The minimum wage

Originally posted by karnachz
They can import cars from a country that manufactures them.

But doesn't that require for instance a GM to have some kind of presence, directly or indirectly, in Liechtenstein?

Originally posted by karnachz
Of course they can afford it, and they're sitting on enormous amounts of wealth. They just enjoy exploiting workers and ripping the guts out of them if they can get away with it. Lots of people once enjoyed owning slaves. It's easier to send unskilled work (such as Nike factory work) overseas, than to do the same to a CEO; plus the CEO makes a lot of the de ...[text shortened]... t exists in more than one country, thus making it harder for a single government to regulate it.

Nike factory work exported to Indonesia, resulted in 5X increases in wages for the workers there, and the efficiency allowed Nike to grow exponentially. Huge numbers of middle management, sales and marketing jobs, as well as the tangential jobs of companies selling Nike gear, like Dick's Sporting Goods.

Of course they can afford it. So you say. But would that course of action be good for the workers, in the end. Is the path sustainable? While it is true that there are many executives and managers that stumble upward, and don't deserve their pay, there are many who do. I don't trust government or any other outsider to dictate wages or other things about how a business is run.

Originally posted by vivify
Another good point. Although, who was it that voted to give themselves raises with bailout money, even though their failures brought about the need for a bailout? I bring that up only because I'm sure we can find just as many examples of people who don't deserve their outrageous salaries.

The bailouts of both the banks and the car makers prove exactly what I'm saying. Companies making poor choices deserve to become extinct, whether the overpaying is line workers or executives. No bailouts.

Originally posted by normbenign
Nike factory work exported to Indonesia, resulted in 5X increases in wages for the workers there, and the efficiency allowed Nike to grow exponentially. Huge numbers of middle management, sales and marketing jobs, as well as the tangential jobs of companies selling Nike gear, like Dick's Sporting Goods.

Of course they can afford it. So you say. But ...[text shortened]... t government or any other outsider to dictate wages or other things about how a business is run.

At the very least, there's a case for a welfare state within the U.S. and other first-world countries. There aren't enough jobs to go around, because corporations like Nike send the jobs overseas. Welfare beneficiaries aren't at fault for their own predicament, so they need to be paid a living allowance so they survive intact. Yes, one individual might be able to fight hard and get a job, but that means someone else misses out on the job instead, if there aren't enough jobs to go around.

Originally posted by KazetNagorra
But doesn't that require for instance a GM to have some kind of presence, directly or indirectly, in Liechtenstein?

No, I don't believe so. A foreign company can make shipments as a foreign business, through importing and exporting. That way they're treated like a foreign company by the government. I don't mind a foreign company having a -physical- presence within a country that they're not registered as a business within, e.g. owning buildings to store cars in.

Originally posted by karnachz
At the very least, there's a case for a welfare state within the U.S. and other first-world countries. There aren't enough jobs to go around, because corporations like Nike send the jobs overseas. Welfare beneficiaries aren't at fault for their own predicament, so they need to be paid a living allowance so they survive intact. Yes, one individual might be a ...[text shortened]... that means someone else misses out on the job instead, if there aren't enough jobs to go around.

"There aren't enough jobs to go around, because corporations like Nike send the jobs overseas."

At the time Nike exported jobs, it employed about 300 people making athletic shoes, at two US factories. Count how many people Nike now employs.

One of the big reasons for not enough jobs is that government has invested so heavily in ventures that quickly go bust.

Originally posted by normbenign
"There aren't enough jobs to go around, because corporations like Nike send the jobs overseas."

At the time Nike exported jobs, it employed about 300 people making athletic shoes, at two US factories. Count how many people Nike now employs.

One of the big reasons for not enough jobs is that government has invested so heavily in ventures that quickly go bust.

We saw the consequences of lack of government during Herbert Hoover's presidency. The New Deal reduced the unemployment rate from 24.9% to 14.3% within four years. If you think that government investment has increased the unemployment rate at other times, then I'd like to see some evidence for this claim, please.

As for Nike, even if what you say is true, the corporation could very easily have instead grown within the U.S., without exploiting third-world workers.

Originally posted by karnachz
No, I don't believe so. A foreign company can make shipments as a foreign business, through importing and exporting. That way they're treated like a foreign company by the government. I don't mind a foreign company having a -physical- presence within a country that they're not registered as a business within, e.g. owning buildings to store cars in.

So then what you are saying is that all production should be local? This is hardly any more feasible - many countries lack the natural resources to make everything required for a modern society.

It is a common misconception that unemployment is caused by jobs being "shipped overseas."

Originally posted by bill718
Too all those out there who think raising the minimum wage is a bad idea, consider this. While the minimum wage has slowly climbed in the last few decades (amid the whailings of multi billion dollar companies who claim they can't afford it) executive pay, even for medium sized business's has gone up much faster. This begs a few questions:

1. Are these executives really worth all these millions of dollars a year?...

Is anyone who currently is making minimum wage actually worth $15/hr, which is what they're demanding the min wage be raised to? No.

Is anyone making minimum wage actually worth the minimum wage? No.

The minimum wage is an arbitrary rate set by the government. It has no basis in economic reality in terms of what those positions are actually worth.

There should be no minimum wage. Period. There's no economic reason to have one.

Why shouldn't the M.W. be $150K / year? Is that too much? Don't you want people to live well?

Originally posted by karnachz
We saw the consequences of lack of government during Herbert Hoover's presidency. The New Deal reduced the unemployment rate from 24.9% to 14.3% within four years. If you think that government investment has increased the unemployment rate at other times, then I'd like to see some evidence for this claim, please.

As for Nike, even if what you say is tru ...[text shortened]... on could very easily have instead grown within the U.S., without exploiting third-world workers.

Nothing FDR did in his first term was any different than what Hoover had been doing.

Take the period from 2008 to 2012. Last year of Bush Presidency, and Obama's first term. Unemployment went from around 4.5% to over 10% and persisted there a long time inspite of massive spending by both Bush and Obama.

Incidentally, this virtually parallels the Hoover/FDR scenario. Big spending started under a Republican, and escalated under a Democrat. Tell me if those "shovel ready" jobs were real? Did Soyndra help cure unemployment?

Nike could indeed have remained in Oregon and New Hampshire. It took them nearly a couple of decades to grow to over 300 manufacturing jobs, which didn't pay like UAW jobs making cars.

The company went through the roof after moving all but high end shoe manufacturing to Indonesia. Indonesians benefited, Americans benefited. Nike is a success story globally. The "exploited" workers most of them double up to 10Xed their income. No they did not make what the New Hampshire and Oregon workers did, but they dramatically improved.

Originally posted by normbenign
Nothing FDR did in his first term was any different than what Hoover had been doing.

Take the period from 2008 to 2012. Last year of Bush Presidency, and Obama's first term. Unemployment went from around 4.5% to over 10% and persisted there a long time inspite of massive spending by both Bush and Obama.

Incidentally, this virtually parallels the ...[text shortened]... they did not make what the New Hampshire and Oregon workers did, but they dramatically improved.

Year; Tax Receipts; Spending; Growth; Unemployment Rate
-------------------------------------------------
1929 -- -- -- 3.2% < Hoover era, Great Depression begins
1930 4.2% 3.4% - 9.4% 8.7
1931 3.7 4.3 - 8.5 15.9
1932 2.9 7.0 -13.4 23.6
1933 3.5 8.1 - 2.1 24.9 < FDR, New Deal begins; contraction ends March
1934 4.9 10.8 + 7.7 21.7
1935 5.3 9.3 + 8.1 20.1
1936 5.1 10.6 +14.1 16.9
1937 6.2 8.7 + 5.0 14.3 < recession begins, May
1938 7.7 7.8 - 4.5 19.0 < recession ends, June
1939 7.2 10.4 + 7.9 17.2
1940 6.9 9.9
1941 7.7 12.1
1942 10.3 24.8
1943 13.7 44.8
1944 21.7 45.3
1945 21.3 43.7

Hoover was fiscally conservative, just like Harding and Coolidge, both before and after the crash leading to the Great Depression. Democrats won the 1930 Congressional elections, resulting in a more economically liberal Congress who attempted to pass legislation to relieve the Great Depression. Hoover eventually compromised and agree to relief legislation in 1932, but by then swing voters saw it as "too little, too late" on Hoover's part. Hoover was a fiscal conservative, who tacked somewhat to the center in 1932, after his fiscal conservatism had already worsened the Great Depression.

You could say that the New Deal began in 1932 under Hoover and Democrats in Congress, but the point is that fiscal conservatism caused the Great Depression, and the New Deal was fixing it (unemployment was reduced from 24.9% in 1933 down to 14.3% in 1937, long before WW2 military spending began).

The worsening unemployment rate trajectory that Obama inherited had stopped falling by the end of 2009. Without the stimulus package and TARP, it would have been much higher than 10% by then. (I'm certainly not saying TARP was perfect, or that I like corporate handouts, but it was better to have it than have nothing.)

http://data.bls.gov/timeseries/LNS14000000