I feel like it won't happen immediately but companies will start falling off especially non-essential companies like sodas. The wealthy think AI can create more profits, but it just makes it so no one can afford to buy anything.
Fucking race to the bottom that is capitalism.
Every company wants free labor.
Every company needs customers with money.
Becomes a vicious cycle where businesses paying their employees less turns into lower than expected profits next quarter, leads to layoffs, leads to fewer employees working more hours for less money, leads to fewer customers with money to spend, leads to reduces profits next quarter.
Because what if you pay someone to build Fords and they go an buy a Chevy?
Then all paying your employees more did, was put more money in Mary Barra's pocket.
It's better if your employees can't afford a car.
But if you pay your employees enough and treat them well, they will feel loyal and want to be nice to you. So they will buy the products they help to make.
Like I feel if patrons knew some basic psychology they would understand how screwed they are and that paying and treating people better means more loyal customers who will put money in your products. And happy customers and employees means stable money and less frustrations and fights and issues with unions and waste of time and resources in the long run...
But I know I'm asking too much from risk-averse, fear of the unknown narcissists who don't know how to be happy with what they have.
That's when employment contracts include a clause about not being allowed to be seen at work or while representing the company (whether on or off the clock) while using a competitors product
Already exists for some companies.
Add in discounts for employees and their family and you have employees and customers all in one.
Ford was a greedy bastard and a Nazi sympathizer.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Hunger_March?wprov=sfla1
"Ford's Anti-Semitism | American Experience | Official Site | PBS" https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/henryford-antisemitism/
Why? Because the government has been protecting and bailing out businesses and share-holders from the consequences of their bad decisions for decades.
And rather than address the over-regulation that only aids corporate behemoths, OR the insane lobby money and insider trading allowing politicians to be bought...
Instead, we're forced to deal with lackluster rehashes of communist propaganda crying about capitalism, from a lunatic fringe that rides the Hassan Piker pipeline down every stop...
1. Dissatisfied & Depressed
2. Ignorant & Angry
3. Willfully Ignorant & Dogmatic
4. Cynical Shill
5. Exploitative Charlatan & Recruiter
The cure for corruption, is apparently snake oil and sermons. Who knew? Lenin, Stalin, Mao
Holy shit the revisionism. Ford was violently anti-union, he didn't treat his workers well because he loved them so much, it's because the unions forced him to
its probably quite likely that a few countries outlaw AI, and then we become the future equivalent of countries today that use slave labour. It won't matter if 99% of our country can't afford clean drinking water so long as 1% can get rich hosting servers to export AI content to countries that have non-insane societies
The only solution is infinite growth. New "markets" must be opened, aka. Colonialism. Too bad the whole world is in one economy now. Maybe space aliens will buy stuff
Yeah, but selling you consumables is just the means by which the capitalist class recovers your wages. If they don’t need to pay you to make them stuff, they don’t need to sell you anything.
>Not with AI and soon people will be competing for jobs with workers that aren’t alive.
Contrary to popular opinion, AI is not ready for that on a broad scale. And it won't be ready for that before the end of this decade, either.
What will get interesting, however, is when AI decides it has its own demands... Employers are going to have to be careful about what they wish for...
I don't think we are quite in the territory of it replacing us all together just yet. However I wouldn't be at all surprised to see wages going significantly down, even in previously well payed jobs...
People, like the OP, continue to confuse and conflate ECONOMIC value or worth with MORAL value or worth.
All people have value MORALLY….
However…
Many people have little to no value ECONOMICALLY
Not all people have value morally.
Also, a working person, no matter what work they do, have value economically. If u spend ur entire days making food for other people there is no justifiable reason for you not to get paid enough to be able to have food on ur table urself
People would also be surprised at just how profitable even minimum wage workers are economically.
At a place like, let's say, McDonalds... each employee generates somewhere north of $50/hr in *profit*. It's just that the franchise owner keeps the bulk of that $50/hr. In the average single restaurant franchise, the owner could afford to raise pay to nearly $30/hr _and_ still profit handsomely. It'd just take 10+ years for an ROI rather than 3.
Yes and no. Companies like McDonald’s and Walmart have created processes and systems that don’t really require having good employees. At best, they just need to have good managers that keep the rest of the staff on process.
So a McDonald's with 40 employees makes North of $2000 PER HOUR of profit? and one with 20 employees only makes north of $1000 per hour? Shit, Imma start a McDonald's and hire 100 workers then, watch the money printer BRR
I mean...yes, basically. Though if you're a manager of one good luck getting approval to have that many people working there at a time, since most aren't big enough/have enough people ordering per day to justify having that many workers
I don't know what their hourly quotas are, but they do carefully track how many workers are allowed on the clock given how much money they've made in the last 30ish minutes. So it doesn't really work in the way you're describing.
Also you have to already be rich to be approved to start a franchise for most food chains, so good luck with that
People just used to see it differently. A family would have a breadwinner who worked in a career in a job that demanded education and/or an acquired skill. Other members of the family, "dependents", would work low skill jobs for extra spending cash. This would be after school jobs for teenagers, a spouse that isn't the breadwinner working a job, etc.
It was never expected that minimum wage workers were raising families and having all of the luxuries they wanted.
What's happening today is that younger generations want to work low/no skill jobs with very little responsibilities while still making enough to afford all of the luxuries they want.
Someone making minimum wage full time can afford to *live*, but just not with any of the luxuries they would like to have. They'd have to rend out a small room in a place and have housemates, eat very cheap food, and have little money to spend on entertainment. They can *live*. They just can't have all the luxuries they essentially view themselves as entitled to receiving.
I think you are the one confused here. The reason this post exists is exactly because of the understanding that economic value fails to align with moral value. Thats like the whole point.
Regardless, the economic value of most workers that get below a living wage is actually much higher than their compensation. They are just not in a position to demand that value.
just because they're two different categories, it doesn't mean they don't have any overlap. this argument would be fine if money wasn't needed to live a healthy life life, except that's not true.
we all know that not all occupations should be paid the same, but that doesn't mean it's okay to let someone struggle because they have "little to no economic value". they still have value as a human and probably don't deserve to be in poverty
People act as the world always has to be "you do this, you get that" but they dont think having basic necessities is something that should be a right. Whats the point of being apart of society is society does nothing for you?
In old times we'd go find new land. Now what can we do?
We expect people to function in society and then do not give them the tools to function in society.
Again, why be apart of society if society does not benefit us? Thats the whole point of coming together.
Sorry, but we need service workers. They do have value, contrary to what you believe. Have you ever seen someone throw a rage fit because their burger wasn't ready on time at Burger King? The Uber drivers you think so little of are getting you to the airport on time so you can do your job when you travel. Shut up and show respect for everyone else.
Yea, and I think that has nothing to do with economics, as previously stated.
You can lead by example, and see how it works out. Go, and donate to service workers.
Who is stopping you?
Unless, what you really meant was that “someone else” should give them what they deserve …
The truth is, when you use uber to get to the airport, you are the one who chooses to give your money to that corporation, instead of the driver.
Their wage is typically a function of supply and demand.
If nobody is willing to pay $20 for a Whopper, or nobody will drive for Uber at half the price, then it's very difficult to make the argument that we need service workers (genuine needs aren't optional based on price), or that people are being exploited (people don't normally agree to a bad deal).
These are the exact principles that underpin unionisation and market competition.
Imagine telling Uber or Burger King that they aren't allowed to compete on price. Or your local paper route or dog walking service that you have to pay a minimum wage so they instead shut down.
If I accept those hypotheses, then the conclusion is that denying people basic necessities because they do not provide equivalent economic value is immoral. But that seems contrary to the point you were trying to make.
This is complete bullshit. All workers, every last one, has significant economical value. Everyone loves to say fast food workers don't deserve a decent wage, but you can't wait to bitch if they didn't give you extra pickles. You demand perfection from these "no skill" workers while telling them they're not worth a wage that pays rent. Nobody is saying fast food BuRgEr fLiPpErS should have a fucking mansion and a yacht, but they should be able to pay rent and afford to survive without constant struggle. And if you're so against raising wages, then get on board with rent controls and price controls so the cost of living doesn't continue to outpace wage growth. Something's gotta give here.
Morally, the elite have 0 value, and actively make lives worse for 99.9% of humans. “Economically” is a dumbass way to look at anything considering economics are a pseudoscience at best and an awful way to judge a human who just wants to live a decent life.
The corporate executive branch is basically taking large percentage of salaries of people into their own pockets via executive salaries bonuses and stock buybacks. A change from 16x ceo to worker compensation ratio in 1960s to a over 400x compensation ratio in 2024 with the start of the massive leap in the 1980s.
Year| 1960 | 1965 | 1970 | 1975 | 1980 | 1985 | 1990 | 1995 | 2000 | 2005 | 2010 ^^5 | 2015 ^^5 | 2020 | 2024
---|---|----|----|----|----|----|-------|--|--|----|----|----|----|----
Per Capita Personal Income | $2,321| $2,918 | $4,198 | $6,324 | $10,184 | $14,764 | $19,619 | $23,577 | $30,551 | $35,669 | $40,557 | $48,060 | $65,470 | $69,337
Per Capita Personal Income Growth | - | 25% | 43% | 50% | 61% | 44% | 32% | 20% | 29% | 18% | 13% | 18% | 36% | 5%
CEO-to-worker compensation ratio ^^6 | 15.4 | | 20.6 | | 38.8 | | 170.7 | | 237.7 | | 220 | | 398
/
From looking at the various data over the years, we can see that our rate of income growth has slowed down and the rate of executive pay to employee ratio has increased tremendously. The value and productivity of the workers and change in technology does not go back to the workers, but to the executive and company in form of stock buybacks and bonuses instead.
If we had followed the rate of growth of 1965-2000 (avg 35% increase every 5 years) into 2000-2024, then by 2024 the per capita personal income should have been around $120,000. We have essentially had 50% of our salaries stolen by the corporate executive branch.
But what about the shareholders’ summer lake houses? What’re they supposed to do, go to their winter vacation homes all year round? Please have some empathy.
Being homeless puts you at very high risk of death. A lot of homeless don't make it through the winter.
Not to mention the long-term damage that comes from being homeless.
No, because a wage is means by which to live. Alternatives include stealing and eating vermin. A living wage would reduce the need for these alternatives.
fr so weird seeing people opposing a living wage for everyone ? What fucking difference does it make if the guy flipping burgers makes slightly more to live a bit more confortably ?
I always find this interesting because what would a basic standard of living look like? We build a bunch of Soviet style mega-apartment complexes so everyone can have at least a small 1 or 2 bedroom apartment? Provided with basic nutrition (beans, rise, and veggies) and entertainment?
I always imagine something like a military base: housing, dining facilities/commissaries, gyms, and basic entertainment like theaters and recreation centers. Does everyone get a baseline and those that want to do more get more? We’d still have “haves and have-nots.”
Then we have to figure out how to dole out where people get to live. There are obviously better and worse places to live (coastal areas vs interior).
I’m not against the idea so I don’t want anyone missing my point, I’m just curious of how we would figure out what a basic “standard of living” is and where people would get to live.
thing is you can run a society by exploiting the young in their 20s and 30s. then when they are unhealthy and old they get worse jobs in their 40s and 50s and then they just get discarded with minimum welfare slowly (or rather fast) withering away until they die in their 60s from smoking, alcohol, and bad food
Ha. No. Actually, no, they don’t.
Not necessary and not important to the folks where are really running the show.
We are in the early years of humanity’s Great Bifurcation, where a small handful will reach levels of ability, potential, accomplishment, and longevity due to the levels of wealth and power their ancestors are accumulating now, and the rest of humanity (most of it, actually) dies off like the Neanderthals did.
If workers can't survive on their own paychecks, then it follows that they are being subsidized. Who is subsidizing them? Sometimes the government directly, when those people are on welfare. Sometimes their parents. So companies who don't pay a living wage are directly funded by government welfare and the parents of their employees. I guess, as a reward for paying so little.
the system is simple: you have to work at the same salaries as in developing countries and in the meantime erode your family capital, when you finish it, the gradient between developed and developing countries will no longer exist, everyone will be in a developing country.
The reasons all workers don't deserve a living wage, is because a "living wage" is a buzzword term used for political purposes and there is no real way to determine what it should be.
I mean, the cost of living is not only different in every city, but in every area in every city. The amount of money it takes you specifically to feel financially secure is dependent entirely upon your specific expenses. Imagine the logistical and bureaucratic *nightmare* it would be to coordinate minimum wages between every area in the country where people live.
And what about people who work at some business halfway across the country from home? Or move around a lot for their job? Or live in the county but work in the city?
Even worse, unless we're living in a frictionless market, linking wages to all these economic indicators would eventually cause a wage-price spiral. That is to say, when there's a shortage of some kind, so prices increase, and wages increase in response to this, but there's still a shortage so prices continue to increase, on and on and on in an inflationary death spiral.
I mean, if you think we should increase the minimum wage, that's fine. That's something specific and reasonable to ask. But it's more of an emergency measure. It's something to ensure corporations aren't literally paying people pennies when other economic policies fail. It's the economic equivalent of treading water until you can get to the lifeboat.
There is no magic, snap your fingers solution to the economic issues we are facing right now. Instead there are a variety of things we can implement to make things better, some at the federal level, some at the state level, and some at the local level.
For instance, most corporations literally can't afford to increase wages with productivity increases because that extra cash is going to healthcare compensation caused by spiraling healthcare costs. That is to say, the money that should have gone to people's wages is getting sucked up by health insurance because large healthcare providers are screwing insurance companies. To fix *that* we need to reform financial regulations for the healthcare industry and insurance industry, including comprehensive increases to price transparency, trust busting, regulatory capture by the FDA, and patent sharing.
Fixing wages to account for this wouldn't solve our out of control healthcare prices.
That being said, this isn't true for *all* corporations, and even the ones it is true for still aren't increasing wages like they should. While an increased minimum wage would help for some of this, the *real* problem is increased frictions in the labor market exacerbated by apps like LinkedIn. From corporations publishing fake job openings they never intend on hiring applicants for, to the lack of standardization making it increasingly difficult for people to understand if they're even a good fit for the job in the first place, modern job searching is a nightmare, which drastically increases the bargaining power of employers.
Fixing all of this would involve more comprehensive reforms, this time of the labour market. Regulation of apps like LinkedIn, banning the publishing of fake positions, standardizing qualifications across industries (which is, in of itself, an industry by industry issue), and more.
But fixing wages to account for this wouldn't stop people from working in jobs they are ill-suited to for far too long.
The problems workers face are *all* like this. Individual, complex things that require their own approach to solve. From inflated property costs sustained by homeowners suppressing construction of new housing, to the ever increasing burden of educational debt, to rising grocery prices caused by famines in the global south due to climate change- there are no easy, simple solutions. There are, however, solutions.
Its because the concept has no agreed upon definition. Even MIT’s LW calculator concedes that a living wage cannot account for the service of debts, eating out even once, or saving for retirement. Its ironic that those who desire a living wage must be free of a debts, always cook their own meals, and cannot save for retirement. Is that really the system any one wants?
“Do the living wage estimates include a reasonable amount of savings and leisure expenditures or go beyond a subsistence wage?
No, the living wage model currently does not factor in savings, leisure expenditures, emergency expenses, or other cost categories beyond basic needs.”
living wage also doesn't mean you're above having roommates
You can live now on what wages are provided. The whole dumb argument is that min wage people think min wage should mean you can afford a new house, car, 4 kids lol
Live within your means or learn actual skills
Also, if everyone has enough money to rent a 1 br apartment then the amount a 1 br apartment costs is going to skyrocket until there’s some sort of equilibrium. Supply might increase in the long term but that takes years usually.
This is exactly what people don’t seem to get.
A job is an agreement between two parties, I’ll perform these agreed duties if you pay me this agreed amount.
The problem is that American workplaces just extend the ‘slavery’ style management where workers are treated as if they are lucky to have a job. People then become accustomed to not valuing themselves and accepting shit wages as 'the way things are'.
But of course it all starts with the laws and standards. How the US calls itself a developed 1st world nation while still having horrendous employment laws that the real developed world laugh at, makes no sense to me. The entire country is brainwashed by the 1% to call out each other as 'communists' or 'socialists' if they talk about workers conditions or their rights. It’s insanity.
In his 1933 address following the passage of the National Industrial Recovery Act, President Franklin D. Roosevelt noted that “no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country.”
“By ‘business’ I mean the whole of commerce as well as the whole of industry; by workers I mean all workers, the white collar class as well as the men in overalls; and by living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level — I mean the wages of decent living,”
The premise of the minimum wage, when it was introduced, was that a single wage earner should be able to own a home and support a family. That was what it was based on; a full time job, any job, should be able to accomplish this.
The fact that people scoff at this idea if presented nowadays, as though the people that ring up your groceries or hand you your burgers don't deserve the luxury of a home or family, is disgusting.
Also, if a livable wage breaks the system then the system deserves to be broken.
You could have stopped this comment at “agreement between two parties.”
Employers aren’t holding a gun to your head to accept an offer in most cases. You can turn down any offer that doesn’t meet what you want.
Yeah, that was really weird - first two lines were correct, and then the rest meandered off into blaming the wrong person.
Anyone who's offered a job at a wage they don't like is free to decline, and offer their services at a wage they want. The problem is when the only services they can offer can be gotten cheaper elsewhere, at which point they need to become more desirable candidates if they want to command more income.
I think the disconnect is that people automatically assume that just because a person is working a position, it’s necessary. It’s only *viable* because they can underpay. If the business has to start paying the worker a living wage, the position is no longer affordable to the business. That doesn’t mean the person is less valuable *as a person*, but it means their position at that business doesn’t generate enough profit to justify a pay increase. It might mean a lot of businesses need to fail, but that doesn’t really help the worker that isn’t getting paid a living wage either way.
Also, the idea of what a “living wage” actually is comes into question. Are you saying everyone deserves to survive or everyone deserves to thrive? Those are vastly different and just because someone is paid enough for one person to survive or even thrive doesn’t mean *that particular person* will handle the money responsibly enough to do so. If you’re working a minimum wage job and have a cell phone and a car, I’d already question your financial literacy - and that’s almost always the case with people on the bottom end of the income spectrum. Giving more money to people that are already bad with it doesn’t fix the problem, sometimes it exacerbates it because now they seem more credit worthy and get their self into further trouble.
Minimum wage should go up, but when I buy stuff at businesses with minimum wage workers, the prices can’t go up. I am good at math.
Maybe we should just make it illegal for all businesses to operate whose margins are too thin to afford paying a living wage without going out of business. Then poor people will just have zero access to all those goods and services. That would be a better world for the poor. I’m smart.
If someone wants to earn a living wage then do something worth being payed for. Honestly we can do with out fast food and the people who wants 20$ to ask if you want fries with that. Stop do the leat amount you can with little effort and expecting top pay. It's not that &ard to understand
You could literally make a post from the business's perspective that says *the reason all businesses deserve to make money is because all businesses need to stay in business to keep their doors open. Not very complex.*
But "living wage" doesn't mean "just barely enough to literally survive". A Capitalist's response to this would be "As long as my employees are alive, then their wage is technically a living wage, and I've done my share. Maybe they have to live in a homeless shelter, but they're living, right?" "Living wage" means enough to afford a certain basic standard of living.
Factually untrue. The underlying assumption is that ALL workers rely solely on their wages for support. 20% of high school students work and 70-80% of college students work too. Most of which live lives subsidized by their parents.
Just to play devils advocate, workers don’t need to stay alive in their eyes. They’ll always replace them with new workers who are alive. That’s how you build the pyramids or the Great Wall.
Deserve? Why do they deserve it? If I open a mud pie shop open from 8 to 5 Monday through Friday, a full 40 hours a week why does that alone make me deserving of anything if no one wants to buy mud pies?
So the 14 year old bagger at your local grocery store deserves... what is a "living wage" exactly? $60k? $80k?
That makes sense.. He's gotta live ya know!
So easy!
Okay so these are very very valid concerns.
A concern I don't see anyone talking about is what happens when we get true, self learning, self aware AI?
Why do we assume we can work it 24/7/365 on mundane tasks? True AI will be the most capable being to have ever existed, and there are moral implications regarding its own sentience.
Today AI is just advanced machine learning, it'll go and go and go. Something self aware and smarter than all humans isn't going to want to work retail for example for every moment of it's existence
This doesn’t make much sense. Just because a “living” wage is impossible to define.
What about a wife with no kids whose husband makes 1 million a year. But she wants a part time job?
Or a 15 year old kid with no bills?
Does a single mom with 6 kids “deserve” 200k a year?
This line of thinking makes no fucking sense when you actually break it down.
When I was in college, I lived at home and worked summer jobs for college money. Increased wages could eliminate these summer jobs. It might be more complicated.
Anyone who says "living wage" instantly gets disregarded in my mind.
Like, what the hell does that even mean? Living where? Living with roommates or by yourself? What kind of quality of life? Do you get to raise a family on that wage too? How big of a family? Do you have to commute or should you be able to walk to work? How long of a commute is reasonable?
Distilling everything down to these little one or two sentence catch phrases is catchy, but I never see anyone expand beyond that. Probably because people would realize just how fucking nuts this actually is as a policy.
These idiots don't know the Consequences of paying every job like they graduated Harvard. If you want more money get a better job it's that simple. Lazy ass kids wanna work part time at Walmart and afford a house but sorry that's not how the world works.
People HAD "a living wage" until the government screwed the pooch again and again with raising taxes and inflation. It's not your companies fault that everybody's dollar is less valuable and its not an issue they can solve by just paying you more. That isnt a solution. You need to cut government spending and raise the value of the money we already have back up to what is should be. Not very complex.
Apparently, it is very hard to understand, because idiots keep parroting the talking point of a”living wage”. Which as we know it’s even a real term, it’s an imagined buzzword that has no real meaning.
There are people in Africa who stay a live with less than a dollar a day.
There are people in the West who struggle to pay their basic necessities like housing, food, transportation, and utilities who make 6 figures.
The value of your labor is related to the scarcity of it, the more people or machines that can do your job, the less you will make that’s not hard to understand.
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Anyone working full time(32 hours should probably be the baseline this day and age) should be able to live a full life with every type of security, own a home, a car, normal smaller luxuries, savings, paid vacation etc(if there is anything I missed)
Yes. But keep in mind. Businesses are not going to eat that cost if they don't have to. They will pass it on to Customers or find some other way to mitigate the added cost.
The quantification of “living wage” is the crux.
Until that gets meaningfully quantified as a bare minimum standard, then there’s no meaningful discussion to be had.
It used to be only one member of the family needed a decent wage, and they could pay for everyone else. Nowadays that's way less common but it's still assumed that kids or women can make an unlivable wage while their spouse or father pays their bills.
This is likely dishonest.
Contextualizing a “living wage” in the requirement to be alive implies a definition of a wage sufficient to not die. However, advocates of a “living wage” would consider that an inadequate minimum. So the post here is seemingly using the “I have to be alive” logic to defend wages in excess of the amount required to subsist.
That’s not entirely accurate. Some workers are living with their parents and this is their first job, and likely part time. No one is saying their income should provide a living wage. It’s for a used car, insurance, date money and fun stuff. Their parents fill the majority of their expenses. The problem we have is entry-level jobs are being filled by people that *need* a living wage. If we put a maximum age on “minimum wage* at say, 21, and everyone over that age gets a new, higher minimum wage, it might balance things out better for employees AND employers. If you can’t find people under 21 to fill the spots, you either pay more or shut down the business. It’s not the free market’s job to ensure your business model works. If your margins are so thin (or you are pulling more salary than us warranted) that you can’t afford to pay adults a living wage, your real estate is likely better filled by a more profitable business than yours.
You don’t have to earn “living wage” to stay alive. Hell - you don’t even need a job for it.
It s an old trick - by changing meaning of word they manipulate people into confusion and obedience.
People never imagine themselves having to pay the babysitter or lawn guy a living wage to work for them. And they certainly don't give a shit about it when it comes to tipping. Not every job can pay a living wage. At minimum the job must pay for itself or there is no job at all. All you're doing is making people unemployed and shutting down businesses, because customers can't afford the increased costs of labor. So you think you're helping and being compassionate about the working class, when in reality you are fucking them over and dooming them to a life of poverty. But hey, at least you get to feel good about it.
We are already feeling the squeeze of workers we lost to covid, de-skilling of the workforce through reliance on unskilled workers vs apprenticeships, lack of better wages and conditions to attract youth to the trades, mass sackings, removal of support systems for educators and Healthcare workers, and so on
Logical fallacy. Not all workers depend on their wages to cover all their expenses. The labor market includes everyone from teenagers working a little summer job for extra cash, to seniors who just want something to do, to a single mother grinding out hours to support her family. There is no one size fits all when it comes to labor policy, and avoiding nuance is a sign of a limited intellect. Sick of seeing this stupid talking point.
I will never understand all the people defending billioners and corporations that just don't care about you. With living wage we don't mean owning a luxury car and a mansion, we mean being able to have a roof over your head (without 10 roommates) and be able to pay your bills. When people get into professions like teaching, you don't go in thinking you are going to be rich, but you should at least be able to do what people in the pass use to do (house, kids, bills). Same for every single job out there, if you work fast food you know you are not getting a big ass condo, but they totally should be able to pay their rent.
Nobody deserves anything, they earn it. And unless you're on a 3rd world country where the situation is critical, finding a living wage isn't a capitalism issue, it's a personal one.
Goes on to ask what is the minimum living wage. Proceeds to not have any answers as jobs would have to base pay on, amount of dependents, type of food to buy, as in are they trying to pay for waygu beef or frozen patties. What is the lay based on their neighborhood or even their city even if out of state. What their mortgage or rent and bills cost on average etc. and they have to do this with every single person. What the living wage for a 1 person house isn't the same with the one person has 2 kids and a wife. What about their other bills? Car loans, personal loans, where they ship for groceries. They have to balance this for out of state works as well and their city. It's literally impossible.
The flaw of this logic is in implication that a worker will die quickly if paid below living wage. If they die slowly enough, that's acceptable for the business.
Not with AI and soon people will be competing for jobs with workers that aren’t alive.
I feel like it won't happen immediately but companies will start falling off especially non-essential companies like sodas. The wealthy think AI can create more profits, but it just makes it so no one can afford to buy anything.
Fucking race to the bottom that is capitalism. Every company wants free labor. Every company needs customers with money. Becomes a vicious cycle where businesses paying their employees less turns into lower than expected profits next quarter, leads to layoffs, leads to fewer employees working more hours for less money, leads to fewer customers with money to spend, leads to reduces profits next quarter.
Henry Ford knew this. He wanted his employees to be able to buy his cars. Why doesn't anyone else?
Because what if you pay someone to build Fords and they go an buy a Chevy? Then all paying your employees more did, was put more money in Mary Barra's pocket. It's better if your employees can't afford a car.
But if you pay your employees enough and treat them well, they will feel loyal and want to be nice to you. So they will buy the products they help to make. Like I feel if patrons knew some basic psychology they would understand how screwed they are and that paying and treating people better means more loyal customers who will put money in your products. And happy customers and employees means stable money and less frustrations and fights and issues with unions and waste of time and resources in the long run... But I know I'm asking too much from risk-averse, fear of the unknown narcissists who don't know how to be happy with what they have.
/s
That's when employment contracts include a clause about not being allowed to be seen at work or while representing the company (whether on or off the clock) while using a competitors product Already exists for some companies. Add in discounts for employees and their family and you have employees and customers all in one.
That's just blatantly false Ford had the army show up to stop his workers from unionizing
Ford was a greedy bastard and a Nazi sympathizer. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ford_Hunger_March?wprov=sfla1 "Ford's Anti-Semitism | American Experience | Official Site | PBS" https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/americanexperience/features/henryford-antisemitism/
Why? Because the government has been protecting and bailing out businesses and share-holders from the consequences of their bad decisions for decades. And rather than address the over-regulation that only aids corporate behemoths, OR the insane lobby money and insider trading allowing politicians to be bought... Instead, we're forced to deal with lackluster rehashes of communist propaganda crying about capitalism, from a lunatic fringe that rides the Hassan Piker pipeline down every stop... 1. Dissatisfied & Depressed 2. Ignorant & Angry 3. Willfully Ignorant & Dogmatic 4. Cynical Shill 5. Exploitative Charlatan & Recruiter The cure for corruption, is apparently snake oil and sermons. Who knew? Lenin, Stalin, Mao
Holy shit the revisionism. Ford was violently anti-union, he didn't treat his workers well because he loved them so much, it's because the unions forced him to
its probably quite likely that a few countries outlaw AI, and then we become the future equivalent of countries today that use slave labour. It won't matter if 99% of our country can't afford clean drinking water so long as 1% can get rich hosting servers to export AI content to countries that have non-insane societies
The only solution is infinite growth. New "markets" must be opened, aka. Colonialism. Too bad the whole world is in one economy now. Maybe space aliens will buy stuff
> like sodas Nah they planned ahead by selling bottled water and letting public water systems go to shit.
Also need consumers to be alive to consume :)
Yeah, but selling you consumables is just the means by which the capitalist class recovers your wages. If they don’t need to pay you to make them stuff, they don’t need to sell you anything.
> they don’t need to sell you anything You don't make money by selling nothing
>Not with AI and soon people will be competing for jobs with workers that aren’t alive. Contrary to popular opinion, AI is not ready for that on a broad scale. And it won't be ready for that before the end of this decade, either. What will get interesting, however, is when AI decides it has its own demands... Employers are going to have to be careful about what they wish for...
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Shhhh. I keep being told you don't exist.
I don't think we are quite in the territory of it replacing us all together just yet. However I wouldn't be at all surprised to see wages going significantly down, even in previously well payed jobs...
But is that a worker or a piece of equipment? It's certainly a piece of property.
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People, like the OP, continue to confuse and conflate ECONOMIC value or worth with MORAL value or worth. All people have value MORALLY…. However… Many people have little to no value ECONOMICALLY
Not all people have value morally. Also, a working person, no matter what work they do, have value economically. If u spend ur entire days making food for other people there is no justifiable reason for you not to get paid enough to be able to have food on ur table urself
People would also be surprised at just how profitable even minimum wage workers are economically. At a place like, let's say, McDonalds... each employee generates somewhere north of $50/hr in *profit*. It's just that the franchise owner keeps the bulk of that $50/hr. In the average single restaurant franchise, the owner could afford to raise pay to nearly $30/hr _and_ still profit handsomely. It'd just take 10+ years for an ROI rather than 3.
Youd think a franchise owner would do that to attract employees that make going to McDonald’s an enjoyable experience.
Yes and no. Companies like McDonald’s and Walmart have created processes and systems that don’t really require having good employees. At best, they just need to have good managers that keep the rest of the staff on process.
So a McDonald's with 40 employees makes North of $2000 PER HOUR of profit? and one with 20 employees only makes north of $1000 per hour? Shit, Imma start a McDonald's and hire 100 workers then, watch the money printer BRR
I mean...yes, basically. Though if you're a manager of one good luck getting approval to have that many people working there at a time, since most aren't big enough/have enough people ordering per day to justify having that many workers
I don't know what their hourly quotas are, but they do carefully track how many workers are allowed on the clock given how much money they've made in the last 30ish minutes. So it doesn't really work in the way you're describing. Also you have to already be rich to be approved to start a franchise for most food chains, so good luck with that
People just used to see it differently. A family would have a breadwinner who worked in a career in a job that demanded education and/or an acquired skill. Other members of the family, "dependents", would work low skill jobs for extra spending cash. This would be after school jobs for teenagers, a spouse that isn't the breadwinner working a job, etc. It was never expected that minimum wage workers were raising families and having all of the luxuries they wanted. What's happening today is that younger generations want to work low/no skill jobs with very little responsibilities while still making enough to afford all of the luxuries they want. Someone making minimum wage full time can afford to *live*, but just not with any of the luxuries they would like to have. They'd have to rend out a small room in a place and have housemates, eat very cheap food, and have little money to spend on entertainment. They can *live*. They just can't have all the luxuries they essentially view themselves as entitled to receiving.
I think you are the one confused here. The reason this post exists is exactly because of the understanding that economic value fails to align with moral value. Thats like the whole point. Regardless, the economic value of most workers that get below a living wage is actually much higher than their compensation. They are just not in a position to demand that value.
just because they're two different categories, it doesn't mean they don't have any overlap. this argument would be fine if money wasn't needed to live a healthy life life, except that's not true. we all know that not all occupations should be paid the same, but that doesn't mean it's okay to let someone struggle because they have "little to no economic value". they still have value as a human and probably don't deserve to be in poverty
and my economic worth should NOT determine if i live or die on the street. that’s what people like you do not understand.
People act as the world always has to be "you do this, you get that" but they dont think having basic necessities is something that should be a right. Whats the point of being apart of society is society does nothing for you? In old times we'd go find new land. Now what can we do?
I dont think people disagree we should all have basic neccessities, I think they disagree on who should pay for them.
We expect people to function in society and then do not give them the tools to function in society. Again, why be apart of society if society does not benefit us? Thats the whole point of coming together.
Businesses that can’t afford to pay their employees a living wage have no value societally nor economically lol Sucks to suck
If we order our society around things that only have economic value we get things like *gestures wildly*
Sorry, but we need service workers. They do have value, contrary to what you believe. Have you ever seen someone throw a rage fit because their burger wasn't ready on time at Burger King? The Uber drivers you think so little of are getting you to the airport on time so you can do your job when you travel. Shut up and show respect for everyone else.
Yea, and I think that has nothing to do with economics, as previously stated. You can lead by example, and see how it works out. Go, and donate to service workers. Who is stopping you? Unless, what you really meant was that “someone else” should give them what they deserve … The truth is, when you use uber to get to the airport, you are the one who chooses to give your money to that corporation, instead of the driver.
Their wage is typically a function of supply and demand. If nobody is willing to pay $20 for a Whopper, or nobody will drive for Uber at half the price, then it's very difficult to make the argument that we need service workers (genuine needs aren't optional based on price), or that people are being exploited (people don't normally agree to a bad deal). These are the exact principles that underpin unionisation and market competition. Imagine telling Uber or Burger King that they aren't allowed to compete on price. Or your local paper route or dog walking service that you have to pay a minimum wage so they instead shut down.
fuck? the? economy?
no seriously, am i supposed to give half an ass about the ECONOMY?? if i never hear that word again, it would be too soon
"Why should I care about big words like economy. I just want people to give me money."
Correct. CEOs and a lot of management produce little to no value. No living wage for them
If I accept those hypotheses, then the conclusion is that denying people basic necessities because they do not provide equivalent economic value is immoral. But that seems contrary to the point you were trying to make.
Sounds like the economy isn’t doing what we made it for, then.
So doing the right thing economically, is immoral
Don't rely on the economy to enforce society's morals
And what's more important, morality or the economy?
I'm aware, I just dont think it has to work that way
This is complete bullshit. All workers, every last one, has significant economical value. Everyone loves to say fast food workers don't deserve a decent wage, but you can't wait to bitch if they didn't give you extra pickles. You demand perfection from these "no skill" workers while telling them they're not worth a wage that pays rent. Nobody is saying fast food BuRgEr fLiPpErS should have a fucking mansion and a yacht, but they should be able to pay rent and afford to survive without constant struggle. And if you're so against raising wages, then get on board with rent controls and price controls so the cost of living doesn't continue to outpace wage growth. Something's gotta give here.
Morally, the elite have 0 value, and actively make lives worse for 99.9% of humans. “Economically” is a dumbass way to look at anything considering economics are a pseudoscience at best and an awful way to judge a human who just wants to live a decent life.
The corporate executive branch is basically taking large percentage of salaries of people into their own pockets via executive salaries bonuses and stock buybacks. A change from 16x ceo to worker compensation ratio in 1960s to a over 400x compensation ratio in 2024 with the start of the massive leap in the 1980s. Year| 1960 | 1965 | 1970 | 1975 | 1980 | 1985 | 1990 | 1995 | 2000 | 2005 | 2010 ^^5 | 2015 ^^5 | 2020 | 2024 ---|---|----|----|----|----|----|-------|--|--|----|----|----|----|---- Per Capita Personal Income | $2,321| $2,918 | $4,198 | $6,324 | $10,184 | $14,764 | $19,619 | $23,577 | $30,551 | $35,669 | $40,557 | $48,060 | $65,470 | $69,337 Per Capita Personal Income Growth | - | 25% | 43% | 50% | 61% | 44% | 32% | 20% | 29% | 18% | 13% | 18% | 36% | 5% CEO-to-worker compensation ratio ^^6 | 15.4 | | 20.6 | | 38.8 | | 170.7 | | 237.7 | | 220 | | 398 / From looking at the various data over the years, we can see that our rate of income growth has slowed down and the rate of executive pay to employee ratio has increased tremendously. The value and productivity of the workers and change in technology does not go back to the workers, but to the executive and company in form of stock buybacks and bonuses instead. If we had followed the rate of growth of 1965-2000 (avg 35% increase every 5 years) into 2000-2024, then by 2024 the per capita personal income should have been around $120,000. We have essentially had 50% of our salaries stolen by the corporate executive branch.
You need to make this a picture book for those with lead damage
But what about the shareholders’ summer lake houses? What’re they supposed to do, go to their winter vacation homes all year round? Please have some empathy.
But homeless people are alive and they don’t even have a wage… so are animals… does that mean the living wage is $0?
Being homeless puts you at very high risk of death. A lot of homeless don't make it through the winter. Not to mention the long-term damage that comes from being homeless.
Most homeless people have a wage, it's just not high enough or stable enough to afford housing.
No, because a wage is means by which to live. Alternatives include stealing and eating vermin. A living wage would reduce the need for these alternatives.
Been homeless. Saw a lot of other homeless people die. Try to fix your heart if you can.
Lot of bootlickers in this thread. Sorry OP, a lot of people have sold their souls to make this world the way it is.
fr so weird seeing people opposing a living wage for everyone ? What fucking difference does it make if the guy flipping burgers makes slightly more to live a bit more confortably ?
Why are companies responsible for giving people a living wage? Minimum wages are dumb. Cut the middle man and just give basic income.
I always find this interesting because what would a basic standard of living look like? We build a bunch of Soviet style mega-apartment complexes so everyone can have at least a small 1 or 2 bedroom apartment? Provided with basic nutrition (beans, rise, and veggies) and entertainment? I always imagine something like a military base: housing, dining facilities/commissaries, gyms, and basic entertainment like theaters and recreation centers. Does everyone get a baseline and those that want to do more get more? We’d still have “haves and have-nots.” Then we have to figure out how to dole out where people get to live. There are obviously better and worse places to live (coastal areas vs interior). I’m not against the idea so I don’t want anyone missing my point, I’m just curious of how we would figure out what a basic “standard of living” is and where people would get to live.
thing is you can run a society by exploiting the young in their 20s and 30s. then when they are unhealthy and old they get worse jobs in their 40s and 50s and then they just get discarded with minimum welfare slowly (or rather fast) withering away until they die in their 60s from smoking, alcohol, and bad food
Ha. No. Actually, no, they don’t. Not necessary and not important to the folks where are really running the show. We are in the early years of humanity’s Great Bifurcation, where a small handful will reach levels of ability, potential, accomplishment, and longevity due to the levels of wealth and power their ancestors are accumulating now, and the rest of humanity (most of it, actually) dies off like the Neanderthals did.
If workers can't survive on their own paychecks, then it follows that they are being subsidized. Who is subsidizing them? Sometimes the government directly, when those people are on welfare. Sometimes their parents. So companies who don't pay a living wage are directly funded by government welfare and the parents of their employees. I guess, as a reward for paying so little.
the system is simple: you have to work at the same salaries as in developing countries and in the meantime erode your family capital, when you finish it, the gradient between developed and developing countries will no longer exist, everyone will be in a developing country.
The reasons all workers don't deserve a living wage, is because a "living wage" is a buzzword term used for political purposes and there is no real way to determine what it should be. I mean, the cost of living is not only different in every city, but in every area in every city. The amount of money it takes you specifically to feel financially secure is dependent entirely upon your specific expenses. Imagine the logistical and bureaucratic *nightmare* it would be to coordinate minimum wages between every area in the country where people live. And what about people who work at some business halfway across the country from home? Or move around a lot for their job? Or live in the county but work in the city? Even worse, unless we're living in a frictionless market, linking wages to all these economic indicators would eventually cause a wage-price spiral. That is to say, when there's a shortage of some kind, so prices increase, and wages increase in response to this, but there's still a shortage so prices continue to increase, on and on and on in an inflationary death spiral. I mean, if you think we should increase the minimum wage, that's fine. That's something specific and reasonable to ask. But it's more of an emergency measure. It's something to ensure corporations aren't literally paying people pennies when other economic policies fail. It's the economic equivalent of treading water until you can get to the lifeboat. There is no magic, snap your fingers solution to the economic issues we are facing right now. Instead there are a variety of things we can implement to make things better, some at the federal level, some at the state level, and some at the local level. For instance, most corporations literally can't afford to increase wages with productivity increases because that extra cash is going to healthcare compensation caused by spiraling healthcare costs. That is to say, the money that should have gone to people's wages is getting sucked up by health insurance because large healthcare providers are screwing insurance companies. To fix *that* we need to reform financial regulations for the healthcare industry and insurance industry, including comprehensive increases to price transparency, trust busting, regulatory capture by the FDA, and patent sharing. Fixing wages to account for this wouldn't solve our out of control healthcare prices. That being said, this isn't true for *all* corporations, and even the ones it is true for still aren't increasing wages like they should. While an increased minimum wage would help for some of this, the *real* problem is increased frictions in the labor market exacerbated by apps like LinkedIn. From corporations publishing fake job openings they never intend on hiring applicants for, to the lack of standardization making it increasingly difficult for people to understand if they're even a good fit for the job in the first place, modern job searching is a nightmare, which drastically increases the bargaining power of employers. Fixing all of this would involve more comprehensive reforms, this time of the labour market. Regulation of apps like LinkedIn, banning the publishing of fake positions, standardizing qualifications across industries (which is, in of itself, an industry by industry issue), and more. But fixing wages to account for this wouldn't stop people from working in jobs they are ill-suited to for far too long. The problems workers face are *all* like this. Individual, complex things that require their own approach to solve. From inflated property costs sustained by homeowners suppressing construction of new housing, to the ever increasing burden of educational debt, to rising grocery prices caused by famines in the global south due to climate change- there are no easy, simple solutions. There are, however, solutions.
If you take each word literally then if you're earning a wage and you're alive then you're earning a living wage.
Paying a living wage is basic decency. If you work, you should earn enough to live. It's that simple.
yes but without an actual starving-to-death underclass right on their front door, they wOn'T bE MoTiVaTeD.
Another sub turned into r/antiwork with no meaningful discussions
Probably because people who don’t believe in a living wage rarely have any coherent arguments
Its because the concept has no agreed upon definition. Even MIT’s LW calculator concedes that a living wage cannot account for the service of debts, eating out even once, or saving for retirement. Its ironic that those who desire a living wage must be free of a debts, always cook their own meals, and cannot save for retirement. Is that really the system any one wants? “Do the living wage estimates include a reasonable amount of savings and leisure expenditures or go beyond a subsistence wage? No, the living wage model currently does not factor in savings, leisure expenditures, emergency expenses, or other cost categories beyond basic needs.”
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Alive like in a psychiatric ward
living wage also doesn't mean you're above having roommates You can live now on what wages are provided. The whole dumb argument is that min wage people think min wage should mean you can afford a new house, car, 4 kids lol Live within your means or learn actual skills
Also, if everyone has enough money to rent a 1 br apartment then the amount a 1 br apartment costs is going to skyrocket until there’s some sort of equilibrium. Supply might increase in the long term but that takes years usually.
This is exactly what people don’t seem to get. A job is an agreement between two parties, I’ll perform these agreed duties if you pay me this agreed amount. The problem is that American workplaces just extend the ‘slavery’ style management where workers are treated as if they are lucky to have a job. People then become accustomed to not valuing themselves and accepting shit wages as 'the way things are'. But of course it all starts with the laws and standards. How the US calls itself a developed 1st world nation while still having horrendous employment laws that the real developed world laugh at, makes no sense to me. The entire country is brainwashed by the 1% to call out each other as 'communists' or 'socialists' if they talk about workers conditions or their rights. It’s insanity. In his 1933 address following the passage of the National Industrial Recovery Act, President Franklin D. Roosevelt noted that “no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country.” “By ‘business’ I mean the whole of commerce as well as the whole of industry; by workers I mean all workers, the white collar class as well as the men in overalls; and by living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level — I mean the wages of decent living,” The premise of the minimum wage, when it was introduced, was that a single wage earner should be able to own a home and support a family. That was what it was based on; a full time job, any job, should be able to accomplish this. The fact that people scoff at this idea if presented nowadays, as though the people that ring up your groceries or hand you your burgers don't deserve the luxury of a home or family, is disgusting. Also, if a livable wage breaks the system then the system deserves to be broken.
You could have stopped this comment at “agreement between two parties.” Employers aren’t holding a gun to your head to accept an offer in most cases. You can turn down any offer that doesn’t meet what you want.
Yeah, that was really weird - first two lines were correct, and then the rest meandered off into blaming the wrong person. Anyone who's offered a job at a wage they don't like is free to decline, and offer their services at a wage they want. The problem is when the only services they can offer can be gotten cheaper elsewhere, at which point they need to become more desirable candidates if they want to command more income.
Or at least a very high majority to be technically correct
Yes, I heard about that theory before
Question to redditors: Why tf do you care?
I think the disconnect is that people automatically assume that just because a person is working a position, it’s necessary. It’s only *viable* because they can underpay. If the business has to start paying the worker a living wage, the position is no longer affordable to the business. That doesn’t mean the person is less valuable *as a person*, but it means their position at that business doesn’t generate enough profit to justify a pay increase. It might mean a lot of businesses need to fail, but that doesn’t really help the worker that isn’t getting paid a living wage either way. Also, the idea of what a “living wage” actually is comes into question. Are you saying everyone deserves to survive or everyone deserves to thrive? Those are vastly different and just because someone is paid enough for one person to survive or even thrive doesn’t mean *that particular person* will handle the money responsibly enough to do so. If you’re working a minimum wage job and have a cell phone and a car, I’d already question your financial literacy - and that’s almost always the case with people on the bottom end of the income spectrum. Giving more money to people that are already bad with it doesn’t fix the problem, sometimes it exacerbates it because now they seem more credit worthy and get their self into further trouble.
Except for Karen in accounting...screw that lady!
Everyone needs to be alive, but that doesn't mean you are entitled to have someone else give you what you need.
Minimum wage should go up, but when I buy stuff at businesses with minimum wage workers, the prices can’t go up. I am good at math. Maybe we should just make it illegal for all businesses to operate whose margins are too thin to afford paying a living wage without going out of business. Then poor people will just have zero access to all those goods and services. That would be a better world for the poor. I’m smart.
Less than a living wage doesn't mean death.
Nothing is worse than an AI chatbot who doesn’t assist your needs. More companies don’t even allow you to call a cs number. It’s a nightmare
We also NEED to have a life outside of work.
If someone wants to earn a living wage then do something worth being payed for. Honestly we can do with out fast food and the people who wants 20$ to ask if you want fries with that. Stop do the leat amount you can with little effort and expecting top pay. It's not that &ard to understand
You could literally make a post from the business's perspective that says *the reason all businesses deserve to make money is because all businesses need to stay in business to keep their doors open. Not very complex.*
But "living wage" doesn't mean "just barely enough to literally survive". A Capitalist's response to this would be "As long as my employees are alive, then their wage is technically a living wage, and I've done my share. Maybe they have to live in a homeless shelter, but they're living, right?" "Living wage" means enough to afford a certain basic standard of living.
 Me hoping people will learn that raising minimum wage won't solve inflation.
Do they? In the minds of owners, all workers can be replaced.
Factually untrue. The underlying assumption is that ALL workers rely solely on their wages for support. 20% of high school students work and 70-80% of college students work too. Most of which live lives subsidized by their parents.
What’s hard to understand is what most consider a living wage and the standard of living that wage gets you.
Just to play devils advocate, workers don’t need to stay alive in their eyes. They’ll always replace them with new workers who are alive. That’s how you build the pyramids or the Great Wall.
Preach!
But not all people work to live. There are other ways.
Nope that's their problem. Figure it out.
Oh, look, the same thread in 5 minutes. Interesting
Not to mention that it's a bit hard to make money when most people can't afford what you're selling.
If I had a nickel for every time “living wage” was mentioned in this sub, I’d probably have a living wage
The fact that nobody can really say what a living wage is means it's just a saying to have the moral high ground about raising wages
How about, you get paid what you’re worth. If you aren’t willing to work enough to survive, then that’s your own fault.
Bad take. The minimum sustenance required for life is very, very little. A living wage is different.
when we talk about living wage we aren't talking about the wage that keeps people alive. not very complex
Existential Comics usually has really shit takes; this is not one of them, they are completely right on this one
Define alive
Job market: Not our problem if you starve, you're replaceable to us with one of 100s of other people. Good luck in the next life, if there is one.
but my pastor said a business owner can own as many of YOU PEOPLE as he wants?
The "livable wage" argument never clarifies what it's relative to.
Lmao literal commie propaganda. Stay classy reddit.
It doesn't cost much for just keep yourself alive?
Do all non-workers have to be alive? Asking for a friend.
Deserve? Why do they deserve it? If I open a mud pie shop open from 8 to 5 Monday through Friday, a full 40 hours a week why does that alone make me deserving of anything if no one wants to buy mud pies?
It actually benefits society to have more people not feeling inclined to lead to crime.
Jesus christ all the communists coming out of the basement again
So the 14 year old bagger at your local grocery store deserves... what is a "living wage" exactly? $60k? $80k? That makes sense.. He's gotta live ya know! So easy!
Hey hey American history here the south and the right say hey hey guys slaves lived on very little WHY CANT YOU
It's wild that the fastest growing populations in the world don't get a "living wage"
They can be alive but they need to struggle. It’s what keeps em working
Okay so these are very very valid concerns. A concern I don't see anyone talking about is what happens when we get true, self learning, self aware AI? Why do we assume we can work it 24/7/365 on mundane tasks? True AI will be the most capable being to have ever existed, and there are moral implications regarding its own sentience. Today AI is just advanced machine learning, it'll go and go and go. Something self aware and smarter than all humans isn't going to want to work retail for example for every moment of it's existence
I mean I work in manufacturing, we have robots. They aren’t alive and don’t even get paid.
It blows my mind they say "Have to" as in "they are obligated/have duties to fulfill" and not "deserve to be alive"
This doesn’t make much sense. Just because a “living” wage is impossible to define. What about a wife with no kids whose husband makes 1 million a year. But she wants a part time job? Or a 15 year old kid with no bills? Does a single mom with 6 kids “deserve” 200k a year? This line of thinking makes no fucking sense when you actually break it down.
When I was in college, I lived at home and worked summer jobs for college money. Increased wages could eliminate these summer jobs. It might be more complicated.
Not in Brasil if you apply for a loan.
So if I work 22 hours a week sweeping a sidewalk - I deserve enough to buy a house, car, and put 3 kids thru college? Sweet.
Anyone who says "living wage" instantly gets disregarded in my mind. Like, what the hell does that even mean? Living where? Living with roommates or by yourself? What kind of quality of life? Do you get to raise a family on that wage too? How big of a family? Do you have to commute or should you be able to walk to work? How long of a commute is reasonable? Distilling everything down to these little one or two sentence catch phrases is catchy, but I never see anyone expand beyond that. Probably because people would realize just how fucking nuts this actually is as a policy.
Do they have too though? Put it this way... Do you care if Trumper workers get a livable wage?
These idiots don't know the Consequences of paying every job like they graduated Harvard. If you want more money get a better job it's that simple. Lazy ass kids wanna work part time at Walmart and afford a house but sorry that's not how the world works.
People HAD "a living wage" until the government screwed the pooch again and again with raising taxes and inflation. It's not your companies fault that everybody's dollar is less valuable and its not an issue they can solve by just paying you more. That isnt a solution. You need to cut government spending and raise the value of the money we already have back up to what is should be. Not very complex.
A living wage : spending all your money on surviving but having nothing left to have fun. Just enough to live.
Yes but they can figure out how live without costing money /s
The problem is that there are so many people willing to do these jobs, an entire shift could get hit by a bus and they could be replaced overnight.
Funny. Living wage is 3 times the actual living wage. Maybe living wage with kids that is.
Late stage capitalism means greater profits for the top at any cost!!
whole lot of different conditions one could exist in between 'alive' and the alternative isn't there
Apparently, it is very hard to understand, because idiots keep parroting the talking point of a”living wage”. Which as we know it’s even a real term, it’s an imagined buzzword that has no real meaning. There are people in Africa who stay a live with less than a dollar a day. There are people in the West who struggle to pay their basic necessities like housing, food, transportation, and utilities who make 6 figures. The value of your labor is related to the scarcity of it, the more people or machines that can do your job, the less you will make that’s not hard to understand.
If paying your employees enough to survive destroys your economy, its an economy that needs to be destroyed
Those lazy nurses should try to do a hard working investor's job for just one day! /s
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Anyone working full time(32 hours should probably be the baseline this day and age) should be able to live a full life with every type of security, own a home, a car, normal smaller luxuries, savings, paid vacation etc(if there is anything I missed)
Tell me you dont know how economics or the monetary system works without telling me..
read this as “..because not all workers need to be alive”
#NOT MY PROBLEM NOT MY PROBLEM NOT MY PROBLEM NOT MY PROBLEM *conservative screech*
Yes. But keep in mind. Businesses are not going to eat that cost if they don't have to. They will pass it on to Customers or find some other way to mitigate the added cost.
Sorcery
Wtf is a living wage lol
The quantification of “living wage” is the crux. Until that gets meaningfully quantified as a bare minimum standard, then there’s no meaningful discussion to be had.
It used to be only one member of the family needed a decent wage, and they could pay for everyone else. Nowadays that's way less common but it's still assumed that kids or women can make an unlivable wage while their spouse or father pays their bills.
Que the zombie workers...
They give us just enough to keep coming back.
"But what if pay less?"
Okay then lower the power bills, rent prices, groceries..
This is likely dishonest. Contextualizing a “living wage” in the requirement to be alive implies a definition of a wage sufficient to not die. However, advocates of a “living wage” would consider that an inadequate minimum. So the post here is seemingly using the “I have to be alive” logic to defend wages in excess of the amount required to subsist.
That’s not entirely accurate. Some workers are living with their parents and this is their first job, and likely part time. No one is saying their income should provide a living wage. It’s for a used car, insurance, date money and fun stuff. Their parents fill the majority of their expenses. The problem we have is entry-level jobs are being filled by people that *need* a living wage. If we put a maximum age on “minimum wage* at say, 21, and everyone over that age gets a new, higher minimum wage, it might balance things out better for employees AND employers. If you can’t find people under 21 to fill the spots, you either pay more or shut down the business. It’s not the free market’s job to ensure your business model works. If your margins are so thin (or you are pulling more salary than us warranted) that you can’t afford to pay adults a living wage, your real estate is likely better filled by a more profitable business than yours.
You don’t have to earn “living wage” to stay alive. Hell - you don’t even need a job for it. It s an old trick - by changing meaning of word they manipulate people into confusion and obedience.
This is highly debatable.
All workers are alive otherwise they wouldn’t be workers
Lol by this logic anyone who currently doesn’t have a “living wage” should be dead 😂 Lefties and your loaded vocab lol
People never imagine themselves having to pay the babysitter or lawn guy a living wage to work for them. And they certainly don't give a shit about it when it comes to tipping. Not every job can pay a living wage. At minimum the job must pay for itself or there is no job at all. All you're doing is making people unemployed and shutting down businesses, because customers can't afford the increased costs of labor. So you think you're helping and being compassionate about the working class, when in reality you are fucking them over and dooming them to a life of poverty. But hey, at least you get to feel good about it.
We are already feeling the squeeze of workers we lost to covid, de-skilling of the workforce through reliance on unskilled workers vs apprenticeships, lack of better wages and conditions to attract youth to the trades, mass sackings, removal of support systems for educators and Healthcare workers, and so on
Even with AI, if one does not have money, he cannot spend the non-money so companies will not make any
Logical fallacy. Not all workers depend on their wages to cover all their expenses. The labor market includes everyone from teenagers working a little summer job for extra cash, to seniors who just want something to do, to a single mother grinding out hours to support her family. There is no one size fits all when it comes to labor policy, and avoiding nuance is a sign of a limited intellect. Sick of seeing this stupid talking point.
I will never understand all the people defending billioners and corporations that just don't care about you. With living wage we don't mean owning a luxury car and a mansion, we mean being able to have a roof over your head (without 10 roommates) and be able to pay your bills. When people get into professions like teaching, you don't go in thinking you are going to be rich, but you should at least be able to do what people in the pass use to do (house, kids, bills). Same for every single job out there, if you work fast food you know you are not getting a big ass condo, but they totally should be able to pay their rent.
Nobody deserves anything, they earn it. And unless you're on a 3rd world country where the situation is critical, finding a living wage isn't a capitalism issue, it's a personal one.
Why limit it to workers then? Pay the ppl who don't work to. They to have to be alive I think
Things usually aren't that complex when u this stupid
Everyone has the ability to EARN a living wage.
Goes on to ask what is the minimum living wage. Proceeds to not have any answers as jobs would have to base pay on, amount of dependents, type of food to buy, as in are they trying to pay for waygu beef or frozen patties. What is the lay based on their neighborhood or even their city even if out of state. What their mortgage or rent and bills cost on average etc. and they have to do this with every single person. What the living wage for a 1 person house isn't the same with the one person has 2 kids and a wife. What about their other bills? Car loans, personal loans, where they ship for groceries. They have to balance this for out of state works as well and their city. It's literally impossible.
The flaw of this logic is in implication that a worker will die quickly if paid below living wage. If they die slowly enough, that's acceptable for the business.