The date in your article claimed different and the arguments and links in my articles claimed the exact opposite, which you conveniently ignore. Yes, the articles claim that higher minimum wages do cause higher unemployment. They all state this implicitly. "The" assertions I made are correct, and they were also made in all three.

So you go back to the article you linked to and keep claiming "my article is right and yours is wrong." You seem to ignorant to realize the inverse is as valid a claim.

You have no intellectual level to engage upon. All you keep saying is "my article is right and yours is wrong." While I put forth explicit statements which I will restate for you.

The demand for labor is not inelastic while the funding for labor costs is largely inelastic without prospects for market share growth. So raising per unit labor costs (raising the minimum wage) does not increase the funding for labor. So workers will either get laid off or get their hours cut. To claim this premise isn't valid one must argue that employers ignore labor costs and either raise prices to cope with increased labor costs or accept decreases in profit margin or operate at a loss when encountering increased labor costs.
Your article argues that increased labor costs have no effect, laughable as that is.
These leads to the statement made in all three of my articles that if this premise is true then why don't we just raise the minimum wage to make everyone rich, at $1,000 an hour. You claim this isn't a valid point, but of course it is because your position preposterously claims that labor costs do not effect employment in any way.

Of course your problem is that if you finally admit the truth. that labor costs do affect employment then you have to begin judging at what level this effect takes place. Which of course you won't do.

Jack Klein viewpoints left with no logical support, but since JK is irrational he clings to it.

JK, you repeatedly ignored the almost direct correlation between increases in the minimum wage and increased teenage unemployment. The logical reason for this is obvious. When the minimum wage is $8.00 an hour no one with skills not worth $8.00 will get hired thus teenagers without skills don't get hired.
A generation ago when the minimum wage was lower the teenage employment rate was much greater in direct correlation.

"But does one see in the history that increases in the minimum wage lead to a jump in unemployment rates, particularly of the young (and decreases in the minimum wage leading to lower unemployment rates)? Actually, no. Unemployment rates do fluctuate a good deal, as they depend on macro conditions in the economy. But it is hard to see any obvious jump in unemployment rates in the months following the sporadic increases in the real minimum wage we have had over the last more than 60 years.

It is also worth noting that due to the politics of the minimum wage, and the resistance of conservatives and businessmen to higher rates, increases in the minimum wage have been generally infrequent and then relatively large in percentage terms. This thus provides good material for a test of whether increases in the minimum wage lead quickly to jumps in the unemployment rate (particularly of the young). Yet one does not see it."

Direct quote, supported by data.

If you have any real data to present, please do so. I grow weary of discussing this with somebody who refuses to use facts.

You're constructing a straw man argument with the whole "$1000 an hour" discussion. its not relevant. What we're trying to accomplish is to ensure the people at the bottom have enough to get by, and to counteract the iron law of wages. (Otherwise, I'm sure our benevolent masters at Wal-Mart would pay even less, requiring we as a people to pay even more in assistance to compensate for their generally exploitative nature).

Also, assuming that prices do rise as a result of the minimum wage increases, you also have a whole group of people injecting more money into the economy. Remember, if a poor person has more income, they've got something to spend it on (catch up on bills, maybe get little Johnny or Julie a new pair of pants, etc).

Maybe I'm crazy, but that nutty Henry Ford guy may have been on to something when he wanted to pay his employees enough that they could also be consumers of his goods.

Crazy idea, that.

To origina; post topic: If you are a moron that is content with working minimum wage your *entire* life, if you have no ambition, if you are *such* a ass clown that you can never advance beyond flipping burger...then welfare might pay better than work.

But you have to be an incredible fucking moron for this statement to be true.

End of discussion.

Here's another for you JK, from Greg Mankiw, chairman of the economics department at Harvard. In Mankiw's "Essentials of Economics" 3rd edition, Part 2, Chapter 6. He has a case study of "How the Minimum Wage Affects the Labor Market." He states verbatim, if the minimum wage is above the equilibrium (wage) level the quantity of labor supplied exceeds the quantity demanded. The result is unemployment.

Guess he is "invalid" in JK's delusional world as well. Mankiw accounts for the data in the article you linked to as well. If the labor force is skilled and experienced an increase in the minimum wage will not affect them. So rise in the minimum wage does not affect workers with skills that exceed that wage level and your study did not differentiate for this fact. The study I linked to did, because teenagers do not have the requisite skills and experience to justify rising minimum wages and they face increased unemployment in direct correleation. Mankiw states verbatim, The minimum wage has its greatest impact on the market for teenage labor. Your study does't account for this fact at all. No doubt in my mind because this fact didn't fit well with that studies agenda.

Good luck educating yourself on the direct relationship of minimum wage and unemployment JK. I'm quite comfortable with the level of rational knowledge supplied to me by Baum and Mankiw.

I would personally be in favor of having the minimum wage bumped up, and then pegged to inflation.

It would no longer be up to the whim of a particular Congress, and it would remain more or less the same in purchasing power regardless. And any small increases should be of minimal impact. Set it at say... $10.00 an hour (which I frankly think is too low, but I'm willing to compromise and get at least some of what I want), and peg that fucker to inflation.

Its not perfect, but its a damn sight better that it has been.

It's also not even worth arguing between welfare and minimum wage work, since most people on minimum wage also qualify for welfare...

JK, I think that General Motors would be happy to pay their assembly line workers minimum wage, but since those workers possess skills and experience that makes the minimum wage irrelevant to them your inclusion of them is invalid. Better luck next time. Maybe you'll post next on how minimum wage increases don't effect the employment rate of software engineers at Microsoft and Google.

http://www.irle.berkeley.edu/workingpapers/157-07.pdf

Except the data doesn't line up with their assertions. A hypothesis is great, but when the hypothesis is contradicted by the data, you have to change your hypothesis. Ignoring data means you're trying to game the result to satisfy some other desire.

You have still not addressed the basic facts that your (and their) claims are not accounted for by the actual data.

You can argue with me until you're blue in the fact, but you can't argue with the facts. They say your assertion is incorrect.

Maybe if minimum wage was high enough that somebody working 40 hours a week on it would avoid being on welfare, we might have something.

I mean, which is better. Raising the minimum wage so people who are willing to work don't have to be on any public assistance... or continuing to provide public assistance, to such people and then in effect, subsidizing businesses that won't pay their employees a living wage?

That is the choice we have here, folks. Would you rather require a living wage, or subsidize a business grossly exploiting its workers?

If somebody qualifies for welfare, they should be required to find work, and then have a portion of the pay deducted from the welfare.

IN Michigan, for example, half your wages are deducted from your unemployment if you have a part time job. Not a perfect system, but it encourages a person to find work.

So if you made $100 on unemployment, and get a job making another $100, you come out at $150. This is *assistant* a person, and encouraging them to work.

Welfare should be a time limited situation, and welfare case workers should boot people off the system if they are not attempting to find work, or continuously "lose" the job. I'd even go so far as to say that employers hiring a person currently on welfare/unemployment (I know, two different, but related things), the employe should be given a (time limited) tax break on their payroll taxes.

But bottom line, nobody should be permanently on welfare, and *NOBODY should make the claim that minimum wage is *supposed* to be a livable wage. It isn't and shouldn't be, because the skills you possess for a minimum wage job are *not* "life" skills....that's why 15 and 16 year old work min. wage jobs.

How is a business exploiting a worker, Jack? If there are enough people lined up for the job, and they willingly take the job, and they are compensated for their work, that is NOT exploitation.

If you can't "live" on your min wage job, then rent a place to live with other people and split the costs! God damn...all you idiots think that the government is supposed to wipe your ass...so you are all for sharing costs....but you are **never** for **personal** responsibility.

Funny thing is, none of you libtards here probably live your own life the way you claim all the "little" disenfranchised people are you live their lives. This is a *classic* example of the soft bigotry of the left....a bunch of (typically white male) supremisists that look down on everyone around them and think they are too stupid too live life intelligently. Why are *you* smart enough to live you life in a rational manner (such as sharing housing costs), but think everyone around you is too stupid to have the same common sense...or worse, think that by right of birth everyone "deserves" to live by themselves and absorb all costs in life by themselves.

http://www.forbes.com/sites/janetnovack/2013/07/23/mcdonalds-minimum-wage-budget-ignores-tax-credits-food-stamps-and-reality/

I would say if you're willing to work, you should be able to at least meet your basic needs. Considering how large companies are expoiting their workers (by paying them a pittance and then gaming their hours to ensure they don't get benefits).... the result? You and I, being taxpayer types, end up picking up the slack in various ways (food stamps, higher insurance costs to cover uninsured e-room visits, etc).

Like I said... which do you prefer? Ensuring somebody willing to work full time can make the basics, or subsidizing companies that treat their people like shit?

Its really a simple choice, despite your grandstanding.

Well, we've completely left the realm of rational argument and entered the moralizing realm of "paying a pittance" "gaming hours" "don't get benefits." When does money start falling from the skies to pay for everything is the only question? Oh, I forgot, raising the minimum wage doesn't have any effect so we can't just raise the wage so everyone is rich. Jack, can you find your own ass with two hands behind your back?

op=bs

Clearly you're interested in a high level conversation using real world data. I tried having that conversation, and you ignored it, and restated your original position without changing anything to fit the *real world* data I presented.

Emac, I'll be here when you want to discuss this using facts. Until then, I'm afraid this isn't a particularly productive discussion.

"Like I said... which do you prefer? Ensuring somebody willing to work full time can make the basics, or subsidizing companies that treat their people like shit?"

What fucking world do you live in? I...and *most* of my friends growing up in HIGH SCHOOL...worked min-wage jobs at McDonalds, Burger King, etc. After 30 days I got a $0.50 raise and never....NEVER....worked minimum age again. I had a *blast* working at McDonalds....I wasn't treated like shit. I went home after work to my FAMILY...

By the time I was old enough to "need" to support myself, I had finished my education, had a continuous work record (borken only by school), and got a job with decent wages.

It's called GROWING THE FUCK UP Jacky-poo.

Again...all you fucking BIGOTs on the left that think that there is some group of humans out there that are so lowly, so stupid and incopetent that they are *literally* incapable of ever advancing beyond minimum wage. You use your code words...but we all know that you are referring to the minorities you love to coddle and protect...because you are the big Noble White Liberal out to save the poor little minorities from themselves, because YOU believe they are incapable of getting a better job.

Fucking racists...that's what this is all about...just another perverse form of Liberal racism.

*I* believe that *ANY* human being is capable of educating himself, getting a job, SHOWING UP and creating a work history...and then you don't have to worry about minimum wage. And for those that "can't" do this....i.e. **refuse to**....I don't really give a fuck. Work minimum wage for 20 years and find 5 friends that are just as incompetent as you and rent a cheap apartment together.

Reality...if McD's raises there prices any more, it won't be worth it to go there. It hardly is now...for their prices, I might as well go to a real restaurant and get served.

So go ahead and raise the prices...and then when McD's start going under, these fucktards won't have ANY jobs. Bwaaaa ha ha ha ha ha!!

Way to dodge the question, Krellin.

I'll say the same thing to you that I did to Emac. When you're ready to discuss this issue based on facts and not... whatever that last bit was, I'll be here.

@krellin

The problem is this: people do not start off on an equal footing. I am well off because I am talented, but also because my parents are well off. If I grew up with a single parent and had to work to help support the family, I may have never made it through HS. Through no real fault of my own, I may have been stuck in a minimum wage job for lack of an education.

Is raising the minimum wage the way to solve this? In my opinion, no. What we need is better education for the disenfranchised. Minimum wage is often used as a fallback solution because it's much easier to gain support for and addresses the symptoms (although not the problem) much quicker.

However, to call people racist because they realize that, in the real world, the cards are just stacked against some people, is nonsense.

Through "no fault of my own" I might have been......
So there is no personal responsibility for anything? You can always find an excuse. You had a better mommy and daddy. Your school was better. Your boss liked you more. What an endless stream of excuse making nonsense. Human beings rise to the occasion or they don't. Excuses are for failures.

@Emac

Do you genuinely believe you'd be where you are now irregardless of your circumstances growing up?

Also, I'd appreciate it if you were more careful when quoting me.

Abgemacht, do you believe a person is simply a victim of circumstance and has no individual responsibility for outcomes? I put quotes around exactly what you said verbatim. "no fault of my own."

Krellin, you were lucky. I worked at Waldenbooks for minimum wage and Radio Shack for commission all the way through college. Minimum wage for way longer than 30 days (try two years).

Emac - A person works for the same comps y for years only to have that company fold up shop or have to do layoffs in a recession. They are now unemployed through no fault of their own. You need to rethink the better than thou attitude.

How are you unemployed through no fault of your own Draugnar? Do you not have a responsibility to keep improving your skills? Do you not have a responsibility to know the status of your company or your industry? No one is responsible for anything. Once I get hired nothing is my fault. No wonder the country is in the state it is when people think that their lives are the responsibility of someone else, and they can find an excuse or someone to blame for everything. Just ludicrous.

Emac, what have you done for a living? I'm sure we could find more than a few people on this very forum who have been laid off out of no fault of their own (economic downturn).

You strike me as somebody who doesn't have much experience in the working world.

May I ask your chosen profession/career, so we may get some context?

Emac: In times of economic downturn and high unemployment, when there are more job-seekers than available jobs, what then? Even if every single job-seeker tries hard to get a job, in such a situation, some will remain unemployed. How are they to blame for that?

Emac - here is some economic language you can understand
" bloody foreigners, lazy faggot spongers stealing money, blah blah, immigration eroding society values, blah blah, going to hell in a handcart, put them up against the wall and shoot them, liberal shambles, jobs for the blacks, bring back slavery they may have had a point, Ronald Reagan, Margaret Thatcher, every kid has shoes and an i-pad, never had it so easy, socialists and communists, muslims bad blah de blah, ..... if I were in change I'd string 'em all up and be done with it !!
I didn't say you were an idiot, I don't think it needs saying ........