Robots Will Create 'Permanently Unemployable Underclass'

[astonas]

Re: Definitions need references!

In the dictionaries I could find, ethical and moral mean nearly the same thing.

Nearly is not the same as exactly.

Even in the link you cite, both personal and shared values are mentioned, and this definition also bases the judgement on values held by an individual or group:

: based on what you think is right and good: considered right and good by most people : agreeing with a standard of right behavior

Note that ethics leaves out the question of personal or shared values, and instead seeks to apply a logical framework to find objective standards for right and wrong. (It is technically classified as a branch of philosophy, while morality is generally classified under religion or culture.) That is the essential difference. Even though they both refer to evaluating "what is right and wrong" and hence appear very similar at first glance, they claim different sources of legitimacy for that judgement, and hence remain very distinct concepts.

There may well be valid arguments for Ghent's positions. If so, they must be made logically, since moral legitimacy is absent. But arguing them based on personal moral outrage is absurd.

I don't see a lot of people registering libertarian. But I don't see a lot of people critical of the FED and obsessing about FIRE either. But more states are legalizing marijuana, and one has legalized prostitution. In
Europe, entire nations have legalized these things.

These are yet more reasons why morality should be less important than it is in forming government policy. It also demonstrates that the popular (moral) is quite clearly not always the same as what should be done based on logic (ethical). Again, this highlights both the difference between the moral and ethical solutions to a given problem, and also demonstrates the danger of letting too much morality into governance in the first place.

But none of this counters the assertion that the solutions Ghent proposes have no moral legitimacy.

[Polish_Silver]

Definitions need references!

. . .

That point was as follows: A claim to a "moral" basis for extreme libertarian positions like complete elimination of the minimum wage, and creating a market free of any law or government, is absurd.

If one uses the earlier parts of the definition of morality, such as a set of personal values, then one is inherently assuming that it is acceptable to apply one's personal values over a large population that does not share them. .

If you use the definition's latter concepts of shared values . . .

To return: you simply do not have a moral argument here. If I were you, I'd focus on the ethical argument. There at least you have a chance to make a case, however long the odds. . . .

In the dictionaries I could find, ethical and moral mean nearly the same thing.

I'd also like someone to answer Ghent's argument, that if it is legal to work for 0$/hour ( volunteers) why it is illegal to work for 3$/hour?

The reality is we don't like it that there are low paid people, but does making low paid work illegal really help them?

What about changing the public benefits structure so that everyone has an incentive to work---ie not losing food stamps if you have a bottom rung job?

I don't see a lot of people registering libertarian. But I don't see a lot of people critical of the FED and obsessing about FIRE either. But more states are legalizing marijuana, and one has legalized prostitution. In
Europe, entire nations have legalized these things.

[LazyBoy]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

(deleted)

[astonas]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

Perhaps I am not getting what you said.

This is evidently the case.

I was trying to make one main point in my post, and I clearly labored it with sufficient supporting information to confuse a reader. Sorry for that.

That point was as follows: A claim to a "moral" basis for extreme libertarian positions like complete elimination of the minimum wage, and creating a market free of any law or government, is absurd.

If one uses the earlier parts of the definition of morality, such as a set of personal values, then one is inherently assuming that it is acceptable to apply one's personal values over a large population that does not share them. (In my post I described this as "pure arrogance", though the semantics are not critical to the argument. The non-technical usages of megalomania, or psychopathic might serve just as well.)

If you use the definition's latter concepts of shared values, then it is clear that this nation simply does not share your values. No matter how small a fraction of people vote in a given election, that number is still absolutely vast in comparison to the portion that would follow your prescription - eliminate the minimum wage entirely, have a completely unfettered free market, etc. A good indicator here is to see what fraction of the population votes for the libertarian party in any given election. However strongly you may hold your views, the fraction of people who agree with you in these more extreme positions is simply miniscule.

(I could go on for a long time about why I think morality should have a smaller role in selecting government leaders than it does, but that tangent is best left for later.)

To return: you simply do not have a moral argument here. If I were you, I'd focus on the ethical argument. There at least you have a chance to make a case, however long the odds.

The ethical branch of the discussion is also the only one of the two in which it is worth trying to convince another party of anything, since it demands that appeals must be made to logic, rather than individuals' personal or cultural beliefs. Thus, the moral argument is not only indefensible, it is also unproductive.

[Polish_Silver]

Against Minimum wages

Or chose to starve. Ruanda in America. Luckily we're not there yet.

Thanks but I really don't need your condescending tone or for you to tell me how I've formed my ideas.


. . .

I have mixed feelings about minimum wage laws, but much can be said against them. The proponents point out that it raises the wages of some workers . What they never discuss is that some people cannot be hired at all because the employer cannot afford them at the minimum wage, though he might be able to at some lower wage. So the minimum wage law probably puts people on welfare who could work in some capacity.

If you are starving, the option to work for $3/hour might be a lot nicer than the options of stealing or starving.

This country has no guaranteed income. You have to "qualify" somehow for almost every type of assistance. Meaning that there are probably people who can't find work and can't qualify for welfare.

There are also people trying to live on pensions or savings, for whom that $3/hour might make the difference between staying afloat and going down.

A minimum wage solves one set of problems by creating another set. I have never seen an empirically based argument decide one way or the other.

Germany, for many years, had no minimum wage, but they did have very generous unemployment, creating a defacto minimum wage.

It's hardly a defect on the employers behalf to offer someone a low paying job. A man who accepts it has no better choice.

It's not clear that workers have better choices because of minimum wage laws .

An alternative solution would be for the government to guaranty a minimum income, or to subsidize low wage work.

[Ghent12]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

Sorry, Ghent12, but elections are in fact the ONLY way to claim a basis in moral legitimacy for a nation.

(italics added by me)


Morality is therefore based on the consensus of a given group of people (for example, people who share a given religion, or live in a given nation) while ethics seeks to determine right and wrong by establishing an objectively defensible logical framework for decision-making.

So if the majority of people in a nation vote for something, it is by definition the moral consensus of those voters, regardless of whether it is considered moral by a sub-group of that nation (such as a religious right-wing subset). The explanation for the difference in opinion is simply whether the sub-group is defining as intrinsically worthless the opinions of all those not in their local tribal clique. Such attitudes are common, but obviously dismissible as pure arrogance.

It should be noted that there have been plenty of cases where societies have acted morally but not ethically (eg. the election of Hitler) and cases where leaders have acted ethically but not morally (a government making a logically necessary but unpopular decision). Neither morality nor ethics is therefore infallible, and the concept of a republic and the structure of our government were invented specifically to take input from both ethical and moral considerations.

Now, since it is entirely obvious that libertarianism is not considered moral for this nation as a whole, if you wish to assert that libertarian principles are ethical though not moral you must first explain and justify a valid and logically self-consistent ethical framework, that defines what may be considered "good" and "bad" for society as a whole. This is precisely what thinkers like Ayn Rand have attempted, but failed ridiculously at doing. I have yet to see an attempt that is not more full of holes than a colander, and Rand's is so patently absurd that it doesn't withstand even a first glance.

But by all means, I'd love to see another attempt. It will be fun.

I think you are confusing terms. While it is cute that your source is Wikipedia, and further it is rather adorable that you only accept the third of the three terms in the list while ignoring the rest (personal or cultural values and codes of conduct), if you want to deal only with what the people perceive then I suppose that can be done. You also seem quite careless with other terms, so let us be very clear if we are going to try to argue semantics in this pit.

While I cannot speak for other nations, it seems that the majority of the people in the United States have never once voted for any one candidate for office. You made the mistake which politicians seem to live in--you conflated people with voters. In fact, you contradicted yourself in the sentence I highlighted. People are not votes, and people are not merely voters. If you think that the actions of President Obama or that his election are moral because the majority of people in this country voted for him, then you are objectively wrong. Only 23% of the people in this country voted for him in 2008, and even fewer elected him in 2012. Even discounting children and teenagers, the point still stands.

Perhaps I am not getting what you said. Perhaps you are claiming that only voters are a part of society, and the 50% or so of people who live in this country who cannot or will not vote should not be considered to be a part of society? It would seem I have your permission to discount that possibility as pure arrogance.

While I am all for republicanism in general, I prefer the logical arguments in favor of it, as opposed to your apparent perception. Evidently you drink the rah-rah Kool aid and believe in the "consent of the governed" and that the "majority rules" and all that. If you cannot or will not see how distorted that view of our current "social contract" is, but want to expand your horizons, I would recommend watching or reading a lot more diversity in opinion. At the very least you can look at the census data and conclude that small minorities actually create law.

[Ghent12]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

In our community our minimum wage is $10.66 an hour. Folks like you in our community railed against it several years ago but we've found a way to make it work. Marginal businesses have gone away and better ones have taken their place. McDonalds pays their workers $10.66 and hour and magically they still turn a profit. I donate my time to a small non-profit here and we run it well enough to pay our kids $10.66 an hour. Some of them are 15. As adults we have a responsibility to run our business well enough to pay our employees a good wage. You live in a community where the adults would be lazy and choose to use children and pay them $6 an hour. I think you should be ashamed.



Walmart pays everyone here our minimum wage and apparently they're doing fine, they just opened up a Super Center. The "cause and effect" is that people paid well enough to buy what they need to live do just that, spend their money and support other businesses.

Here's the bottom line: Fascists hate humanity. I can't explain it. They expect people to work for nothing or close to nothing. They would let their kids do it and support the fascists enslaving them. I don't know how you live with yourself and your ideas but apparently you're fine being intellectually lazy and expect your kids to accept the world of near slavery you envision for them. Luckily for them, most of us respect them and will work harder to build businesses strong enough to pay them a decent wage.

I am a bit confused on your message. Are you saying your community is full of fascists, but the current laws force them to pay more than they otherwise would?

Also it seems as if you are confused about my message. It should be obvious that Wal-Mart and McDonald's will be doing relatively well under higher minimum wages--minimum wages generally HELP large, profitable corporations in industries which use minimum wage labor. In fact, minimum wage laws help in proportion to how profitable a business is currently; they tend to act like a profit ratio booster. The reason is simple; the laws help to drive away the competition. Businesses which are not profitable are not sustainable. Increased labor costs across a whole industry will reduce the profit of all businesses in that industry. Those businesses which were barely sustainable before the increased labor costs can be made unprofitable and bankrupt as a result of the increased costs; and further, those firms which were contemplating entering the market are further deterred by the artificial increase in costs. All of this tends to serve the interests of the largest and most profitable businesses in those industries quite nicely.

[astonas]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

We have every right to elect representatives who make the law. And they have every right to legislate.

That explains the current law, but gives it no basis in moral legitimacy.

Sorry, Ghent12, but elections are in fact the ONLY way to claim a basis in moral legitimacy for a nation.

"morality" refers to personal or cultural values, codes of conduct or social mores. It does not connote objective claims of right or wrong, but only refers to that which is considered right or wrong.

(italics added by me)


Morality is therefore based on the consensus of a given group of people (for example, people who share a given religion, or live in a given nation) while ethics seeks to determine right and wrong by establishing an objectively defensible logical framework for decision-making.

So if the majority of people in a nation vote for something, it is by definition the moral consensus of those voters, regardless of whether it is considered moral by a sub-group of that nation (such as a religious right-wing subset). The explanation for the difference in opinion is simply whether the sub-group is defining as intrinsically worthless the opinions of all those not in their local tribal clique. Such attitudes are common, but obviously dismissible as pure arrogance.

It should be noted that there have been plenty of cases where societies have acted morally but not ethically (eg. the election of Hitler) and cases where leaders have acted ethically but not morally (a government making a logically necessary but unpopular decision). Neither morality nor ethics is therefore infallible, and the concept of a republic and the structure of our government were invented specifically to take input from both ethical and moral considerations.

Now, since it is entirely obvious that libertarianism is not considered moral for this nation as a whole, if you wish to assert that libertarian principles are ethical though not moral you must first explain and justify a valid and logically self-consistent ethical framework, that defines what may be considered "good" and "bad" for society as a whole. This is precisely what thinkers like Ayn Rand have attempted, but failed ridiculously at doing. I have yet to see an attempt that is not more full of holes than a colander, and Rand's is so patently absurd that it doesn't withstand even a first glance.

But by all means, I'd love to see another attempt. It will be fun.

[santafe2]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

Indeed, without a minimum wage everyone would be free to choose to work for any wage rate.

Or chose to starve. Ruanda in America. Luckily we're not there yet.

Your worries about the theoretical bottom for "this sort of system" are largely unfounded. The discussion about work conditions isn't a part of the conversation about minimum wages--that is a strawman brought forth in desperation by dcarrigg.

Thanks but I really don't need your condescending tone or for you to tell me how I've formed my ideas.

It might surprise you to learn that it is currently legal to work for $0 per hour. It's called an unpaid internship, and those who choose to accept such an employment contract work for compensation other than monetary wages--almost exclusively for the hopes of gaining relevant skills and networking in the industry they are doing the internship for. Why should they never be able to accept some amount of money per hour between $0 and the arbitrary minimum wage rate? It might also surprise you to learn that disabled people can be paid below the minimum wage. It probably won't surprise you to learn that there are already huge numbers of people already working well below the normal minimum wage in the food service industry.

It's not pretty but you have to appreciate it when a true fascist reveals their character. They revel in this ugly sea where some people, some very educated people, are forced to work for nothing. Where service folks work for almost nothing because they have the power to starve or work for what is offered.

On a personal note, I delved deep into this subject after my first child was born. As I was thinking of his future, I realized that one of the challenges he will face as he approaches adulthood will be employment. Still on a personal note, I get extremely angry that it is and will likely remain illegal for my son to choose to work for, let's say, $6 an hour at age 15. Do the proponents of the minimum wage not see what they are doing?

In our community our minimum wage is $10.66 an hour. Folks like you in our community railed against it several years ago but we've found a way to make it work. Marginal businesses have gone away and better ones have taken their place. McDonalds pays their workers $10.66 and hour and magically they still turn a profit. I donate my time to a small non-profit here and we run it well enough to pay our kids $10.66 an hour. Some of them are 15. As adults we have a responsibility to run our business well enough to pay our employees a good wage. You live in a community where the adults would be lazy and choose to use children and pay them $6 an hour. I think you should be ashamed.

Finally I will note the intense irony that the people supporting the minimum wage are actually doing the bidding of Wal-Mart, McDonald's, and other large corporations. If you understand cause and effect, you will know what I am speaking of.

Walmart pays everyone here our minimum wage and apparently they're doing fine, they just opened up a Super Center. The "cause and effect" is that people paid well enough to buy what they need to live do just that, spend their money and support other businesses.

Here's the bottom line: Fascists hate humanity. I can't explain it. They expect people to work for nothing or close to nothing. They would let their kids do it and support the fascists enslaving them. I don't know how you live with yourself and your ideas but apparently you're fine being intellectually lazy and expect your kids to accept the world of near slavery you envision for them. Luckily for them, most of us respect them and will work harder to build businesses strong enough to pay them a decent wage.

[Thailandnotes]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

Washington Post...


Beginning in the 1980’s, the private sector began an effort that continues to this day to reduce the proportion of the cost of selling goods and services attributed to labor. This takes many forms, including limiting wage growth, outsourcing, union busting, sending jobs overseas, transferring jobs to right-to-work states, increasing the ratio of part-time to full-time employees, not translating workplace productivity gains into wage increases, shifting more health care costs to employees, ending defined benefit pensions, reducing employer contributions to defined contribution pensions and switching to once-a-year, lump sum contributions, classifying employees as independent contractors to avoid paying benefits and workingman’s compensation contributions, increasing the number of unpaid internships, hiring new workers through temp agencies, requiring employees to sign non-compete agreements, and layoffs, not only during recessions, but also after mergers and acquisitions. Non-cyclical layoffs have become a permanent feature of the new economy.

[dcarrigg]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

Oh, man, Ghent. If you're going to drop the level of conversation to writing out a laundry list of logical fallacies like this is some high school debate class instead of a discussion forum, while claiming anyone who disagrees with you is desperate, then I'm going to have a little fun with it!

______________________________________________

All hail libertarians, Kings of Logic! Woe is me, for I didn't pledge my undying allegiance to Von Mises and take His Holy Word to be my Gospel in rejecting the scientific method and empirical studies in favor of His True and Holy word through Praxeology, Amen!

For as Disciple Ghent points out, it is only through my desperation I disagree with him! No logic could ever disagree with Libertarianism! Oh, Market, Let me give up my heretical ways and embrace Libertarianism with all my heart!

For we knoweth that Government is the Devil and Markets art thine Lord! In Rothbard's name! Amen!

And woe be to him who doesn't praise all axiomatic deduction from first principles! Let him forgo his blasphemy and turn towards all that is holy - and let him take Lew Rockwell into his heart and know that thine Markets are LORD! For on the first day His Lord Holiness on high the good Baron Von Mises hath told us that Humans Act. And from there we know the Truth!

All pragmatic blasphemers who point to unholy academic studies in which the minimum wage is found to have near zero disemployment effects be Heretics! They stand with the Devil Government, who must be purged from the Holy Land! They have no logical argument to stand on because a posteriori scientific knowledge is not Real Knowledge! History matters not! Courts matter not! Rule of law is rule by the Devil! The wisdom of the crowds matters not! Democracy is meaningless! Let them eat cake! The Republic is the One True Satan! The only real knowledge was handed down to us by Von Mises in Human Action and through his holy profit Rothbard and the good deeds of his spirit Rockwell!

For we must shun the non-believers in the academy! They do not pay homage or fall to their knees for the holy books of Libertarianism! They do not call themselves Austrian, like all holy True Believers do! They believe in mainstream economics supported by DATA! And their views are so illogical, they actually UPDATE them based on new data when it comes out!

Oh, woe be to the heretics who do not regurgitate his holy word and dismiss the Devil's data. For we all know the word statistics comes from STATE, that unholiest of devils, and the Union, whose name must not be spoken for it lets evil into our hearts, is merely tricking the non-believers with mathematics and a supposed science, which we know to be untrue thanks to our ONE TRUE AUSTRIAN CANNON!

May we all tithe to the one LOGICAL TRUTH, and may Hayek's grace rain down upon the ONE TRUE AND HOLY LOGICAL MARKET and may we dismiss all non-believers and let them know that THEY HAVE NO LOGIC IN THEIR HEARTS!

And we shall exercise the Devil from the non-believers by saying the TRUE AND HOLY WORDS:

AD HOMINEM!

STRAW MAN!

APPEAL TO AUTHORITY!

For we shall never consider what thoughts the heretics may write or speak at face value, but we shall ourselves accuse them of the FALLACY of worshiping EVIL and move on to end all conversations with the nonbelievers!

SHOUT IT AGAIN!

AD HOMINEM!

POST HOC ERGO PROPTER HOC!

BANDWAGON!

Let the unbelievers be sure that THERE IS NO LOGIC BUT THROUGH LIBERTARIANISM! Ignore their shouts back of ARGUMENTUM AD LOGICAM and continue to assert the ONE TRUE AND HOLY LOGIC HANDED DOWN FROM MARKET ON HIGH THROUGH HIS HOLY PROFITS!!!!!

In the name of Mammon, Rand, and Rothbard!

AMEN!

[Ghent12]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

We have every right to elect representatives who make the law. And they have every right to legislate.

The Supreme Court already settled this matter in regard to the minimum wage and "freedom" to contract for less in West Coast Hotel v. Parish.

That explains the current law, but gives it no basis in moral legitimacy. The Supreme Court has upheld numerous legal standards of conduct which we would rightfully revolt if they existed today. The Supreme Court doesn't "settle" matters, it simply removes rights from people or allows people to exercise their rights, depending on the whim of the justices--justices we cannot elect, but justices who nonetheless "make" the law what it is. Would you support the "every right [of legislators] to legislate" no matter what they did? Have you no values or ethical philosophy of your own?

The argument you are using is an appeal to authority logical fallacy, combined later with a bandwagon logical fallacy. I mean no offense when I say that there is no logic reasoning behind your contentions.

Although I'd question what kind of "freedom" it is to forcefully subject people to the will of their employers in company towns or on company boats paid in scrip.

You and a few other fringe folks may want to go back to the bad old Lochner Era days from the turn of the 20th century full of child labor and long, barely compensated work in dangerous conditions, no recourse for employees, and bloody battles between workers and Pinkertons.

But the rest of America clearly doesn't agree.

And God Bless the Republic of the United States of America for giving her people a voice in the matter, and not simply subjecting them as servants to the unbridled will of their employers.

Work environments are clearly better today than 100 years ago.

And I think that probably anybody who reads history or who has bothered to have long talks with their grandfather while he was alive thinks likewise.

Thanks for the concession via strawmen arguments and ad hominem. If you wanted to concede this, you could have just said, "I have no logical reason to support minimum wage laws, I just think they are right." That would have been more honorable.

I happened to be watching "The Roosevelts" tonight and Ken Burns used this image from tenement life in NYC. I think it makes the point well. If a person has the "right" to work at $5 an hour, then logically they have the right to work for $4 or $2 and hour. They have the right to work in conditions we would recognize as slavery. The theoretical bottom for this sort of system is starvation or another such end.

Indeed, without a minimum wage everyone would be free to choose to work for any wage rate. Your worries about the theoretical bottom for "this sort of system" are largely unfounded. The discussion about work conditions isn't a part of the conversation about minimum wages--that is a strawman brought forth in desperation by dcarrigg.

It might surprise you to learn that it is currently legal to work for $0 per hour. It's called an unpaid internship, and those who choose to accept such an employment contract work for compensation other than monetary wages--almost exclusively for the hopes of gaining relevant skills and networking in the industry they are doing the internship for. Why should they never be able to accept some amount of money per hour between $0 and the arbitrary minimum wage rate? It might also surprise you to learn that disabled people can be paid below the minimum wage. It probably won't surprise you to learn that there are already huge numbers of people already working well below the normal minimum wage in the food service industry. Did you know that if the minimum wage was raised to $10.10 an hour three years ago, you would have no idea what jobs might exist at $7.25 an hour today?

I sometimes wonder if the supporters of minimum wage laws actually think about the consequences of the law. There is no moral reason, which has been articulated in this thread, to make it illegal to work until you can get paid some arbitrarily high amount of money--supporting the minimum wage is like saying it should be a law that people cannot buy food unless they buy at least 800 calories per purchase, or they cannot rent an apartment or buy a house unless it has at least 900 square feet per person. What is the actual moral basis for the minimum wage law? That it helps workers? Then how come every proponent of the first implementation of a minimum wage law argues that the minimum wage is necessary to protect certain types of workers from other types of workers?

On a personal note, I delved deep into this subject after my first child was born. As I was thinking of his future, I realized that one of the challenges he will face as he approaches adulthood will be employment. Still on a personal note, I get extremely angry that it is and will likely remain illegal for my son to choose to work for, let's say, $6 an hour at age 15. Do the proponents of the minimum wage not see what they are doing?

Finally I will note the intense irony that the people supporting the minimum wage are actually doing the bidding of Wal-Mart, McDonald's, and other large corporations. If you understand cause and effect, you will know what I am speaking of. Proponents say that the large corporations can afford to pay their workers more, but they never seem to mention those businesses which cannot afford it. In this sense, the minimum wage law is like licensing and Obamacare and all of the other burdensome regulations placed on businesses which can be annoying to some businesses and crippling to other ones. This isn't as ironic as those who earn $8 an hour and picket for a $15 an hour minimum wage, because it takes a special type of person to want to make their current job illegal.

[flintlock]

Re: In the beginning!

Yet another new low on Itulip.com open forums. The decent into PC mind control. Ghent didn't write anything racist. The mere mention of race provokes such a knee jerk reaction these days. At worst it showed a reluctance to worship at the alter of political correctness. Blasphemy! Bow down and submit!

Substitute any word you want for "plantation" but both parties are doing their best to put Latinos in the same "place". Poor, poorly educated, and dependent on govt. Can't bring them in fast enough. Both sides think they can buy votes by circumventing the constitution. So far Democrats are doing a better job at this but I have faith the Republicans will make a comeback.
Talk about racism! The idea that Latinos don't care about things like law and order. That they need the US to "rescue" them, because only here can they make a better life. If people really gave a damn they'd advocate sending military aid to finance revolution in these countries, so they could actually improve their own lot and not rely on table scraps from their gracious "superiors". But then who would spread the mulch, or clean all the Mac-Mansions? God forbid mediocre yuppies might no longer be able to live above their means and pretend they are rich by having "servants" like they are some 18th century Lord. Such a lot of condescending drivel.

[lakedaemonian]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

While I think the minimum wage should be higher, an interesting issue with it in 2014 is that the median household income for families in the US has fallen 6.6% since 2000 and the minimum wage has increased over 40% during the same period, ($5.15-$7.25). Since the percentage of workers making minimum wage is only 2.6%, (all hourly and salary workers), we should probably be much more concerned with median household income if we're going to pull out of this.

I assume that's in nominal dollars?

So what's it in real dollars/purchasing power?

How can government effectively respond with policies to promote an increase in real median income instead of getting stuck in the pigpen mud slinging over minimum wage?

[santafe2]

Re: Greenspan the Un-Rand

While I think the minimum wage should be higher, an interesting issue with it in 2014 is that the median household income for families in the US has fallen 6.6% since 2000 and the minimum wage has increased over 40% during the same period, ($5.15-$7.25). Since the percentage of workers making minimum wage is only 2.6%, (all hourly and salary workers), we should probably be much more concerned with median household income if we're going to pull out of this.