The Biden Stimulus Bill

[Knight In TN]

You’re the king of cherry picking with gems like that one. The real question is: is increasing the minimum wage important to the overall health of our economy? Yes or no.

No. And you still won’t answer the question. I’ll take your avoidance as acknowledgment that this will result in significant numbers of low wage workers being out of the workforce altogether.

There are very simple economic principles that are ignored here. The first being that demand for everything goes down as the price for it goes up. When you raise they price of low level labor, demand will go down. When you raise the price of products and services produced by low level labor, demand for them will go down.

Lower demand and productivity is not a good effect in any economic system. Not sure how it can be seen any other way.

 

[Nautiknight]

I still come back to this Shuck, as a small business owner who hires mainly high school kids and college kids ,both truly not needing a 40 hour a week livable wage , what happens to their jobs?

You discount the importance of getting your first job in high school. You discount the college kid needing a job paying $10 or $12 an hour right now . Then you ignore the real costs it is to small busineses in the retail, food and tourism trade to simply raise their labor costs. You further ignore that my payroll taxes which are a percentage of my labor costs are also going to escalate.

So, where do I get this magical money to pay for the increased labor cost abs increases in federal payroll taxes? how do I support my business and my family? You don't get a job from a poor person but between taxes , regulations and forced wages you can take a middle I come small business owner and make them a poor person pretty quickly.

What gets me is this. If you and your progressive minded comrade really cared about the poor you would advocate for killing the income tax . you would advocate for a fair tax by taxing goods and services , and stop taking 14% of their check every week or two weeks . if I didn't have to pay payroll taxes all my employees would get 100% of their check now. I would get a 14% savings and I would likely pay my crew more money. The payroll tax is a job killer for small businesses.

I will say this. I am an independent. I lean libertarian. I have learned how deeply embedded both parties are too big global corporate interests. The fact is $15 an hour for the big giant corporations is nothing. The more I think about it the more I realize they just want to destroy small busineses. These big companies from retail to Facebook are not the friends of the middle of class and they are not the friends in our towns.

Progressives who run the democrat party are not the friends to the middle class or small business. They are wealthy elites sucking up to china and using their power to buy votes promising free everything to the low information voter who either is too lazy to work for their dreams or just makes one bad choice after another in their lives and wants to blame everyone else for it, then they want everyone else to pay for it too.

I can't stop this $15 an hour because I have no voice in DC. If it happens I will figure it out. I will raise prices , lay people off, likely will no longer hire that high school kid looking for their first job and if none of that works , I will close up. Maybe you can come up to the mountains Shuck and help me auction off my business should that day come?

You know what I prefer though, you come up to the mountains and shop in my stores or stay in my vacation homes and put your money where your policies are. Support small businesses. Support working people and stop shopping on Amazon and going to Starbucks . lol.

You like to talk about theory ,but I live in the real world as small business owner. The government is not our friend. it only extracts wealth ,creates burdens and never accepts any responsibility for when it screws up and it screws up a lot.

 

[DaShuckster]

Less than 1% of US workers make minimum wage, and it's been going down steadily since 1980. That means wages have already been increasing without raising the minimum wage.

Hmmmm....I wonder what THAT means, Crazy?

 

[DaShuckster]

You like to talk about theory ,but I live in the real world as small business owner.

I've 'been there and done that' for the majority of my working life so please spare me the 'you talk theory' shit.

I had to adjust my business 'game plan' on a somewhat regular cycle over the years due to minimum wage - and yes, it meant that I had to make adjustments by cutting back on the number of my PT employees. It also meant that, in some cases, I needed to reconsider the salaries of some of my other employees given the MW increase. Last I checked, that's called being an owner/manager and it's been part and parcel of 'doing business' ever since the minimum wage was first created in our Country (long before any of us were born.)

The very notion that an increase in the minimum wage is going to 'destroy' small businesses has been disproven over and over again over the course of the minimum wage's existence. Any example you might try to throw my way is an example of a business that was already failing for a whole bunch of other reasons.

 

[Knight In TN]

Hmmmm....I wonder what THAT means, Crazy?

It means wages increase on their own because of competition for labor in the market.

 

[DaShuckster]

It means wages increase on their own because of competition for labor in the market.

Then why is raising it -- like this nation has done since the late 1930s -- cause for such hand-wringing?

 

[Nautiknight]

Here is another unintended consequence of $15 an hour. My wife makes $14 an hour plus benefits as a high school teaching assistant for special needs kids. Minimum wage in NC is $7.25. So keys knock that bad boy up to $15. I am guessing the part time bus drivers making $14 and the cafeteria workers making $14 plus benefits and the teaching assistants will want more than "minimum wage" entry level pay to continue to do their jobs. The school district will have to pony up more money for all these jobs then the teachers will want more too because they need to make more than the cafeteria lady starting out ,right? Where will all that money come from? local property taxes are going to go up on residential and businesses . In short artificially raising this wage will have a ripple or at least a decent wave of costs increases across the board. The end result all that buying power and prosperity will be eroded quickly when taxes go up, rents go up to pay for property taxes, food costs go up , it's all going up. It's a fallacy that $15 will be a livable wage because everything is going to costs more.

 

[Knight In TN]

Then why is raising it -- like this nation has done since the late 1930s -- cause for such hand-wringing?

Because the primary effect will be decreased employment of people with already low incomes, disproportionately harming small businesses, and raising the prices on survival items like food.

I can keep explaining this to you but apparently you’re never going to understand.

 

[Crazyhole]

Hmmmm....I wonder what THAT means, Crazy?

It means a couple of things: 1, there are fewer minimum wage jobs to be had for unskilled workers and 2, there is inherent inflationary pressure in the labor market already.

Someone else already said it here, but raising the minimum wage denies an unskilled worker the opportunity to gain employment and learns skills and work ethic.

FWIW, I've never paid an employee minimum wage. I always felt like offering a higher wage would get me higher quality candidates to choose from. I've never given anyone a raise for longevity, which has upset a few employees but I've given a lot of raises out for performance. IMO, that's the way things should work.

 

[Nautiknight]

You’re the king of cherry picking with gems like that one. The real question is: is increasing the minimum wage important to the overall health of our economy? Yes or no.

to answer this ...it's no.

 

[Nautiknight]

you know what I find interesting here ? Some of us run a business. We know what it takes , we know how to rub a few pennies together to make more pennies. Guys like Shuck live in a different world and operate in theory on a macro level. In grad school I had to take macro economics. They see some altruistic benefit to the worker only . They ignore the damage it will have especially on guys like me. They are collective thinkers ,the collective wins while the individual loses.

Shuck you make a natural law kind of argument. As a biologist trained by UCF the idea of biodiversity is the individual species is important in the make up of a community. Individuals drive the system with their DNA and how they interact within the ecosystem. We hear the argument of climate change and how species will be lost . You need to look at your community the same way. The individual business owner are the producers in the urban human ecosystem. We provide a means to function. If you lose enough of us your community looks like Bithlo or Mims. If you want a healthy economy you want diversity in goods and services from big and small. $15 an hour seems like a good thing to the worker in the short run but it will cause the producers to have less jobs available . It may cause some to go out of business.

You have business owners telling you this. We are not academic theoriest or politicians ,who don't know jack crap ,but we are your friends and neighbors saying, if you do this ,here are the consequences of this action. The weird wtiststed irony is this. We are the folks being ignored . it's the forgotten man thing here and at its very core , if you want to know why people like Trump, here it is. We are tired of being ignored,being told to sit down and shut up, we know better. You have folks here telling you if X happens then here is Y reaction . Yet we are discounted. I am not here to change how you vote . I am here to genuinely educate you on the negative impacts of this public policy . I am here to tell you that if you only want national brands in your town and you want to kill the entrepreneurial spirit , go ahead mandate these ridiculous wages. The unintended consequences to me are greater than $15 hour perceived benefit .

 

[Crazyhole]

you know what I find interesting here ? Some of us run a business. We know what it takes , we know how to rub a few pennies together to make more pennies. Guys like Shuck live in a different world and operate in theory on a macro level. In grad school I had to take macro economics. They see some altruistic benefit to the worker only . They ignore the damage it will have especially on guys like me. They are collective thinkers ,the collective wins while the individual loses.

Shuck you make a natural law kind of argument. As a biologist trained by UCF the idea of biodiversity is the individual species is important in the make up of a community. Individuals drive the system with their DNA and how they interact within the ecosystem. We hear the argument of climate change and how species will be lost . You need to look at your community the same way. The individual business owner are the producers in the urban human ecosystem. We provide a means to function. If you lose enough of us your community looks like Bithlo or Mims. If you want a healthy economy you want diversity in goods and services from big and small. $15 an hour seems like a good thing to the worker in the short run but it will cause the producers to have less jobs available . It may cause some to go out of business.

You have business owners telling you this. We are not academic theoriest or politicians ,who don't know jack crap ,but we are your friends and neighbors saying, if you do this ,here are the consequences of this action. The weird wtiststed irony is this. We are the folks being ignored . it's the forgotten man thing here and at its very core , if you want to know why people like Trump, here it is. We are tired of being ignored,being told to sit down and shut up, we know better. You have folks here telling you if X happens then here is Y reaction . Yet we are discounted. I am not here to change how you vote . I am here to genuinely educate you on the negative impacts of this public policy . I am here to tell you that if you only want national brands in your town and you want to kill the entrepreneurial spirit , go ahead mandate these ridiculous wages. The unintended consequences to me are greater than $15 hour perceived benefit .

Interesting metaphor. I'm sure the point will be lost on some, but it really does work.

 

[DaShuckster]

It means wages increase on their own because of competition for labor in the market.

Which is why we’re talking about a MINIMUM wage. Today’s minimum wage hasn’t been updated in 12 years and has lost 40% of is buying power from those ‘good ole days’ when you guys all opine that the standard was ‘more reasonable.’

The federal law was never meant to crucify small businesses, it was solely intended — and is STILL solely intended — to insure that employers aren’t allowed to take advantage of the lowest working class, be that your high school kid or some poor working Mom with three kids to feed.

 

[Nautiknight]

Which is why we’re talking about a MINIMUM wage. Today’s minimum wage hasn’t been updated in 12 years and has lost 40% of is buying power from those ‘good ole days’ when you guys all opine that the standard was ‘more reasonable.’

The federal law was never meant to crucify small businesses, it was solely intended — and is STILL solely intended — to insure that employers aren’t allowed to take advantage of the lowest working class, be that your high school kid or some poor working Mom with three kids to feed.

Shuck, none of my employees make minimum wage. I have an autistic young man who by all accounts only wants to work 10 hours a week. He helps me bag chocolate,make simple chocolates and label things. I pay him $9.50 an hour. My average wage is $11 an hour. My target employees are part time kids, summer job types and such. My full time -ish people make around $13 an hour not including tips as baristas. The minimum wage is $7.25. By keeping the wage low I can offer more than minimum wage and attract a better quality part time person. It's competition for labor that should drive wages up. When you have a shortage of labor , labor naturally commnds more money. A shortage of labor occurs in a strong economy. We had that prior to Covid . we had the best job market in a decade and as a result wages organiically increased. The government can't wave a magic wand and just artificially set wages and if they do we can not expect it to actually benefit anybody especially small businesses.

 

[DaShuckster]

Shuck, none of my employees make minimum wage. I have an autistic young man who by all accounts only wants to work 10 hours a week. He helps me bag chocolate,make simple chocolates and label things. I pay him $9.50 an hour. My average wage is $11 an hour. My target employees are part time kids, summer job types and such. My full time -ish people make around $13 an hour not including tips as baristas.

By keeping the wage low I can offer more than minimum wage and attract a better quality part time person. It's competition for labor that should drive wages up.

Good for you - and I wholeheartedly agree with your philosophy and employed it myself.

The government can't wave a magic wand and just artificially set wages and if they do we can not expect it to actually benefit anybody especially small businesses.

They are not 'artificially' SETTING wages. They are protecting low wage earners from being exploited. Does that mean you might have to reconsider some of your salaries? Yeah. That's part of what being a wise owner/manager means.

 

[Nautiknight]

Good for you - and I wholeheartedly agree with your philosophy and employed it myself.

They are not 'artificially' SETTING wages. They are protecting low wage earners from being exploited. Does that mean you might have to reconsider some of your salaries? Yeah. That's part of what being a wise owner/manager means.

I guess my real point is this. Low skilled jobs exist in the service industry. There is nobody in the downtown Waynesville area paying anyone $7.25. The competition for labor in a voluntary job market is driving labor prices up without any exploitation of workers. I am not saying some businesses don't pay minimum wage , but let's be honest if you are seeking employment and you are taking a minimum wage job , it's not the wage or the job that is the issue here.

small businesses need part time help and that's just how it Is. I am afraid by setting the wage to $15 the ability to have part time help will be impacted. I have said it before ,at $15 an hour minimum wage I will be forced to pay $17,$18 or maybe $19 to keep some of my best crew. Which means that $4.50 or $5.00 medium latte will have to be around $9 or $10 .

I have said this before too as well. Everyone wants a union wage but they only want to pay walmart prices. I will gladly pay my crew that money but in return you and all my other customers need to gladly pay $9.00 for latter.

 

[Knight In TN]

Which is why we’re talking about a MINIMUM wage. Today’s minimum wage hasn’t been updated in 12 years and has lost 40% of is buying power from those ‘good ole days’ when you guys all opine that the standard was ‘more reasonable.’

The federal law was never meant to crucify small businesses, it was solely intended — and is STILL solely intended — to insure that employers aren’t allowed to take advantage of the lowest working class, be that your high school kid or some poor working Mom with three kids to feed.

I. Don’t. Give. A. Fück. What. The. Law. Is. Intended. To. Do.

The ONLY thing that matters is what the law ACTUALLY does.

Anyone who doesn’t add $15 per hour of value to their company will lose their job, unless the company is mismanaged.

 

[Knight In TN]

But thanks for explaining to us that the cost of everything goes up...except, apparently, minimum wage jobs.

Maybe consider that without a minimum wage the number of jobs would expand to include stuff that businesses aren’t willing to pay what the minimum wage is.

Let’s say someone performing a very simple task on a production line can improve output by 20 items per day. If the gross profit on those 20 additional items is worth $80, it makes sense to hire someone who is willing to do that work for less than $80. Maybe that person is just entering the workforce. Maybe they have special needs or some sort of disability that limits what they can do. For whatever reason, they’re ok with making $7.50.

It’s a win-win-win scenario:
The worker makes their $60.
The business makes their additional $20.
The economy benefits from the additional 20 items available.

BUT... if minimum wage dictates that the price of that labor HAS TO BE $120, then the business simply doesn’t employ that person. They take the hit to production because it’s not profitable, and everyone loses.

Lose-lose-lose:
The worker does not get $60.
The business does not get $20.
The economy does not get 20 additional units of product.

 

[Knight_Classes_begin_7pm]

One party cares about struggling Americans. The other has people screaming into microphones at CPAC among friends that were also at a white nationalist conference this weekend and not doing their job.

View embedded media

It really is Sad. Just amazing!

 

[Knight_Classes_begin_7pm]

Those are very valid questions. Back in the 'good ole days' the two-sides in Congress would have worked together to compromise on a bill that would have addressed the problem facing the country with neither side getting what they wanted -- an approach that has served this country well over the years.

But nowadays the so-called 'Conservatives' in Congress would rather take their ball and go home than actually do their jobs. I have absolutely no doubt that the bill that's going to be passed to help people has a whole bunch of pork in it. But I also have no doubt that if McConnell was still Majority Leader in the Senate, the Republican alternative was no bill at all.

It's like the retard-plicans only care about the 1%

 

[Knight_Classes_begin_7pm]

It means wages increase on their own because of competition for labor in the market.

WRONG.....how do you not see that wages have been suppressed. Trickle down does not work. It's proven. It's the fleecing of America by especially large corporations. Disney etc.

 

[Knight_Classes_begin_7pm]

to answer this ...it's no.

WRONG...that's why we're subsidizing.

 

[Knight In TN]

WRONG.....how do you not see that wages have been suppressed. Trickle down does not work. It's proven. It's the fleecing of America by especially large corporations. Disney etc.

What wages have been suppressed, and by whom?

 

[DaShuckster]

I guess my real point is this. Low skilled jobs exist in the service industry. There is nobody in the downtown Waynesville area paying anyone $7.25. The competition for labor in a voluntary job market is driving labor prices up without any exploitation of workers.

This is a GOOD thing for the Waynesville area. Unfortunately, that is not the case everywhere. As Crazyhole already pointed out, the vast majority of workers make above the minimum wage -- as it should be.

small businesses need part time help and that's just how it Is. I am afraid by setting the wage to $15 the ability to have part time help will be impacted.

For the sake of an accurate discussion here, even if a raise in the minimum wage happened today (which is NOT happening, and likely not to happen anytime soon), the bill indexes it up to $15.00 over the course of a number of years. Everybody's been talking like $15 an hour is the starting point, which it's not.

Personally, I'd like to see a minimum wage that was varied by state (hell, maybe even by regions of a state) based on the cost of living. As we all know, a $100,000 salary means dramatically different things based on whether you're living in New York City or Fargo, North Dakota. I'd also like to see the minimum wage amount set up like social security increases, meaning it goes up automatically without all this political BS.

 

[sk8knight]

This is a GOOD thing for the Waynesville area. Unfortunately, that is not the case everywhere. As Crazyhole already pointed out, the vast majority of workers make above the minimum wage -- as it should be.
For the sake of an accurate discussion here, even if a raise in the minimum wage happened today (which is NOT happening, and likely not to happen anytime soon), the bill indexes it up to $15.00 over the course of a number of years. Everybody's been talking like $15 an hour is the starting point, which it's not.

Personally, I'd like to see a minimum wage that was varied by state (hell, maybe even by regions of a state) based on the cost of living. As we all know, a $100,000 salary means dramatically different things based on whether you're living in New York City or Fargo, North Dakota. I'd also like to see the minimum wage amount set up like social security increases, meaning it goes up automatically without all this political BS.

As Mr. All Hail the Great and Beneficent Federal Government, why is it not surprising that you have forgotten or don't know that states already set their own minimum wages and they are determined democratically by what their individual electorates will tolerate?

 

[DaShuckster]

As Mr. All Hail the Great and Beneficent Federal Government, why is it not surprising that you have forgotten or don't know that states already set their own minimum wages and they are determined democratically by what their individual electorates will tolerate?

Oooooooh, 29 states have their own minimum wages laws on the books!!! Silly me, who needs the "Great and Beneficent Federal Government" to step in for the poor people in those other 21 states, right?

I swear back in 1964, we'd have had people upset THOSE FEDS were stepping in with their heavy-handed Civil Rights Act because "states already have anti-segregation laws determined by what their individual electorates will tolerate."

 

[Knight In TN]

Oooooooh, 29 states have their own minimum wages laws on the books!!! Silly me, who needs the "Great and Beneficent Federal Government" to step in for the poor people in those other 21 states, right?

I swear back in 1964, we'd have had people upset THOSE FEDS were stepping in with their heavy-handed Civil Rights Act because "states already have anti-segregation laws determined by what their individual electorates will tolerate."

CRA rectified and overrode unconstitutional segregationist laws. Great example of government acting in its only legitimate mission: to protect the freedoms of its citizens.

But keep cheerleading a more and more powerful federal government. A government powerful enough to give you everything you want is also powerful enough to take everything you have.

 

[DaShuckster]

But keep cheerleading a more and more powerful federal government. A government powerful enough to give you everything you want is also powerful enough to take everything you have.

I'd love to understand how setting a WAGE FLOOR, a minimum wage standard, that most businesses have wages that are already well-above, makes the fed's 'more powerful?' It only impacts the businesses that are taking advantage of their employees.

You seem to think this is about the government setting some magical wage standard that everyone has to follow. Seems to me that most posters here already acknowledge that the free market is the one setting the standard, not the feds.

 

[knightraveler]

I got a genuine question . Why stop at $15 an hour ? Why not $25 an hour ? Why stop at $2,000 per person? Why not $5,000 or even $10,000? it's only the Fed and Treasury firing up their HP printers and printing money. I mean if we are going to be the Home of the Brave and Land of free stuff , might as well do it right .

Because $7.25 is not even near a livable wage and therefore business's that pay these wages are subsidized by the taxpayers to pay for welfare programs to make up the difference. There has not been an increase in the minimum wage in 11 years. It doesn't have to be $15.00 per hour but it should be at least $11.00 to compare to what is was through the sixties and seventies. And don't forget the proposed $15 minimum wage would be phased in over 5 years and not tied to the cost of living index. We would not have this problem if the minimum wage was tied to the cost of living index.

 

[goodknightfl]

Bottom line is the Bill is 3 to 500 billion of Covid relief and 1.5 to 1.7 Trillion bull crap.

 

[Crazyhole]

Bottom line is the Bill is 3 to 500 billion of Covid relief and 1.5 to 1.7 Trillion bull crap.

Democrats still believe in trickle down economics. If they didn't, they'd send out 10,000 dollar checks instead of 1,400 and let the money flow upwards. 1.9 trillion could go a long ways towards lifting people up.

 

[knightraveler]

Democrats still believe in trickle down economics. If they didn't, they'd send out 10,000 dollar checks instead of 1,400 and let the money flow upwards. 1.9 trillion could go a long ways towards lifting people up.

All bills have $$$ things some people don't agree with. The states are hurting financially because of covid as well as small business's which represents a big portion of the bill. Anyway, this site is suppose to be for UCF sports not politics.

 

[Crazyhole]

All bills have $$$ things some people don't agree with. The states are hurting financially because of covid as well as small business's which represents a big portion of the bill. Anyway, this site is suppose to be for UCF sports not politics.

? This board is all politics all the time. Has been for years.

 

[knightraveler]

? This board is all politics all the time. Has been for years.

I try to steer clear from it as much as possible because it can poison the well really quick. The last thing we need is to divide our alumni and fans.

 

[DaShuckster]

The last thing we need is to divide our alumni and fans.

Ironically, you could say the same thing about dividing all of us Americans. But it seems -- for some -- their tribal identity is more important than their love of country and what it stands for.

 

[Crazyhole]

Ironically, you could say the same thing about dividing all of us Americans. But it seems -- for some -- their tribal identity is more important than their love of country and what it stands for.

Kinda like how calling people deplorables and Neanderthals?

 

[DaShuckster]

Kinda like how calling people deplorables and Neanderthals?

Personally, I prefer calling them insurgents.

 

[Knight In TN]

? This board is all politics all the time. Has been for years.

Lol... good luck finding anything about UCF sports in the Water Cooler.

 

[goodknightfl]

Biden thinks UCF should pay their fair share to FAU and FIU because we make more.

Yet UF gets to keep theirs and get even more because they live in the swamp.

 

[Poolside Knight]