Comments on: How The Minimum Wage Hurts The Poor http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/blog/how-the-minimum-wage-hurts-the-poor/ Horror Writer and Political Thinker Sat, 17 Mar 2012 02:16:18 +0000 hourly 1 By: SaraC http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/blog/how-the-minimum-wage-hurts-the-poor/#comment-4217 SaraC Sat, 17 Mar 2012 02:16:18 +0000 http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/?p=29#comment-4217 I know from personal life experience that it is the larger corporations protecting their profit margins that keeps minimum wage down. It does not stop most small businesses from hiring. I've worked for 3 large chain corporations, 3 small privately owned businesses, and 1 non-profit. Can you guess which 3 jobs I had where I was actually paid minimum wage??? That's right - the 3 large corporations with the huge profit margins. One of those corporations even got hit with a class action suit for not paying proper over time to employees and threatening our jobs if we refused to stay at our regular rate. In the smaller companies, the one's people against an increased minimum wage argue would be put out of business if the wage was increased, always paid me near double the minimum wage. They are all still in business by the way. I actually made the highest wage at the non-profit which makes sense because they have to spend out every dollar that comes in. They aren't concerned with a profit margin to protect.    And Aaron no - if I were unemployed I would not want to make less than I could live off of rather than no paycheck at all. At that point after paying gas to get to and from and childcare to be at work I would be broker than not working. I know. I worked my way from welfare mom to college educated working single mom. I decided I needed to get my degree before I could get off of aid and work because financially living off of the minimum wage would have left me with less money at the end of the month.  I know from personal life experience that it is the larger corporations protecting their profit margins that keeps minimum wage down. It does not stop most small businesses from hiring. I’ve worked for 3 large chain corporations, 3 small privately owned businesses, and 1 non-profit. Can you guess which 3 jobs I had where I was actually paid minimum wage??? That’s right – the 3 large corporations with the huge profit margins. One of those corporations even got hit with a class action suit for not paying proper over time to employees and threatening our jobs if we refused to stay at our regular rate. In the smaller companies, the one’s people against an increased minimum wage argue would be put out of business if the wage was increased, always paid me near double the minimum wage. They are all still in business by the way. I actually made the highest wage at the non-profit which makes sense because they have to spend out every dollar that comes in. They aren’t concerned with a profit margin to protect. 
 
And Aaron no – if I were unemployed I would not want to make less than I could live off of rather than no paycheck at all. At that point after paying gas to get to and from and childcare to be at work I would be broker than not working. I know. I worked my way from welfare mom to college educated working single mom. I decided I needed to get my degree before I could get off of aid and work because financially living off of the minimum wage would have left me with less money at the end of the month. 

]]> By: Aaron Ross Powell http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/blog/how-the-minimum-wage-hurts-the-poor/#comment-20 Aaron Ross Powell Mon, 28 Jun 2010 23:08:10 +0000 http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/?p=29#comment-20 Nope. Not really. To begin with, a higher minimum wage would leave more people unable to find work. I'm sure an unemployed person would rather be making something, even if it's less than he'd like, than nothing.<br><br>But I think it's also wrong to think that, if CEOs were just paid less, workers would get more. Let's take Walmart as an example. A Google search indicates that they employ 1.8 million in the world, with 1.3 million of those being in the United States. According to the Wall Street Journal, in 2010, the CEO of Walmart received $19.2 million in compensation (which is different from, and higher than, salary, but we won't worry about that).<br><br>So let's say the CEO gave 100% of his $20 million salary to the 1.3 million Walmart workers. This is the most we could hope for if an increased worker wage had to come out of CEO pay, after all. What would that mean to the annual compensation of a Walmart worker? It'd mean that each would earn an extra $15. So if Michael T. Duke was paid NOTHING, each of his employees could get a single extra dinner at Applebees EACH YEAR. Nope. Not really. To begin with, a higher minimum wage would leave more people unable to find work. I'm sure an unemployed person would rather be making something, even if it's less than he'd like, than nothing.

But I think it's also wrong to think that, if CEOs were just paid less, workers would get more. Let's take Walmart as an example. A Google search indicates that they employ 1.8 million in the world, with 1.3 million of those being in the United States. According to the Wall Street Journal, in 2010, the CEO of Walmart received $19.2 million in compensation (which is different from, and higher than, salary, but we won't worry about that).

So let's say the CEO gave 100% of his $20 million salary to the 1.3 million Walmart workers. This is the most we could hope for if an increased worker wage had to come out of CEO pay, after all. What would that mean to the annual compensation of a Walmart worker? It'd mean that each would earn an extra $15. So if Michael T. Duke was paid NOTHING, each of his employees could get a single extra dinner at Applebees EACH YEAR.

]]> By: Aaron Ross Powell http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/blog/how-the-minimum-wage-hurts-the-poor/#comment-1895 Aaron Ross Powell Mon, 28 Jun 2010 23:08:00 +0000 http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/?p=29#comment-1895 Nope. Not really. To begin with, a higher minimum wage would leave more people unable to find work. I'm sure an unemployed person would rather be making something, even if it's less than he'd like, than nothing.But I think it's also wrong to think that, if CEOs were just paid less, workers would get more. Let's take Walmart as an example. A Google search indicates that they employ 1.8 million in the world, with 1.3 million of those being in the United States. According to the Wall Street Journal, in 2010, the CEO of Walmart received $19.2 million in compensation (which is different from, and higher than, salary, but we won't worry about that).So let's say the CEO gave 100% of his $20 million salary to the 1.3 million Walmart workers. This is the most we could hope for if an increased worker wage had to come out of CEO pay, after all. What would that mean to the annual compensation of a Walmart worker? It'd mean that each would earn an extra $15. So if Michael T. Duke was paid NOTHING, each of his employees could get a single extra dinner at Applebees EACH YEAR. Nope. Not really. To begin with, a higher minimum wage would leave more people unable to find work. I'm sure an unemployed person would rather be making something, even if it's less than he'd like, than nothing.But I think it's also wrong to think that, if CEOs were just paid less, workers would get more. Let's take Walmart as an example. A Google search indicates that they employ 1.8 million in the world, with 1.3 million of those being in the United States. According to the Wall Street Journal, in 2010, the CEO of Walmart received $19.2 million in compensation (which is different from, and higher than, salary, but we won't worry about that).So let's say the CEO gave 100% of his $20 million salary to the 1.3 million Walmart workers. This is the most we could hope for if an increased worker wage had to come out of CEO pay, after all. What would that mean to the annual compensation of a Walmart worker? It'd mean that each would earn an extra $15. So if Michael T. Duke was paid NOTHING, each of his employees could get a single extra dinner at Applebees EACH YEAR.

]]> By: Jay http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/blog/how-the-minimum-wage-hurts-the-poor/#comment-19 Jay Sat, 26 Jun 2010 03:47:43 +0000 http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/?p=29#comment-19 For your small grocery store, you say that cutting your pay as upper management wouldn't begin to make the increase in wages affordable. Would you say that's true of most American businesses, with CEO salaries and profit margins that are in the millions? Wouldn't a higher minimum wage help to shrink the gap between people making it and the rich? For your small grocery store, you say that cutting your pay as upper management wouldn't begin to make the increase in wages affordable. Would you say that's true of most American businesses, with CEO salaries and profit margins that are in the millions? Wouldn't a higher minimum wage help to shrink the gap between people making it and the rich?

]]> By: Jay http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/blog/how-the-minimum-wage-hurts-the-poor/#comment-1894 Jay Sat, 26 Jun 2010 03:47:00 +0000 http://www.aaronrosspowell.com/?p=29#comment-1894 For your small grocery store, you say that cutting your pay as upper management wouldn't begin to make the increase in wages affordable. Would you say that's true of most American businesses, with CEO salaries and profit margins that are in the millions? Wouldn't a higher minimum wage help to shrink the gap between people making it and the rich? For your small grocery store, you say that cutting your pay as upper management wouldn't begin to make the increase in wages affordable. Would you say that's true of most American businesses, with CEO salaries and profit margins that are in the millions? Wouldn't a higher minimum wage help to shrink the gap between people making it and the rich?

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