Thursday, March 30, 2006 6:10 PM
11 Comments »
So are you for or against raising the minimum wage?
Comment by Polanco Consulting — January 5, 2006 @ 11:56 am
Might as well ask how many minimum wage workers he wants to see laid off, that and price hikes are the twin impacts of raising the minimum wage.
It’s amazing to me that so many politicians fail to understand basic economics.
There are 535 yahoos on Capital Hill who support the “war on drugs” while drug dealers two blocks east of the Supreme Court stand on street corners selling pot, cocaine, and heroin proving that capitalism works and that politicians are fools.
Strange.
Comment by johnb — January 5, 2006 @ 12:25 pm
Moore seems to be generating a lot of support. Check out his blog
www.onedollarmore.blogspot.com
Comment by Sharon Michelle — January 5, 2006 @ 5:29 pm
I’d refer johnb to Alan Kreuger, economist at Princeton who has repeatedly demonstrated that labor markets show few, if any, ill-effects after minimum wage increases.
Or perhaps he’d like to take the issue up with the four Nobel laureate economists (and 562 others) who recently signed a petition for raising the minimum wage. I’m sure his understanding and knowledge of so-called “basic economics” far surpasses their collective wisdom.
http://www.epinet.org/newsroom/releases/2004/10/041006MinWageLtr.pdf
Comment by frank — January 5, 2006 @ 7:11 pm
Mr. Wrenn, is arguing for a policy in terms that a given audience might actually understand really pandering? Richard Moore knowingly walked into an audience that opposed his position and tried his best to convince them that his view was the right one. Some might consider that courage.
Incidentally, you can read the whole speech (which Mr. Wrenn admits he hasn’t done) at the website referenced by the respondent above. Decide for yourself who’s pandering.
If you took the time to do a quick google search and look at Lee Scott’s comments, you would soon see that the Wal-Mart CEO supports increasing the minimum wage because he knows that workers who have pitiful incomes aren’t very good consumers. Another one of those pesky economists that johnb doesn’t like–Keynes–used to talk about increasing demand to improve the economy. Maybe Scott is being cynical, or maybe he believes, similarly to Richard Moore and many others, that our economy depends upon a thriving working class that goes to stores and buys things.
In the end, Mr. Wrenn makes snide and cynical remarks about Richard Moore’s use of the word “morals.” Of course, Mr. Wrenn makes no attempt to argue what his, or Republicans’, morals demand.
Comment by frank — January 5, 2006 @ 7:23 pm
It’s a pity the otherwise intelligent and respectable people still believe (or at least claim to believe) in the hocus-pocus of a government mandated minimum wage. Americans today live in a world of prosperity unimaginable to most of the world’s peoples, and all of it was created by free markets. How can some of us be so blind to the power of free markets to create that prosperity? Perhaps it’s because we are born into it and live with it everyday that we can’t see the forest for the trees.
As for economists, who cares what they think? Anyone over thirty years old knows from experience that you can always find an economist (usually a ‘highly regarded’ one, with a lofty post at a prestigious university) to support whatever hair-brained scheme the politicians cook up.
As regards Mr. Cooper’s morals and integrity, is this the same Attorney General Roy Cooper who could find nothing illegal or unconstitutional in the way the leaders of the General Assembly stashed away millions of dollars of public funds in secret accounts to be used for political pay-off projects (the so-called ’slush funds’)? The same Mr. Cooper who used hundreds of thousands of public dollars to run campaign commercials, thinly disguised as ‘public service announcements’?
The bottom line is that anytime the government dictates that one person or group receive more, some person or group somewhere inevitably receives less. Government mandates don’t create wealth, they just shift it around, usually from someone who did create it to someone who didn’t. If this is what passes for sound economics and/or morality in Mr. Cooper’s camp, then God help us if he is elected.
Comment by Jim Stegall — January 6, 2006 @ 12:43 am
Uhm, no it wasn’t the same Roy Cooper who did all that. He’s the state attorney general. It was Richard Moore, the state treasurer. Nice try, though.
As for your conclusion: workplace safety laws; maximum hour laws; taxes on corporations, sales, and individuals; environmental regulations; zoning laws; the federal reserve system; the creation of a federal debt; etc. are all examples of government interference with the free market. Do you oppose all of those too?
I mean, theoretically, having a government at all that collects and spends money within the market means that the government is then “interfering” with the market. No matter how it collects or spends money, its interactions undoubtedly affect the market.
Comment by frank — January 6, 2006 @ 9:24 am
The Treasurer has no authority to try cases. It was the Attorney General who whiffed on taking any action after the Treasurer’s report (which he didn’t need in order to do his job, by the way). And I have no problem with government creating the conditions, through reasonable regulations, for free interprise to work its magic. Minimum wage laws are not reasonable; they are useless and counter-productive.
Comment by Jim Stegall — January 6, 2006 @ 1:08 pm
Hell yes, I’m for rasing the minimum wage, and providing good jobs to all that want them. After all there is a lot of HIDDEN UNEMPLOYMENT folks who are working part-time because can’t find a full-time job, people who want jobs but are not counted in official statistics because they arent looking.
According to the ESC there are officially over 20,000 unemployed in the Raleigh/Cary MSA alone. There is lots of underreporting of the unemployed to consider as well.
Comment by Louie — January 8, 2006 @ 10:30 am
Hey, I just thought of the perfect solution to all of this. Let everyone who favors a rise in the minumum wage go out and invest their time, energy, and money in starting a business (borrow the dollars if you have to, rates are historically low right now), hire those who are un- or under-employed, and pay them a ‘living wage!’ Problem solved! Show those business-types how it’s done! Why, if every minimum wage hike supporter would create just ONE good-paying job, unemployment would be a thing of the past. Everyone would prosper!
Comment by Jim Stegall — January 8, 2006 @ 6:33 pm
Why borrow the money to start up a business - just go to the Governor for a handout - his pockets are plump with greenbacks for economic development.
I think to qualify you have to say you are going to create ‘x’ jobs over 5-10 years and you land the money. It certainly helps too if you have been making generous contributions to his campaign coffers.
Comment by Abe — January 11, 2006 @ 2:35 pm