[prog2djent]

(Original post by Herr)

Except you forgotten that over 75% of all German workers are a member of a union and are normally covered by a collective bargaining agreement of some sort which essentially means they get a defacto minimum wage anyway.

Same goes for nearly every country in Europe that does not have minimum wage laws including Switzerland.

"Compared with other Western European countries, Trade unions play a rather minor role in Switzerland with only every fourth employee organized in a union or confederation"

And with germany, I think the main areas where unions are concentrated is in construction and manufacturing, something the private sector plays a big role in.

And IMO anyway, Unions > Minimum wage, we can both agree that public sector unions, and the public sector, is much weaker than ours and most of the traditional union-conflict ****holes ... Italy .. Greece, Spain.

Private sector unions aren't as artificial as the min wage law either.

Unions are pretty essentialy in the so-called "capitalist" system anyway.

[Annoying-Mouse]

(Original post by prog2djent)
And with germany, I think the main areas where unions are concentrated is in construction and manufacturing, something the private sector plays a big role in.
.

Nope, that's the place minimum wage applies. "except for construction workers, electrical workers, janitors, roofers, painters, and letter carriers"

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of...ges_by_country

[Annoying-Mouse]

(Original post by prog2djent)
Manufacturing?

No idea.

(Original post by Addzter)
That's not true. It would definitely be in the interest of big corporations that need to have large workforces in the UK in order to operate there (Tesco, McDonald's, Starbucks, Argos) to have minimum wage laws scrapped. If a supermarket, say, could get away with employing the workers who staff their checkouts £2 an hour instead of £6 then they'd do it.

No, they wouldn't because you can't live off on £2 hour = no one takes the job = rise in salary. A simple refutation of this argument would be to look at the salary of German's who work for McDonalds/Aldi etc considering there's no minimum wage there. Plus, there's something called collective bargaining. Unions would form and workers would pressure companies to raise their salary.

[prog2djent]

Manufacturing?

[muddywaters51]

What if Ive been out of work for a year, have no skills and Im on benefits and I WANT to take a job for 3 pounds an hour. The government stops me from doing this, they are restricting my freedom.

[chefdave]

(Original post by muddywaters51)
I do not think minimum wage laws should exist at all.

Agreed, but the trouble with most 'free marketiers' is that their overall ideology leaves workers vulnerable to the forces of big capital. I would support the removal of state protections for the little guy in conjunction with the removal of protections for the wealthy, lopsided reform though is unjust.

[Keckers]

(Original post by chefdave)
Agreed, but the trouble with most 'free marketiers' is that their overall ideology leaves workers vulnerable to the forces of big capital. I would support the removal of state protections for the little guy in conjunction with the removal of protections for the wealthy, lopsided reform though is unjust.

Free marketeers are massively against the sort of corporate welfare that benefits huge businesses and skews contract bargaining powers, that is basically the corner stone of the free market ideology.

[FDR]

From the NY Times (In 2009), but relevant to the discussion:

Would cutting the minimum wage raise employment?

It seems that more and more Serious People (and Fox News) are rallying around the idea that if Obama really wants to create jobs, he should cut the minimum wage.

So let me repeat a point I made a number of times back when the usual suspects were declaring that FDR prolonged the Depression by raising wages: the belief that lower wages would raise overall employment rests on a fallacy of composition. In reality, reducing wages would at best do nothing for employment; more likely it would actually be contractionary.

Here’s how the fallacy works: if some subset of the work force accepts lower wages, it can gain jobs. If workers in the widget industry take a pay cut, this will lead to lower prices of widgets relative to other things, so people will buy more widgets, hence more employment.

But if everyone takes a pay cut, that logic no longer applies. The only way a general cut in wages can increase employment is if it leads people to buy more across the board. And why should it do that?

Well, the textbook argument — illustrated in this little writeup — runs like this: lower wages lead to a lower overall price level. This increases the real money supply, and therefore liquidity. As people try to make use of their excess liquidity, interest rates go down, leading to an overall rise in demand.

Even in this case, it’s hard to see the point of cutting wages: you could achieve the same effect, much more easily, simply by having the Fed increase the money supply.

But what if we’re in a liquidity trap, with short-run interest rates at zero? Then the Fed can’t achieve anything by increasing the money supply; but by the same token, wage cuts do nothing to increase demand.

Wait, it gets worse. A falling price level raises the real value of debt. To the extent that debtors are more likely to cut spending in such a case than creditors are to increase it — which seems likely — the effect of the wage cuts will actually be a fall in demand.

And one more thing: to the extent that people expect further declines in wages and prices, this raises real interest rates, which is even more contractionary.

So proposing wage cuts as a solution to unemployment is a totally counterproductive idea. Not that I expect any of this discussion to make any impact on those proposing it.

[anarchism101]

(Original post by Classical Liberal)
Large corporations don't care, they just go abroad, they just offshore.

If they did care, you could be pretty dammed sure the minimum wage would not exist.

I'd say it's more about capital intensive and labour intensive businesses than large and small ones.

[chefdave]

(Original post by Keckers)
Free marketeers are massively against the sort of corporate welfare that benefits huge businesses and skews contract bargaining powers, that is basically the corner stone of the free market ideology.

Sorry, I should have been more specific. A significant proportion of free market libertarians support the idea of free markets in labour and capital but they're firmly wedded to the concept of a state backed cartel in land. By all means abolish the NMW but lets also address the more pressing problem of subsidies for the rich.

[Clare~Bear]

OP, if you're going to make such a stupid comment at least say why you think that.

Minimum wage stops people from being exploited by big companies who're after people desperate to work.

However I do think for the most menial of jobs £6.08/£6.19 (rom October) might be a bit too much.

[Keckers]

(Original post by chefdave)
Sorry, I should have been more specific. A significant proportion of free market libertarians support the idea of free markets in labour and capital but they're firmly wedded to the concept of a state backed cartel in land. By all means abolish the NMW but lets also address the more pressing problem of subsidies for the rich.

Ah I see what you mean. I agree that abolishing the NMW may be a step in the wrong direction while we still have a system which allows the monopolisation of land.

[Leon Trotsky]

(Original post by Annoying-Mouse)
No idea.



No, they wouldn't because you can't live off on £2 hour = no one takes the job = rise in salary. A simple refutation of this argument would be to look at the salary of German's who work for McDonalds/Aldi etc considering there's no minimum wage there. Plus, there's something called collective bargaining. Unions would form and workers would pressure companies to raise their salary.

Where's your evidence to suggest that nobody would take a £2 an hour job? If it came with the promise of the possibility of higher wages in the future, I'm sure many people would be desperate enough to accept such low pay. Many people are already on apprenticeships working for not much more than £2 an hour.

Like you say though, if the workers formed a union and demanded a pay rise, that would force the company to increase their wages. But legislation was brought in allowing companies to fire workers at will for any reason (like this), they could simply threaten to fire their workers if they strike, which I imagine would put most off.

[Bourgeois]

It is very important to note whom the minimum wage covers. People who already earn above £7 per hour would have earned £7 per hour even if the minimum wage did not exist (the adult rate currently stands at £6.08 so these people are not affected). How many people actually work for less than £6.08 per hour in the UK? according to the low pay comission, that would be 1 in 10 women and 1 in 5 men. 10% of women and 20% of men. Not what one would call a universal programme.

But more importantly:

We again find that minimum wage jobs are more likely to be: part-time; temporary; held for less than a year; in the private sector; in small and medium-sized firms, and in certain low-paying industries (such as retail and hospitality) and occupations (such as hairdressers, cleaners, bar staff and retail assistants). These jobs are also more likely to be carried out by women, young people, older workers, disabled people, ethnic minorities or those with no qualifications.

(emphasis mine)

Two important facts:

1. People do not depend on the minimum wage for more than a year. So anyone who argues that somehow people depend on the minimum wage for their entire lives (or even for a significant part of their lives) do not know what the hell they're talking about.
2. McDonald's is the exception rather than the rule. Most employers who employ minimum wage workers are small/medium size businesses. So, no "corporations are evil" rhetoric is needed. It can plausibly be argued however that small businesses see their costs (wages) increase and their competitiveness decrease compared to bigger businesses. So accusing minimum wage proponents of promoting monopolistic practices is not completely unfair.

Moreover:

firms have attempted to cope with increases in the minimum wage by changing pay structures and reducing non wage costs; reducing hours; raising prices; or accepting lower profits

Yeah so, basically, you get less benefits ("non-wage costs"), you get to work less ("reducing hours") - no extra shifts - and earn less, consumers. including the minimum wage workers themselves, get to pay more for goods ("raising prices") which further lowers real wages. Lastly, capitalists have no incentive to invest in their firms which is what actually makes workers more productive thereby increasing their salaries. Tthis is what "accepting lower profits" means in practice - businesses invest according to the profit rate. The higher the profit rate, the more capital will be invested, the higher the wages workers can command

It's amazing that no one has mentioned all these things so far. There are included in the government's lowpay comission report of 2011.

In short, the minimum wage blows. Wanna help workers? give them more capital to work with and even better, give them skills training because as the report mentions, almost everyone who gets a minimum wage is unskilled because we have destroyed apprenticeships and learning on the job in order to send people to universities to get degrees in near useless topics at public expense.

tldr :minimum wage increases result in less benefits for workers, lower working hours (in effect, lower wages), raising prices for everyone (lower real wages) and lower productivity (less capital investment) for workers as well as increased costs for small and medium businesses (making them less competitive relative to big business).

[plimsolls]

(Original post by Annoying-Mouse)
Give me a case study (list salary, singe/married, amount of children if any, if partner is working) and I'll prove you wrong. It really is enough.

What about single people under the age for working tax credits, not married and with no children. It's not enough for these people. But then again, nobody gives a ****e about this demographic do they. It's 'tough ****' and live with your parents or under a bridge.

[plimsolls]

(Original post by arra)
I'm a very left leaning person; I believe in stimulus, social safety net, and everything.

However, the minimum wage needs to be abolished. If I want to offer my services for 2 dollars and someone wants to hire me for that much well, damnit, I should be able to.

And where will you be living whilst you're earning your lovely £2, sorry 'DOLLARS' an hour?

And eating? Grass?

[arra]

(Original post by plimsolls)
And where will you be living whilst you're earning your lovely £2, sorry 'DOLLARS' an hour?

And eating? Grass?

It's better than earning nothing an hour as a result of minimum wage laws. Furthermore, I would support a very strong social safety net paid for by high taxes on the rich and luxury goods.

[Annoying-Mouse]

(Original post by Addzter)
Where's your evidence to suggest that nobody would take a £2 an hour job? If it came with the promise of the possibility of higher wages in the future, I'm sure many people would be desperate enough to accept such low pay. Many people are already on apprenticeships working for not much more than £2 an hour.

Like you say though, if the workers formed a union and demanded a pay rise, that would force the company to increase their wages. But legislation was brought in allowing companies to fire workers at will for any reason (like this), they could simply threaten to fire their workers if they strike, which I imagine would put most off.

Only a few small minority (less than 2%) can live of £2 an hour and that's because they already have place to live. As I said, look at countries that don't have minimum wage where only a minority are working under standard wage.

No, it wouldn't, not if we got rid of minimum wage. If you pay someone under living wage then they wouldn't take it because they can't survive on that wage. You might fire the employees for demanding more than minimum wage but you wouldn't fire them for demanding minimum wage because you won't get many employees who could afford to take sub-minimum salary.

(Original post by plimsolls)
What about single people under the age for working tax credits, not married and with no children. It's not enough for these people. But then again, nobody gives a ****e about this demographic do they. It's 'tough ****' and live with your parents or under a bridge.

No, it isn't, you don't have to pay council tax and get around £4,600 in housing benefits and £3,000 income support. And shared accommodation isn't very expensive and costs up to £400-500 per month. So you have around £19000 and housing should cost around £9000 which you're left with £10,000 and that's more than enough for food, clothes, bills and recreational activities on the weekend.

[Scumbaggio]

(Original post by undertaker1)
this

why should unskilled dumb low wage workers be protected. it's their fault for not working harder in life
I hate this culture in the UK where everyone should be equal. the people who work hard in life should also pay for others who don't by paying ridiculous levels of tax. All these stupid chavs who walk around all day, ain't a care in the world and are still able to wear all their ridiculously priced chavy clothes. clearly their receiving toooo much in benefits and/or wages.

no one has respect for each other because were all 'equal'. no respects the fantastic National Heath Service because its free. we are so lucky to have a free national health service but it doesn't get the appreciation it deserves.

lol at the neg reps, no wonder this country's getting worse

lmao at the neg reps, slave away people-- pay high taxes so others can waste it on fags, cheap cider and sweets/chocolates for their overweight kids

What a vile human being.

People in the uk ARE NOT all equal.

The sweeping generalisations you make are laughable, You assume that all people who wear 'chavvy' clothes have not paid for them with money they have earned. What is your definition of a chav? If it is the clothes they wear and the way they talk then I know a 'chav' who earns about £80k a year.

You also assume that all people who have accumulated wealth have 'worked hard' in order to do so.

We do not live in a meritocracy and that is why you are wrong.

[Scumbaggio]

(Original post by Annoying-Mouse)
What else are you supposed to be entitled to? BMW? First-class holidays? 50 inch HD TV? I don't need to experience the same lifestyle, I can work out how much that lifestyle costs by calculating the costs of everything + benefits I'd receive. The average apprenticeship wage is £170, minimum wage is £243 or so. When you add the benefits you receive it isn't all that bad.

The whole point of apprenticeships is it's designed for low-skilled youths. What do you think companies would do if we rose it? They'd just scrap their schemes. How can you say they aren't beneficial yet they help alleviate youth unemployment by making the less experienced youths more competitive in the job market? From my understanding and reading there is learning involved and the majority of apprenticeships have off-days at colleges where they study for their respective qualifications. It's mainly hands-on experience. Calling it a loophole is like calling work experience loopholes. It's hyperbolic.

That's your personal experiences. There are many apprentices that disagree. Unless you can show evidence of this being generally the case then it's pointless to discuss. You're obviously going to have to do some of the same job that people of the office do. The whole point is it's in-work experience.

Have you ever supported yourself on £243 pounds a week with no assistance from anyone? What benefits are you talking about? A single person will not get tax credits until age 25.

If not then you're in no position to comment on whether it it an adequate amount. My assumption is that you have a 50 inch TV, BMW and go on first class holidays that daddy pays for.