Minimum wage for the US

Actually Matt, I'm not bashing the USA just the minimum wage. I'm hardly alone in that since many economists have also stated publicly that is should be considerably higher for a number of valid reasons. Some of them even suggest that it should be as high as $21.16 per hour, but I think that's unrealisticly high.

Even noted US newspapers are extremely critical of the minimum wage, the New York Times and the Huffington Post, among them.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/06/1 … 99420.html

It is estimated that 1 in 4 US workers are in jobs that pay at or below the minimum wage (yes, below because some jobs are exempt from the Federal Minimum Wage Law). 25% of the US population is not a figure to be sneezed at.

So, will there be any negative impact on raising the minimum wage? Many economists say that this is highly unlikely since the minimum wage is already so low.

They also point out the fallacy of the age old excuse for not raising the minimum wage, that doing so will mean a reduction in the number of jobs. They point out two compelling reasons that this is simply untrue...

Reason number 1.  Many of the low paying jobs wouldn't end up being outsourced to lower paying countries, because the cost involved in doing so and the small amount that would be saved simply does not justify that. Here a good example of the truth of this argument is again found in Canada. Even though Canada has a much higher minimum wage than either the USA or Mexico, the other members of the North American Free Trade Agreement - NAFTA, jobs didn't start flowing out of Canada to the USA and Mexico as a result. Also there are a number of US laws that would make outsourcing US jobs extremely difficult in the first place.

Reason number 2.  Most of the lower paid jobs are unskilled and really those that need some eyes and common sense. Jobs that while perhaps they COULD be automated, doing so would not be cost effective in any way. Nobody in his right mind would suggest spending the vast sums of money needed to bring robotics to flipping burgers at McDonalds, or automating other low skilled jobs even with a higher minimum wage.

Another fallacy is that a higher minimum wage would be harmful to the economy (well maybe only to the economy of the boardroom of big corporations) but certainly not to the US economy. In fact, it would be a boost to the economy in that it would boost consumerism, having all those people with a little bit of extra income that they would be spending on goods and services that they can't afford right now.

All these same excuses were tried on for size in Canada by those who opposed raising the minimum wage, our provincial governments thankfully saw through the smoke and mirrors; they didn't buy into the line being spouted by big business and raised the minimum wage anyway. They proved that the statements made by big business were wrong long ago, and these lame excuses haven't reared up their ugly heads again in Canada since.

Brazil steadfastly refuses to raise the pathetic minimum wage that they have. They whine and complain that the government simply doesn't have the money to do that. Well folks, that's a pure crock of doo-doo, they've got the highest tax revenues of any nation on earth. They don't cry poor when the polititions who are already making mega-salaries that would put American private sector presidents, vice-presidents and CEO's salaries to shame.... they vote themselves heafty pay increases anyway and quibble about a couple of centavos for the common citizen.