The Minimum Wage

I find it proper to introduce a more precise definition for what exactly we are debating. Minimum wage: The lowest hourly, daily or monthly wage that employers may legally pay to employees. [1] == COUNTER-ARGUMENTS == //[T]he minimum wage law is most properly described as a law saying employers must discriminate against people who have low skills. That's what the law says. The law says here's a man who would — has a skill which would justify a wage rate of $1.50, $2.00 an hour. // This is upon Milton's presupposition of what a "just" wage is. What amount of work justifies a rate of $1.50 an hour? By whose standard? Milton's standard seems to be whatever the employer wants and that this is just because it is "his" business. Allow me to offer some other standards by which "just" could be discerned and then allow me to ask my opponent what makes his standard any better than these others. Living wage theory: "Living wage is a term used to describe the minimum hourly wage necessary for an individual to meet basic needs, including shelter (housing) and other incidentals such as clothing and nutrition, for an extended period of time or a lifetime. In developed countries such as the United Kingdom or Switzerland, this standard generally means that a person working forty hours a week, with no additional income, should be able to afford a specified quality or quantity of housing, food, utilities, transport, health care, and recreation. " [3] Thus they assert a wage which is high enough for the employee to have the necessities is what constitutes "just". They say that anything less than a living wage will result in wage-slavery. "Wage slavery refers to a situation where a person's livelihood depends on wages, especially when the dependence is total and immediate. The term draws an analogy between slavery and wage labor, and may refer to an "[un]equal bargaining situation between labor and capital", particularly where workers are paid comparatively low wages (e. g. sweatshops),or it may draw similarities between owning and employing a person, which equates the term with a lack of workers' self-management. The latter covers a wider range of employment choices bound by the pressures of a hierarchical social environment e. g. working for a wage not only under threat of starvation or poverty, but also of social stigma or status diminution" [4] "Profit is theft" theory: Many Socialists and Anarchists assert that the profit which the employer makes off the the employee(sales-profit minus employees wages) is theft. They assert this because the amount for which the product which the employee made is what the market decided the employee's labor is worth yet they do not get paid what their labor is worth because their employer "owns" it and thus gets to decide how much of the fruits of their labor they get to keep. Virtually always the employer will keep more of the profit for himself than even all the employees combined. Thus they assert, the higher the employee's wage is the more just it is because they are closer to being paid what their labor was actually worth in terms of what they produced. Slavery theory: "The first African slaves hit the shores of the United States in 1619 and were constantly imported into the US until 1860 even though importation had been outlawed in 1808. Over those intervening 246 years they contributed more than 605 billion hours of free labor" "Another way to view the economic contribution of slavery to the US economy would be to assume that only 5% of the value of the slave labor was invested in the stock market in the year the labor was accrued. Five percent was chosen since this is the most common bottom line that is found in Fortune 500 income statements. Using market growth data provided by the Rittenhouse Trust data and the moneys are accumulated from 1700 through 1830 (the beginning of the Rittenhouse data), yields a value of $6.42 trillion current dollars. The subsequent moneys are invested at the time they accrued yields an additional $1.44 trillion. " ~ Waldron H. Giles, Ph. D [5] Some would suggest that slave-labor is necessary for a thriving economy because it brings extra profit to the business to support it and help it grow. Thus, they assert, no wage at all would be just. After-all, there was an entire industry that collapsed along with slavery. .. the slave trade. //But most employers are not in a position where they can engage in that kind of charity. // Is that so? I'd like you to prove that. Tell me, does an employer, who is making profit off a business, have any more trouble than an employee, who make no such profit at all and who is so desperate for money that they must sell their labor for less than what they produce is sold for? And "charity" is it? Again, I ask, by whose standard? Whose is it to give--the employer or the employee? Who is to say from whom it is to be charity--is it not disputed? --and, may I ask you then, who is in the more financially stable position to give it? // Thus the consequences of minimum wage rates have been almost wholly bad, to increase unemployment and to increase poverty. // Is that so? What empirical evidence do you have to support this? Do counties/states with higher minimum-wages have higher unemployment? Lets take a look at that shall we. .. .oh, fancy that. .. .it's the other way around: Lets look at the United States [6,7]: Washington has the highest minimum wage($8.55) and an unemployment rate(9.0%) below the national average(9.6%) Vermont has the fifth lowest unemployment(5.8%) and the 6th highest minimum wage($8.06). Massachusetts has the 7th highest minimum wage($8.00) and an unemployment rate(8.4%) below the national average. By contrast: Puerto Rico, a territory of the United States, has a minimum wage of only $4.10, far below the states. Yet it also has a higher unemployment rate than any of the states (15.9%) South Carolina is tied with many other states as having the lowest minimum wage($7.25, the national standard), yet has the 6th highest unemployment rate(11.0%) Indiana also has has the lowest minimum wage in the United stats and has the 8th highest unemployment rate(10.6) Now, lets take a look at countries[8,9]: Denmark has the highest minimum-wage in the world(23,573 International dollars), yet has an unemployment rate(6.9%) below that of America(9.6%). The United Kingdom has the second highest minimum wage in the world(22,597 International dollars), yet has an unemployment rate(7.8%) below that of America. The list goes on much farther than this, for both states and countries, but sadly it appears I have run out room. I'll lastly add that, when confronted with empirical data instead of simple theory, no one can soundly conclude that minimum wage laws increase unemployment and, in-fact, an equal case could be made for just the opposite. == SOURCES == 1. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 2. . http://www.debate.org... 3. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 4. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 5. . http://www.nathanielturner.com... 6. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 7. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 8. . http://en.wikipedia.org... 9. . http://en.wikipedia.org...