars, but the freaking defense budget, and raise taxes to the 1990s levels and pretty soon we will have no budget issues. I have no problem paying taxes in the 40-50% range on the topside. I understand that it is my responsibility to pay more for society because I earn more.
But to dream on about manufacturing coming back tot he USA at current wages is plain ridiculous.
So you can be sane, yes on the wars, yes on the tax cuts. But you're stuck on the wage issue. How does Germany manage to pay high wages. Hint Germany has trade barriers to imports and strong unions. If you eliminate consumer markets, the economy goes to hell. It's happening now. Consumer demand is tanking. Try looking at cnbc.com.
I know it is tanking. I am totally OK if the Govt subsidizes wages. But I am not OK with fucking around with the free market.
You didn't address Germany.
I know you aren't gonna get it but it's tanking because of what you call the free market. Same as 1929.
Not true at all. World wide GDP is growing. It's a restructuring of wealth to the third world. But overall it is growing. Germany did well because it has no debt.
Response to; "Once again": If you're arguing that the US cannot maintain it's current level of consumption, that is no doubt true. But it's not a matter of reaching parity with China. Energy consumption is already a serious issue. The price/ availability of cheap oil is an issue word wide that will impact the world economy (as it already is). The trade deficit is certainly unsustainable.
response to "Then by logic..."Yes, If US wages drop to the 3rd world level, the trade deficit, (and in fact trade itself) would disappear. Consumer spending would also plummet. The value of stocks would plummet. Tax receipts would decline. GNI would tank. Sound good?
Once again, you are thinking only about the USA. Think of the world. GNI will increase on average across the globe as it has been doing for the past 15-20 years of free trade. Stocks will go up as companies will invest overseas and the overseas markets will provide huge demand. USA will have a hard time, yes, but like I have been saying for a long time, it is not sustainable that a country can continue to have 5% of the world's population and keep consuming 30% of the world's resources. US standard of living will have to drop by 80-90% for parity to be reached with China, India etc.
"If Americans were paid less then they would consume less and the trade surplus would return" Wrong again. If Americans consume less, it does't necessarily follow that they will only decrease consumption of imports. It may decrease imports, but the ratio of imports to exports is a different matter.
Then by that logic if Americans are paid more there is no guarantee either that the trade deficit would shrink as Americans may just consume more foreign goods. So, what's your point? Reality is, Americans are way too rich compared to the Chinese. If American purchasing power became equal to that of the Chinese, the trade deficit would resolve itself. It always has in history in international trade. That is happening right now. American wages are dropping and Chinese wages are going up. Pretty soon the two will stabilize and then the trade deficit will disappear too. Anyone who is a student of economic history would know this.
GNI is growing a little, but moving toward flatline. Personnally, I think a lot of it is false, like the imaginary wealth in derivatives, MBSs. Wait till Greece defaults, then we'll see. Germany has a trade surplus. That's key
Sure, if the numbers dont match your prejudice they must be wrong.
It is impossible for all Countries to have a trade surplus. Anyway, if Americans were paid less then theynwould consume less and the trade surplus will return. Happy?
Look Vladimir, I think we should not worry to manage the world or a country. My opinion, leave everything along and it will adjust itself. Saves money on management also. Let money and products flow freely all over the world, and the world become more or less evenly developed. It has problems because we created problems by interfering with it. Worry about pollution, overpopulation, animals extinction etc. But for now money is the root of all evils.
Get rid of the minimum wage and all regulations and only have a consumption tax and cut government spending like all departments then and only then we will see the largest job boom in history. Everyone will see major advances in standards of living it would be all good. But the socialist agenda of the liberals will never let that happen because they want to take from those who work and give to those who don't.
I actually think eliminating minimum wage would help create a lot of jobs.
I worked for 2.35 an hour min wage. Don't go there?
Also hold the stockholders of the American/Chinese enterprises to human standards, living wage, no subsidies, etc. American and Western standards.
One big problem, the chinese communist government jails dissenters. for decades not overnight.
Okay stop all chinese imports, tax them, buy american
You want to hold the Chinese to American standards? What if the Chinese want to hold Americans to Chinese standards? You wouldn't like it that much, I guarantee you that. You have a serious colonial attitude mate. America needs to worry about its own business and let the Chinese worry about theirs. China is not Iraq where the Americans can wage an illegal war and topple Govts. Sheesh, the neocolonial attitude of some people - purportedly liberals - is just nauseating.
The living wage is a global problem. A $2 minimum wage is slavery.
Its not slavery if the worker was earning 0$/hour (unemployed) and needs some money and agrees to work for $2 voluntarily. Only those who are unemployed for long years know what $2 can do to make a difference. May be shared housing/ low-income housing as benefit from employer in addition to pay would go together long way in making difference in lives of people. Again pay can be increased based on company and individual performance.
What you are describing is the old "Company Store." Why not just pay workers in "Company Script" so they have to shop in only the "Company Store." That system was exposed as slavery a long time ago.
What you ask for is slavery, Slaves to the state. You sir are an idiot, No one will force you to work for any wage so why do you want to force employers to hire at a certain wage. Its only slavery when you are forced to work. You might get hired at 2 dollars an hour but you will gain skills and your pay will go up as you do your job better or you can quit said job and find another higher paying job in that field once you have experience. Right now you will never get hired cause of the minimum wage.
The whole world is in chaos because labor is undervalued. I realize that this is a difficult concept to understand, but your anger and frustration will not solve anything. Labor is a different kind of resource than regular raw materials. Labor is not only a resource, but the market as well. If labor is undervalued, then the market collapses. This has been illustrated over and again, in the collapses of the past.
Look it doesn't matter if the guy/girl taking your order is making 3.00 / 7.25 / 30.00 per hour - this is because there buying power stays the same no matter the base wage. Who do you think makes minimum wage? A factory needing hard work isn't going to start out at minimum wage. If you can only work somewhere and you have this mindset, that is fine but don't complain that its unfair that your doing all the work and someone else is making the money. That is what is wrong. I bet you think child labor in China is bad? When what you are really doing is taking away there best option. Granted not a good one but "All of my grandparents" worked in fields picking cotton or potato's by the time they were 12. When a nation becomes wealthy standards go up. This will happen not due to regulations but due to everyone becoming more wealthy in perspective. You can't think that someone who can only do a simple task and who tasks no risk or never saves deserves more money? You are all for socialism even if you don't think you are. http://web.archive.org/web/20080128195659/http:/www.calvertonschool.org/waldspurger/pages/hegelian_dialectic.htm
No, you are so utterly wrong, that I pray to G-d that you are not in a Corporation, making decisions. If Americans made no more money,than Chinese workers, there would be no incentive for Chinese poeple to move to the United States. The USA has a small population, in need of population growth, particularly, realtive to China or India. If Ameircans had the same purchasing power, as Indians or Chinese, you cannot see how that would be bad? Seriously, you are f-cking kidding, right? The country with the best standard of living, the biggest middle class and an open immigration policy, will ultimately be the next Super Power. Would you move to the USA, f you would be making the samle money where you are living now?
Corporations are not int he business to make USA the richest country in the world. For people clamoring so hard against income inequality in the USA, it seems that income inequality across the globe is just peachy. For shame.
So to meddle in other countries affairs is neo -colonialism, but we should be ashamed because other governments are ok with exploitation. you are a total troll.
I am not talking about income inequality within a foreign country. I am talking of income inequality between USA and the rest of the world. You guys seem to be fine with that. That's hypocritical.
If you are talking about Mcmansions and Escalades and our consumtion of fossil fuel, I agree it's insane.
I'm not fine with it. I just believe it is unrealistic to think we can fix that. It also annoys me that NAFTA forced many Mexican farmers off their family farm because US agribis. flooded their market with subsidized corn. They now are forced to come here or starve.
That's life under free trade.
Ah, Vlad, management is employed to optimize shareholder value, off of activities, conducted by the Corporation, in each and every market serviced; the idea is to optimize shareholder value, not just optimize shareholder value off of activities in China. [rolls eyes] Allowing the American middle class to die out, undermines the best interest of Corporations. The middle class is cheaper to service, than any other class willing and able to purchase goods, the middle class is the most profitable class and when the middle class has population growth we have the best conditions for optimizing long term shareholder value. [states obvious and pats self on head]
Remember, the ideas is to maximize shareholder value, while not exposing the shareholder to unnecessary risk, not to create utter unmitigated market volatility, forcing investors to ration out private investment in the USA, by scaring them into buying Government securites and gold, while creating economic chaos, in Europe and the USA and pushing for repeated taxpayer funded bail outs for banks. [rolls eyes] You do realize why the Soviet Union failed, right? Because of guys thinking like you, Vlad.
There is a huge middle class emerging in China and India which is taking the place of the American middle class so corporations are doing very well, and exactly the right thing by moving jobs to China and India which has the potential for far large middle class markets than the USA.
You do not understand, it is the duty of managers to optimize shareholder value, off of all operations, not some operations. You are thinking too zero sum game and not like a good manager. I would still fall short of my duty, as a manager, if I only maximized wealth creation off of servicing part of the World and not all of the World, under my operations. A manager has a further duty to not expose shareholders to unnecessary risk, as well. The present approach to Globalization does not promote the best interest of shareholders, doing very well is not good enough, so Corporations are not doing the right things.
Really? Well then all managers are not good managers as that's what corporations are doing. You should apply for the top CEO slots and prove to them that while your approach lowers profits it is good for America so should be followed. then get back to me on how the interview went.
Yes, really, Vlad. Sorry to disappoint you, but undermining the American middle class is hurting the ability of companies to optimize profits off of the US market, not enhancing it. You are still thinking of optimizing profits in one market, at the cost of another, in a zero sum game, that does not optimize the long term financial interests of shareholders, off of all of your operations. I know that it is hard to understand, but it is true, the USA made a big mistake putting secondary functional types, from finance, in executive positions. These positions should really go to strategically minded MBA types, like me, not to tactical thinkers.
...The management of a Global Corporation has a non- transferable, affirmative duty to shareholders, that must be acted upon, by managment, not Government, not teachers, not the Easter Bunny, to optimize shareholder value and prevent undue exposure to risk, off of all our Global operations and the markets that we service, period and end of story. That is management, that is the discipline. Any manager falling short of this standard is falling short of his or her duty to shareholders, yes, really. What Corporate management gets away with today; the utter disregard for the best interest of shareholders, in favor of the personal interests of sociopathic I-Bankers and ego maniac executives, due to the corruption of the prostitutes, we call elected officials, is another story entirely, Vlad. [giggle]
Why should corporations care about optimizing profits in the USA market? These are global corporations.
The management of a Global Corporation has a non- transferable, affirmative duty to shareholders, that must be acted upon, by management, to optimize shareholder value and prevent undue exposure to risk, off of all their Global operations and the markets that they service. This duty, in the short run, would include the duty to maximize profits, off of all markets serviced, including the USA, if that is a market that they service. Any manager falling short of this standard is falling short of his or her duty to shareholders.
What part of the duty of management is confusing to you? Also understand that there are specific, additional and expanded duties that may be imposed on management, by Government action or by volitional assumption of additional duties, by management and that there is variation and nuance in the duty, from state to state, country to country and depending on the state of the company; if it is insolvent, there are special duties and what not. Management, at a minimum, will have to live up to what I suggest and usually a lot more.
None, except that corporate profits are at all time highs, so I fail to see how corporate managers are failing. No where there is a requirement that corporations must work, above all, to keep America the richest country in the world.
OMFG! Vlad, it is not necessarily enough to have record profits, not nearly enough. Management must optimize long term growth in shareholder value, off of their activities, directed for the benefit of shareholders, not just create record profits. You understand that there is no necessary equality between the best result recorded and the optimal result achievable and expected, right? Undermining the US middle class does not lead to conditions that favor the optimization of long term shareholder wealth creation, with regard to servicing this market and therefore does not meet the minimum standard expected of management. What do I need to ensure the optimization of shareholder wealth off of servicing this market? I need population growth. I need babies and immigrants.
Vlad, so if I am in managment and I service this Nation, do I want to reduce wages to $2 an hour, so the US is a less attractive place to move and Americans can't afford to have kids, because they are paid too little money or they have no careers, in the first place? Hell no Vlad, hell no! Get the whores and sociopaths out of my chair Vlad! I belong in management and they belong in prison or a whore house; maybe a whore house in a prison! [giggle]
Just put me in and I will play that cheesy Queen song, "Gimme the Prize, " as I assume control. [wink]
"Undermining the US middle class does not lead to conditions that favor the optimization of long term shareholder wealth creation,"
I simply disagree. The future market is not the USA, it is BRIC.
What do you do exactly?
Yeah, because you can live off of 76 dollars a week. No disrespect, that is the silliest thing I have read in a while, and I read the OWS forum. lol
The way I look at is like this. Assume that anyone making less than about $14 an hour is getting some kind of government assistance. Those that are unemployed are getting more assistance than those who make $12 an hour. Get rid of the minimum wage and let people make $3 an hour or whatever else the market determines they are worth. Yes, they will not be able to survive on that and will need government assistance. That is fine. It is just that I would rather give government assistance to people that actually work and don't just sit around all day. And the higher the minimum wage is, the more people who end up just sitting on their butt all day.
The cap on getting assistence is far lower than $14, especially if you work OT. Unemployment is set at half what you used to make. Welfare checks plus food stamps is around $1100 a month and you have to do 180 hours of community service to get the check.
$14 and those other numbers were just an examples to make my point..
Also, what state is that where you say they need to do 180 hours of community service per month?
All of them. The number might be different in different states but the community service part is mandatory under welfare reform passed in the 90s
I am a dentist and work with Medicaid patients several days per month, and have been for years, and I know for a fact that people who are 100% supported by the state do nowhere near that much community service and I would actually be shocked if they did any.
I am all for them being forced to do something for the benefits. They simply don't though.
Are they mothers with young children, or students in school? Because I used to have a temp job at the DJFS and those are the only exceptions. Even students have to do service hours to get cash.
Some are young mothers, most are just plain poor. All shapes, all sizes, all poor. And I would say a solid 90% do nothing productive. And they wonder why there is such a high rate of depression among the poor. Community service should and needs to happen, it just doesn't.
And then there is the corruption of the welfare system but that is a whole other issue. We could help a lot more people if things were more efficient.
Some of those people may be on SSI, which has no service requirement.
You are slowly proving my point. There are so many exceptions that people end up falling in one. Like I said, literally none of them doing anything all day.
Most people don't qualify for SSI. There are far more people putting in hours for assistence than collecting checks for nothing. And welfare cash comes with a 36 month lifetime limit. After that you are cut off.
We don't need a better assistance program, we need better jobs.
There are jobs that don't require skills. Setting brake pads in a factory or running a shot blaster doesn't require any skills. I used to do that while I was in college. But it only pays $800 a month. If welfare plus FS is $1100 a month, you see where I'm going with this.
What kind of good job do you expect people with no education and no skills to be able to obtain? As a whole, poor people have less education and skills than those who aren't poor.
Illegal immigrants do. If you do the same work as them and nothing better, how can you expect to have a better standard of living? Just because they are brown and you are not?
No one can live of that much, illegal or not. You have no idea what you are talking about.
Do you know how much migrant farm workers make?
Read this
http://www.economist.com/node/17722932
People make do with what they have. There are jobs. Americans simply won't take them.
This report is crap. I live in Central Valley California. The heart of food production in the United States. I am Mexican and have several friends in the agriculture business.
Farm hands are paid Minimum Wage. California Minimum Wage.
The idea of being paid a dollar an hour is absolutely insane. On many levels. U.S. Consumers are 70 percent of the Economy. A lower minimum wage would drive wages down across the board And the economy with it...
In case you have not noticed we still have 14 trillion in debts with minimum interest payments. How will we pay that with a deflated currency? Do you know anything about economics? You should use your brain before you type.
Gas for example. Being the country that we are there are massive commutes to get to work.Let's see 3.80 a gallon here that's what 2 hours pay. Say you work 15 Miles away with traffic you can burn a gallon easy each way. That's 4 hours of labor just to transport yourself to work. Leaving you a total of 8 dollars a day or 160 dollars per month.
Of course assuming i rent. The owner of the property most likely does not own the property and makes some minimum payment towards the bank. Is he going to lower is rent to say 50 a month for his tenants? How will he make a 50,000 dollar payment to the bank with 5000 worth of rent receipts?
Gas is subsidized in those countries... and would have to be subsidized here... More so then any other country by our urban sprawl. You will go from subsidizing labor to subsidizing fuel and other inputs. What's the point?
You should take some lesson in economics and history before you speak. Look at the Weimar Republic if you would like a recent example of extreme inflation/ deflation in wages and their ability to track the value of goods being chased by said wages.
They have never kept pace and America is no exception.
To pay 1 dollar to an employee who is part of an economy that was built on a foundation of much higher wages is impossible. There mere thought of it is idiotic.
The government would be forced to subsidize their lives. From fuel to housing.... And for what? So a CEO and a mutual fund can squeeze out even more profit?
The real issue is not our minimum wage it is the currency manipulation going on in China along with a bastardized version of Capitalism that's design is to filter more and more money upwards to the hands of the very few at the expense of everyone else.
The weight of that wealth will eventually be too much and cause the entire system to collapse. It's happened before and it will happen again. .
So did your relatives leave the Soviet Union or the Russian Federation, so you could make do with what you had? [laughing on the floor]
Migrant farm workers are often paid by volume. Some, who are skilled in farm work, can make up to $12 and hour. Those who are not raised on farms make much less. The point being made is that those low paid farm workers often live in camps that are set up for them by the farmers.
No one should break their back for so little in exchange. Little girls in Vietnam working for US companies make .10 an hour and then get charged $1 a day for a bowl of rice and a floor to sleep on. They have to work 10 hours just to break even.
We have laws that are suposed to prevent that kind of exploitation. You want us to go back to the days when a whole family would work in the factory just for afford rent and substandard food?
So have those laws and see jobs disappear. You like high unemployment rates, eh? At least with a job there is food on the table and rent is paid, however substandard. If you insist on better, there are three alternatives. 1) Don't do unskilled labor. Become, for example, a banker. 2) Pass laws such that there are huge trade barriers, but understand that prices will them increase and in reality your standard of living won't as there will be massive inflation. 3) Stay on the public dole, and hope that it never runs out. But then you have to be OK with depending on the kindness of others for your subsistence. You are a beggar, then.
Or you can accept the same wage that everyone is accepting across the globe and at least have a job.
I have a job. Consumer spending drive our economy. If you make $76 dollars a week and rent is $450, exactly how do you get by, let alone create demand.
Share the rent with another family. As for demand, don;t worry about it. Let the corporations worry about that.
Twleve people living in a one bedroom apartment and eating just enough to live, getting sick because of weak immune systems. Brilliant plan.
BTW, low consumer demand means a bad economy and that hurts everyone. The corporations see a smaller bottom line, regular people loss their jobs, including the people working for slave wages.
The demand will come from Canadians. We will move our factories to US from China in order to save on transportation costs. We'll create many jobs for you. It's a good plan.
Once again, let the corporations worry about demand. If demand was weak corporate profits wouldn't be at a record high. As for the horrid standard of living, yes it is horrid but the way out is education and upskilling. There is no way to artificially hold wages high when there are billions in excess labor in the developing countries. By the way, you don;t seem to care at all about these billions who would be without jobs if Americans were to have their wonderful standard of living. You don;t seem to care at all about the poor in the third world who would instead die of hunger. You want to take away their rice bowls so that they can starve instead. For shame.
Right. Because paying those people a decent wage would be so terrible. So the dollar store has to become the $2 store. Oh my, I'd have to pay twice as much for cheap plastic crap that breaks before I get it home. Heavens me.
Lets be real clear here. US consumer demand is extremly weak, which is why the economy sucks. Higher wages = higher demand = more jobs.
Corporations are responsible to generate profits. True. But if businesses took a small cut in profit in the short run, they would have higher wages without increasing costs. More prosperity for working people, who would then buy things from businesses. No corporation is willing to do that, so we have trade laws, minium wage etc. It worked just fine in the past.
What you miss is whatever you gain from higher wages you then lose to higher prices. US economy may be weak but corporations are doing very well. It is not the corporations' responsibility to make the US economy better. They are supposed to deliver higher profits for shareholders and they are doing that just fine, thank you very much.
I would love to see how you can dispute this.
Nobody is with you.
That's a pity. Because my solution would work. I guess people would rather stay unemployed. Their choice.
Protesting banks and moving your money to a smaller bank will do nothing to improve somebodies life or get them a job. Your time would be better spent on protesting companies to bring there manufacturing of products back to THIS country and retailers to sell only USA made products!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Yes a minimum wage of 1-2 dollars an hour would make us more competitive with China, also getting rid of child labor laws would indeed make us more competitive..But it would also destroy anything that was good about this country...You're a P.O.S.
I don't like the idea of this any more than you do, but our only way to take control of American demand for goods is to remain competitive. The market is global now. I think in lieu of offering the current minimum wage, employers and employees would be better off with guaranteed housing, food and health insurance. This might be possible with large scale companies in the manufacturing sector. The kind that are currently employing China.
I have to laugh man...Ok I got a deal for you...I will provide you with work and food and a place to live..You can go to work for me..I'll provide this all to you ..
How this works:
There is a building with three floors. Bottom floor is the manufacturing area..Middle is the cafeteria, and Top is where the sleeping quarters are and you get to live there for free! What do ya think! No wives or children allowed.
I'm giving you all this and I think that you or anyone should appreciate this offer of a job and free food and board!
China's wages are rising in the east part of the country. Their middle class is growing robustly. The only way to attract jobs to the USA is to make it cheaper to make stuff here in the USA,, we need lower taxes, lower healthcare costs, lower litigation risk ( tort reform) lower regulatory costs. Then and only then will companies make stuff in the USA
100% agree. This will permit me to setup a Canadian business and hire cheap labor from across the boarder. Mr. Mayakovsky, you sir, are a genius.
You go work For a dollar an hour!!!!
I work for what the market pays me. everyone should, too.
Your getting screwed if you do that!!!
totally with you
Minimum wage does more to hurt the poor than anything. It's a political stunt to gain votes than sends jobs overseas. If we didn't have a fraudulent money supply, people could have a fair start.
I'm with you.
You would not need a minimum wage that low even. 6$ would work fine, if factories could keep people at that wage. The problem with minimum wage earners is they don't show up to work. The work ethic of our minimum wage workforce is a tremendous limiter to US manufacturing. It's really never been about min wage in factories though. They've paid 20-200% more than that for 20+ years. Companies don't like building in China. We are forced to.
Eliminate the minimum wage entirely.
Free markets for all
I would personally hire a few folks if minimum wage is reduced to $1-2/hour.
Can't get any slaves from a gulag Vladimir?
Huh! Who needs Gulags! Check out my new St. Raygun Parchman Plan!
Scroll down, brother!
Slavery is freedom!
That only works in a communist country.
My brother, have no fear!
I am back from the Great Beyond with my new platform of Regressive Conservatism!
I have the answer for Patriotic Capitalists such as yourself.
I call it my Parchman Plan.
You can lease my hard-working, broken-in BOP residents for just a FRACTION of that dollar an hour you dream of paying!
Have your apples picked with no labor issues and no management costs!
There is precedent for this in the good ole USA, the land you & I love so much! No need for a communist state!
We'll just get back to the common sense conservatism that we used to cling to in this great country of ours & you will have the almost-free labor that you desire.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Convict_lease
We need to get back to basics!
Work will set them free!
I think the repeated references to slavery is really offensive.
i think your attitude is offensive and an insult to the working class, blue and white collar workers.
who is paying you to write this ridiculous stuff?
No! No! No!
You are misunderstanding!
It is not slavery! It is employment!
They get paid! I know you are a good, conscience-filled, Patriotic Capitalist American, son! And you would never want to keep slaves!
See, they get paid:
"There are presently 80,000 inmates in the US employed in commercial activity, some earning as little as 21 cents an hour. The US government program Federal Prison Industries (FPI) currently employs 21,000 inmates, an increase of 14 percent in the last two years alone. FPI inmates make a wide variety of products—such as clothing, file cabinets, electronic equipment and military helmets—which are sold to federal agencies and private companies. FPI sales are $600 million annually and rising, with over $37 million in profits."
And YOU can hire them to pick your apples, as soon as my 2012 St. Raygun Parchman Prison Farm Labor Program goes into effect.
We need to create jobs for millions of Americans. What do you suggest they do? All join OWS and get meals and a tent?
What I suggest is that everyone vote for ME, the Second Coming in 2012 so we can enact my Parchman Plan, son!
It is just what the doctor ordered!
Slavery, no, wait, not slavery.
I meant - Very Low Wage Employment is Freedom!
Ignorance is Strength!
Greed is GOOD!
Sociopathy is Social Justice!
No, freedom is demanding that you only do the job you want, when you want, how much you want, and still earn way, way more than 99% people in the world, but not out of greed. You demand that because it is only right.
Freedom, my son, is having starving and imprisoned people manufacture your goods for you for pennies per hour, while you sit pretty on the Forbes top 100 list!
Freedom, my son, is to overwhelm a small town's tax assessor with frivolous challenges to its tax laws so that your five year abatement gets extended to ten years and the small store owners that you put out of business pay for the necessary services that your big store gobbles up by the ton every month.
Freedom, my son, is being able to live in a gated community and pay off the NYPD to the tune of 4.6 million dollars so you can rest easy & drink a martini and have your paid thugs keep the hungry dollar-an-hour masses away from your door!
Freedom, my son, is sending other people's children off to foreign lands to fight & die to protect your financial interests while your children vacation in every exotic resort in the world!
THAT my son, is sweet, sweet, freedom!
Join with me and make the Second Coming a reality in 2012!
You know you want to.
Now, let's sing:
O beautiful for spacious skies, For amber waves of grain, For purple mountain majesties Above the fruited plain! America! America! God shed His grace on thee, And crown thy good with brotherhood From sea to shining sea! O beautiful for heroes prov'd In liberating strife, Who more than self their country lov'd, And mercy more than life. America! America! May God thy gold refine Till all success be nobleness, And ev'ry gain divine.
Well said. You have my vote. I mean, 12 Families in one cottage. Food barely good enough to keep you alive. But hey they get paid so its ok its not Slavery!
Its better then being a slave right?
I mean a slave what a life. Working just to be given a cottage to share with 12 other families and food barely decent enough to survive.
amen!