Fast food jobs in NY evidently attract a lot of comedians.

If the little bastards weren't so lazy, they would have found wealthier parents to be born to. These kids just need to get with the program.

Well, you've certainly proved you don't deal well with language, which is a collective undertaking, so at least you're consistent. Didn't realize you opposed the existence of police, courts, and army as well, but there you go.

Uncle Albert proves he's full of fail again.

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/07/29/mcdonalds-salaries_n_3672006.html

His predictions of economic collapse and massive inflation if companies would actually have to pay enough that workers wouldn't have to be on welfare just to survive still have me laughing. Also this is if 100% of the cost increase was passed on to consumers, something which would certainly not happen as most companies (especially in the fast food business) simply do not have pricing leverage in a competitive market place. Thus the real cost increase would likely be much less than $0.68.


I'm still against a minimum wage but the wild claims made by Albert are hilarious to read. He really should come back to a fact based world. BTW this study over states price increases by a lot IMHO as the study I previously linked to, done by actual economists, predicted just a $0.48 price increase if fast food companies had to pay workers $15 per hour.

$0.68?

That's a 17% increase...and that won't apply to JUST to the Big Mac. It will apply to EVERY item McDonald's sells. And just about every item sold everywhere else. Remember, the law doesn't apply just to McDonald's or to Big Macs. It applies everywhere.

Is MY salary going up 17%?

No.

So, no, I don't support a $0.68 increase in the cost of a Big Mac just to raise someone else's salary.

But... but... "social justice"!

Why don't you progressives just come out and propose a Constitutional Amendment that sets business profits to a certain percentage?

...exist only in your petty little imagination, cock breath.

Like I said, this one over states the price increase compared to other more authoritative study plus it is extremely unlikely 100% of the cost will be able to be passed on with some of it being absorbed by suppliers, some of it being absorbed by the company in form of reduced profits, some of it absorbed via increased productivity, some of it absorbed via less advertising, and some of it absorbed via lower executive pay.

There are a hell of a lot of places to take besides just increasing prices especially if the market place is competitive (and fast food most certainly is) and customers bulk at price increases (as they no doubt will especially as they've gotten used to $0.99 value menus). The point is even with the maximum possible impact the total impact would be quite small and even a more likely $10 per hour minimum wage for big company workers would only amount to a max of 10% price increase with the more likely effect being below 5%. So, no, it's not the end of the world Albert has painted it to be.

The other thing is that $15 an hour is only a bargaining stance. Realistically, they aren't going to pay that high. But they certainly could pay more than minimum without significant business disruption.

I don't know how people who speak so dismissively about other peoples' money are able to stand themselves. An employer doesn't owe you a standard of living. They don't owe you shit. If you can't feed your brood and send Cancer Boy to the Mayo clinic on your wages, you need to get some skills and find a vocation that's worth more to prospective employers, because it is silly and unreasonable to expect this of menial service jobs.

So, the standard is now "We'll use government to force higher wages until just short of making the business fail?"



In a few years, you'll be wondering where a lot of the businesses went. It is a BAD assumption to assume that a business that merely doesn't fail is going to continue. Owners of business kinda expect, y'know, to make some money from it. If they don't, then why the fuck would they bother?

My god, you people need to spend five minutes running a business. You have no understanding of how it works. Absolutely none. You look at a business someone worked hard to build and you see it as nothing more as a potential jobs program for you to plunder.

Reagan was right. The liberal economic plan is:

"If it moves, tax it. If it keeps moving, regulate it. When it stops moving, subsidize it."

Welcome to Planet Detroit.

It can be sponsored by Reps. Mein and Gimmi.

In the old days, fast food was the low end of the intellectual scale. Wages were kept low, because it was hoped that if they could bring in little or no money, they would not reproduce. But that was the wisdom of half a century ago.

and yet Germany and most of Europe have a higher minimum wage yet are still doing better than us economically. Australia has a higher minimum wage than us yet is still doing better economically.

I'll say it again that I am against a minimum wage but the claims of doom and gloom and economic ruin made by the hyper partisans in this thread are ludicrous and have no creditability to anyone with experience in the real world. The world is not the simple place you imagine it to be and your simple two dimensional dogma doesn't actually hold any water in the real world. You're all vastly over stating the negatives and ignoring the positives and that's what I keep pointing out to you and what you're unable to refute.

Your "wisedom" is nothing but a myth created by people who wish that was true. Fact: ~3/4ths of fast food workers are age 21-35 and only 28% of them even have children. This has gotten a lot of media attention lately so how about using the real numbers instead of numbers you just imagined?

http://www.deathandtaxesmag.com/202...w-impossible-it-is-to-get-by-on-minimum-wage/

http://money.msn.com/now/post.aspx?post=12dc36d4-e13c-4262-b381-412af65541e9

That first link isn't even remotely interested in raising the minimum wage but at least it is factually based and brings up facts which he doesn't like but is honest enough to admit are true. Like the fact that if we just had the minimum wage adjusted for inflation we'd currently be at $10 hour so, yes, wages really have gone down in a big way and, no, the economy wasn't ruined by those higher wages from 1950-2000. In fact, just the opposite.

That was years ago. But no, you wouldn't want to support a family on that.

Except, nobody's saying that. Some people are supporting the idea that workers can and should bargain for he bes deal they can get.

It's not intended to support a family, and anyone who argues on that basis is a fucking mongoloid.

Sure they could... but why should they? Not all labor demands more than minimum wage. I'm all for McDonalds raising their pay if they want to but it's just not skilled enough labor to demand more. If anyone deserves more pay it's the migrant workers who do back breaking labor picking fruit out in California. Where is the outrage over their pay?

Fast food is just not the place to go if you want to make more than the minimum wage. If McDonalds chooses to double their pay and raise their prices the 17% to cover it then I would hope the customer experience and food quality provided by the increased cost follow suit.

They're called trades, last time I looked pushing the Filet O Fish button wasn't up there with concrete work, carpentry, plumbing, electrical, roofing, etc.

But, but...decentwagecostoflivingsubsidizedbywelfare!!!!111

Hey, don't worry -- once there are no longer any 'entry level' jobs, why, we'll all be... better off... yeah...

I'm not sure where the idea came from that a job has to provide sufficient income to provide an arbitrarily defined "minimum lifestyle."

I can recall no point in my entire life where working at McDonald's was anything other than a job for teenagers who wanted to work part-time, for all-but-unemployable adults, and for adults who wanted to supplement some other income.

"I want to go work at McDonald's so I can have a comfortable home in the suburbs with a spouse and a couple of kids, a couple of cars, and a vacation to somewhere nice every year," said NO ONE EVER.

Said nobody in this thread but Uncle Albert.

You do realize that trade jobs make the big money due to unions, right?

That may be how it started but they still make good money in places that aren't unionized. There is a skill in those jobs that isn't required for employment at McDonalds. The reason unskilled labor has so much trouble unionizing is that literally anyone can replace the people doing it. Not just anyone can go be a plumber or do carpentry work.

Maybe up there. Pretty sure the oil companies and their service companies aren't unionized. They're the 500lb gorilla, so if they put out the call for construction workers or truck drivers, you'd better pony up or you'll find yourself with no employees.

No doubt, there is training and skill behind that work. A plumber clearly rates a much higher pay grade than a burger flipper. That doesn't mean that the burger flipper is properly compensated at $7.25, though.

"Properly"

Attach a dollar amount to that, or maybe describe the lifestyle it should support. Best not be anything beyond "college kid splitting rent in a barren studio apartment with three other kids."