Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Posting-Version: version B 2.10.1 6/24/83; site idi.UUCP Path: utzoo!linus!decvax!decwrl!sun!idi!kiessig From: kiessig@idi.UUCP (Rick Kiessig) Newsgroups: net.politics Subject: Re: Unemployment & the minimum wage Message-ID: <229@idi.UUCP> Date: Mon, 6-Aug-84 19:36:58 EDT Article-I.D.: idi.229 Posted: Mon Aug 6 19:36:58 1984 Date-Received: Tue, 7-Aug-84 05:26:57 EDT References: <1665@inmet.UUCP> Organization: Intelligent Decisions, Saratoga, CA Lines: 44 Well, there are really several things going on here. It is true that unions have had some influence on the minimum wage. However, remember that unions were extremely effective before there ever was a minimum wage law. They achieve their effectiveness by creating in effect a monopoly on their services. If they don't get what they want from their employer, they simply stop working. Even without a minimum wage law, it may well be impossible for a company to go out and hire enough sufficiently skilled people if a union were to strike. This is also called blackmail. Do what we want, or else. After talking with and listening to several politicians, I think their reasoning behind the minimum wage goes more like this: Earnings below some (arbitrarily decided) level are not acceptable. If you earned less than $3.35/hr., for example, that would be barely enough for you to live on. Therefore, what we (government) will do is to declare that no one can work for less than $3.35/hr. We can then say to our constituency that we are doing a good thing: writing into law that each and every one of us is worth at least $3.35/hr. On the surface, that looks like a good thing. I.e. it implies that if you have a job, you can earn enough to live above the "poverty level". No more "exploitation". The problem is that they are ignoring the side effects. We don't have guaranteed employment in this country. Just because someone has to pay you at least $3.35/hr. doesn't mean that he actually has to hire you. So if what you were doing isn't worth the government-declared minimum, you lose your job. In other words, what the minimum wage law says is that it's better to be unemployed than to have a job that pays "too little". It's better for black teenagers to hang out at the local park than to have them be able to work. An interesting statistic from Dr. Williams: before the days of the minimum wage, black teenage unmployment was about 9.5%. Today, after the law which was supposed to protect them from poverty and exploitation, the unemployment rate has climbed to 50%. -- Rick Kiessig {decvax, ucbvax}!sun!idi!kiessig {akgua, allegra, amd, burl, cbosgd, decwrl, dual, ihnp4}!idi!kiessig Phone: 408-996-2399