Legally Raising The Minimum Wage In The US Is Pointless

Yes, there will always be unemployment because there will always be people who don't want to work and people who are transitioning from one job to another. No one is denying that. Just because there "will always be unemployment," we can't stop examining the various reasons for it and just hope for the best with an increase in minimum wage. There's a lack of positions for even the working-poor class; nevermind the fact that these jobs make people want to kill themselves. The jobs provided for this class of people are generally provided by corporations who have massive, multi-billion dollar net profits every quarter. We need to examine the circumstances that have made it possible for these corporations to make such huge profit margins without competition that would lower their commodity prices and keep our dollar's buying power up. When you look at a corporation in America that posts multi-billion dollar profits and decimates it's competition, you usually see a few common issues. Most of these companies are profiteering from foreign labor. If you look at my original post, I went over why this is possible in detail, but no single person can quantify the actual implications of it all -- that's a job that I'd love to see our government doing. The government, however, isn't expressing much interest in bringing these issues to light. Large corporations fund successful elections. They make sizable donations to tax exempt foundations that are often run by politicians; when they aren't run by politicians, they're run by people who invest large amounts of money in lobbying as well. It's plain to see why the government might turn a blind eye to tackling the underlying issues for falling wages. I've seen some politicians try to run a campaign on this issue; they are often blasted by the media as isolationists if they get any media attention at all. It's hard to succeed without big funding, particularly when your message is directly against whatever these people are trying to buy with their "donations." You're making big generalizations like "the fact is, there will always be unemployment" and "there will always be a race to the bottom for wages." This is verbatim from the very people who are dodging the underlying issues that actually cause unemployment and a race to the bottom for wages. These are issues that are very much connected to our governance of the market. We inflict expensive regulations upon our domestic labor and do nothing to equalize foreign labor expenses. You can't hire American labor without providing expensive social programs, minimum living wages, and special accommodations for race, religion, special needs, gender equality, etc. These are good things. And let me emphasize; I'm not saying these things should be given up. However, if we continue to trade freely with foreign countries that do not need to incur these expenses, our domestic companies will undoubtedly fail. Anyone who can't identify this issue is ignorant, and anyone who denies it is delusional. Politicians that don't talk about it aren't stupid; when they're forced to talk about it, the way they deflect and warp the topic is quite intelligent. Albeit, when most topic debates are limited to the attention span of your average American (30 seconds or so,) it's not terribly difficult to get out of it unscathed. Say, for example, if Apple wants to make an iPhone; why would they buy American metals, plastics, or glass? All those raw materials can be produced more cheaply in foreign countries. Why would they take those materials and mold components from them? It can be done cheaper elsewhere. Why would they use American laborers for assembly? It's cheaper elsewhere. Even the shipment from foreign nations is cheaper when provided by said nations. Even foreign oil is cheaper to provide energy for all levels of industry. If we can't impose our price fixing on oil, our artificially profitable oil companies fail. If we can't buy patents and inventive employees from foreign countries, we lose our price fixing on products like smart phones. Our economy isn't only suffering on the bottom, but at the top there's a lot of speculation about how long we can continue profiting while producing nothing of actual material worth. Half our market is contingent on loans acquired from speculation. How long can it go on? Brewing a coffee, frying a burger, or ringing through an item does not produce any material wealth. We're outsourcing far too much actual industry, and the world undoubtedly notices that most of us only work to facilitate each others' consumption of foreign goods. Increasing minimum wage under these circumstances is not a solution. Just think about all the jobs that have been removed from American soil lending to any single product that you might go out and purchase. American corporations profit almost entirely from foreigners. The jobs remaining in America that produce actual material worth are extremely difficult to profit from, and it's not hard to see why. So is the solution to simply increase minimum wage? I think not. Increasing minimum wage just serves to perpetuate this problem. It does means that corporations will pay a bit more to their working-poor class. Any corporation would be absolutely silly not to recognize that they can increase prices, at that point, and it will not result in new competition. The corporations are not paying people enough. That's clear, when you see their gigantic profit margins. Take the annual net profit of a large utility, energy, fast-food, or what have you; divide their annual net profit by the number of employees. You'll be shocked at just how much money is produced from each person in comparison to how much is paid out to them. Most of the money goes to already-rich shareholders and lenders. Does it make sense to generate wealth without producing anything of actual substance? Make the corporations pay more to their employees, and what will happen? They'll charge more. They "compete" with a shared reluctance to dip below multi-billion dollar profit margins. Increase their operating expenses, and they'll increase their prices. I can't give you a solution. If I had one, I'd be running for office and probably failing because I'd never get the kind of money required to run an election. Who'd pay for it? What party would accept me? Democrats and Republicans both get the funding for their elections and the funding for their tax-exempt foundations from this system. To have your voice heard in America as a political candidate, you need money, charisma and you need to maneuver around political landmines like being touted as "against a minimum wage increase." What I can illustrate for you, is why minimum wage increases are totally and completely pointless. And that's what this debate is about.