Accurate Map of State Minimum wage Across the United States

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Well first, as the original poster was pointing out, the value of the salary, and the value of the labor, are both flexible.

$50,000 a year in California is practically poverty, while being almost upper class in Mississippi.

At the same time, the value of your labor changes dramatically based on a host of things.

One of the big problems with all left-wing ideology, is that they constantly rely on a one-size-fits-all theory of governance.

The tax rate the works in California, should work everywhere. The regulations that work in New Jersey, should work everywhere.

The value of a job... whatever job... is the same everywhere.

Yet in their own lives they never think this way. Your in-laws say "Why don't live your life like we do. Our system works for us!", and you say... I'm not you, and you are not me, and what works for you doesn't work for me.

Right? It's like one-size-fits-all clothing, that everyone hates.

Well this is true of $7.25/hour. Is that an inflated wage? Well it depends. I think the implication that $7.25 can't be an inflated wage, is wrong.

You can be drastically over paid at $7.25. That's why businesses lay of employees, when they are only paying them $7.25 an hour.

The value of your labor is contingent on many.

The primary factor being, what profit you earn the person you are working for.

Let me give you an example. Near where I live is a bread bakery. More like a bread factory really. That's all they do, is make bread. They have big building, and they load up trucks, and deliver bread to all the grocery stores in the area.

They also have a tiny, about the size of a studio apartment, room with a sign in the window, where you can walk in and by fresh bread right from the ovens.

At this small micro-store at the bread bakery, you can get it 30 minutes after it was removed from the ovens.

So I actually knew a girl that worked there, at this micro-store. She would come in, sit at the register, and collect money for sitting. She would get a dozen to two dozen customers in an entire day.

How much in real profit were they getting from selling at most 30 loafs of bread, while paying her minimum wage? Roughly $2 a loaf, $60, and her wage was $58 for 8 hours at $7.25... not including taxes and the cost of benefits.

And honestly, is sitting there, watching TV, with an occasional "would you like that in a bag?", and sliding a credit card on a reader, really worth $7.25 an hour? No it's not.

Now you might ask why the company had such a store at all, if they were not really making a profit. In fact, almost impossible to make a profit, if you include the overhead.

Two reasons: One, the micro store was built 30 years ago, when far fewer stores existed in the area, and thus they had a many more customers. Two is because the micro-store does serve as a sort of advertisement for the brand. People would see the store, and eventually come in out of curiosity, have some really good bread, and then end up buying their brand of bread at the regulator grocery stores.

Regardless, I think you get my point. $7.25 can be a very inflated wage. It depends on many things.

In fact, the value of the labor can differ inside a company, even with exact same jobs.

So in the 90s, I was working at Wendy's, when the minimum wage was $5.25. I think I was getting $6.50 an hour, because I was full time (+50¢/hour), and I was cashier (+25¢/hour), and because you got 25¢/hour raise every six months, and I had been there one year.

So $6.50/hour. Well I found out that the store down town was paying cashiers $10/hours an hour to start. At the time, I had no idea why they paid so much more, but it was annoying to me that other people doing the exact same job, for the exact same company, were getting paid more.

Then one night, that store sent out an SOS for help. I forget what exactly they called it, there was a term for it at that time, where a store sent out a call for help, and any store that could send over spare employees, was supposed to do so, and would be compensated by corporate.

So they sent me.

That store was packed with customers, and 2 or 3 of their employees called off. Packed. Customers everywhere. And it stayed packed right up till closing. People were still trying to enter the store, when they were flipping chairs up on tables, and turning the dining room lights off.

This was entirely different from the Suburban Wendy's I was used to. We had a lunch rush that lasted from 11:30 to 1 PM, and then a dinner stream of people from 5 PM till 7 PM. Before lunch, or between If you had a dozen cars from 10 AM till lunch, or between lunch and dinner... that was busy day.

Place was dead most of the day.

Again, the value of the labor depends on the profits. How much profit is there when your employees are standing around largely idle for half the working day? Not much. So wages are low.

How much profit is there, when the store has people waiting outside the story when the doors open, and is packed the entire day, and still has people trickling in up till closing time? Tons.
So wages are high.

There are many aspects to the value of labor. But the answer is yes, $7.25 can be way over priced. Which is why when the minimum wage went up, tons of people lost their jobs.

In your bread story, you are TOTALLY off base. The work being done by the girl is not HER value. The onus of the situation is the bad business decision of the bakery to continue to have the store despite the low number of customers and sales. The work value of the employee in the store is going to be the same for anyone you put in there due to outside influences they have zero control over. You could put Jeff Bezos in there and he would give the same amount of labor to profit ratio as the girl. So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So I would agree with everything you said... except that final conclusion. Everything you said is correct.... generally.

There are aspects that the girl can control. People who don't show up on time, or do lousy work, sometimes are still worth employing at a lower wage.

One example was at a company where they hired a guy with mental issues. So he could only be counted on to clean the floors. And honestly, that was about it. Well of course they are not going to pay him a regular wage, when he wasn't able to do a regular job. So he needed a job of any kind, and they needed the floors cleaned, so they created a contract position, where he was paid about $10,000 a year, to clean the floors, and that's it.

And this is true throughout all business. Even in minimum wage jobs, you can have this. I've seen it a few times.

I told you that you got an automatic pay raise if you worked consistently for 6 months or more. Well that automatic pay increase, was still dependent on performance. We had people that worked 'full time' but showed up late, left early, disappeared for smoke breaks in the middle of their shift.

They would have their automatic pay raise waived, and be really angry that a year later, they were still earning minimum wage. There is a spot between not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to pay more.

So there are aspects to the value of your labor.

So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So here is the real crux of the problem. What you just said was contradictory. You said it's about running a business that is no longer profitable.... but the reason it is no longer profitable, isn't just because of reduced number of customers.

It is also because the cost of labor has been pushed above the value of the labor. The labor value has gone down some.... at the same time the cost of the labor has increased because of the minimum wage.

Result: Business isn't profitable.

Remember, when they opened that business, the minimum wage was $4.25. You think they could sell enough bread even today, to make a profit if the minimum wage was $4.25? Sure. And it is a perfect job for a high school student, who wants some experience to put on their resume for a future better job, and some spending money during their high school years.

Or even a retiree, that could do this as a retirement job.

And here in the state of Ohio, the minimum wage has been indexed with automatic increases. The Ohio Minimum wage has increased every single year since 2010.

So every single year, that little store is getting less and less profitable, until they finally close it. In fact, I have not been over that way in 10 years now, and I wouldn't be surprised if they closed it already.

When that happens, if it hasn't already, people that could be employed, won't be.

The value of the labor does not increase, just because the minimum wage does.
When the cost of labor, exceeds the value of the labor, the business closes and people lose their jobs.

 

[Lewdog]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Well first, as the original poster was pointing out, the value of the salary, and the value of the labor, are both flexible.

$50,000 a year in California is practically poverty, while being almost upper class in Mississippi.

At the same time, the value of your labor changes dramatically based on a host of things.

One of the big problems with all left-wing ideology, is that they constantly rely on a one-size-fits-all theory of governance.

The tax rate the works in California, should work everywhere. The regulations that work in New Jersey, should work everywhere.

The value of a job... whatever job... is the same everywhere.

Yet in their own lives they never think this way. Your in-laws say "Why don't live your life like we do. Our system works for us!", and you say... I'm not you, and you are not me, and what works for you doesn't work for me.

Right? It's like one-size-fits-all clothing, that everyone hates.

Well this is true of $7.25/hour. Is that an inflated wage? Well it depends. I think the implication that $7.25 can't be an inflated wage, is wrong.

You can be drastically over paid at $7.25. That's why businesses lay of employees, when they are only paying them $7.25 an hour.

The value of your labor is contingent on many.

The primary factor being, what profit you earn the person you are working for.

Let me give you an example. Near where I live is a bread bakery. More like a bread factory really. That's all they do, is make bread. They have big building, and they load up trucks, and deliver bread to all the grocery stores in the area.

They also have a tiny, about the size of a studio apartment, room with a sign in the window, where you can walk in and by fresh bread right from the ovens.

At this small micro-store at the bread bakery, you can get it 30 minutes after it was removed from the ovens.

So I actually knew a girl that worked there, at this micro-store. She would come in, sit at the register, and collect money for sitting. She would get a dozen to two dozen customers in an entire day.

How much in real profit were they getting from selling at most 30 loafs of bread, while paying her minimum wage? Roughly $2 a loaf, $60, and her wage was $58 for 8 hours at $7.25... not including taxes and the cost of benefits.

And honestly, is sitting there, watching TV, with an occasional "would you like that in a bag?", and sliding a credit card on a reader, really worth $7.25 an hour? No it's not.

Now you might ask why the company had such a store at all, if they were not really making a profit. In fact, almost impossible to make a profit, if you include the overhead.

Two reasons: One, the micro store was built 30 years ago, when far fewer stores existed in the area, and thus they had a many more customers. Two is because the micro-store does serve as a sort of advertisement for the brand. People would see the store, and eventually come in out of curiosity, have some really good bread, and then end up buying their brand of bread at the regulator grocery stores.

Regardless, I think you get my point. $7.25 can be a very inflated wage. It depends on many things.

In fact, the value of the labor can differ inside a company, even with exact same jobs.

So in the 90s, I was working at Wendy's, when the minimum wage was $5.25. I think I was getting $6.50 an hour, because I was full time (+50¢/hour), and I was cashier (+25¢/hour), and because you got 25¢/hour raise every six months, and I had been there one year.

So $6.50/hour. Well I found out that the store down town was paying cashiers $10/hours an hour to start. At the time, I had no idea why they paid so much more, but it was annoying to me that other people doing the exact same job, for the exact same company, were getting paid more.

Then one night, that store sent out an SOS for help. I forget what exactly they called it, there was a term for it at that time, where a store sent out a call for help, and any store that could send over spare employees, was supposed to do so, and would be compensated by corporate.

So they sent me.

That store was packed with customers, and 2 or 3 of their employees called off. Packed. Customers everywhere. And it stayed packed right up till closing. People were still trying to enter the store, when they were flipping chairs up on tables, and turning the dining room lights off.

This was entirely different from the Suburban Wendy's I was used to. We had a lunch rush that lasted from 11:30 to 1 PM, and then a dinner stream of people from 5 PM till 7 PM. Before lunch, or between If you had a dozen cars from 10 AM till lunch, or between lunch and dinner... that was busy day.

Place was dead most of the day.

Again, the value of the labor depends on the profits. How much profit is there when your employees are standing around largely idle for half the working day? Not much. So wages are low.

How much profit is there, when the store has people waiting outside the story when the doors open, and is packed the entire day, and still has people trickling in up till closing time? Tons.
So wages are high.

There are many aspects to the value of labor. But the answer is yes, $7.25 can be way over priced. Which is why when the minimum wage went up, tons of people lost their jobs.

In your bread story, you are TOTALLY off base. The work being done by the girl is not HER value. The onus of the situation is the bad business decision of the bakery to continue to have the store despite the low number of customers and sales. The work value of the employee in the store is going to be the same for anyone you put in there due to outside influences they have zero control over. You could put Jeff Bezos in there and he would give the same amount of labor to profit ratio as the girl. So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So I would agree with everything you said... except that final conclusion. Everything you said is correct.... generally.

There are aspects that the girl can control. People who don't show up on time, or do lousy work, sometimes are still worth employing at a lower wage.

One example was at a company where they hired a guy with mental issues. So he could only be counted on to clean the floors. And honestly, that was about it. Well of course they are not going to pay him a regular wage, when he wasn't able to do a regular job. So he needed a job of any kind, and they needed the floors cleaned, so they created a contract position, where he was paid about $10,000 a year, to clean the floors, and that's it.

And this is true throughout all business. Even in minimum wage jobs, you can have this. I've seen it a few times.

I told you that you got an automatic pay raise if you worked consistently for 6 months or more. Well that automatic pay increase, was still dependent on performance. We had people that worked 'full time' but showed up late, left early, disappeared for smoke breaks in the middle of their shift.

They would have their automatic pay raise waived, and be really angry that a year later, they were still earning minimum wage. There is a spot between not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to pay more.

So there are aspects to the value of your labor.

So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So here is the real crux of the problem. What you just said was contradictory. You said it's about running a business that is no longer profitable.... but the reason it is no longer profitable, isn't just because of reduced number of customers.

It is also because the cost of labor has been pushed above the value of the labor. The labor value has gone down some.... at the same time the cost of the labor has increased because of the minimum wage.

Result: Business isn't profitable.

Remember, when they opened that business, the minimum wage was $4.25. You think they could sell enough bread even today, to make a profit if the minimum wage was $4.25? Sure. And it is a perfect job for a high school student, who wants some experience to put on their resume for a future better job, and some spending money during their high school years.

Or even a retiree, that could do this as a retirement job.

And here in the state of Ohio, the minimum wage has been indexed with automatic increases. The Ohio Minimum wage has increased every single year since 2010.

So every single year, that little store is getting less and less profitable, until they finally close it. In fact, I have not been over that way in 10 years now, and I wouldn't be surprised if they closed it already.

When that happens, if it hasn't already, people that could be employed, won't be.

The value of the labor does not increase, just because the minimum wage does. And when the cost of the labor exceed the profitability of the business... people lose their jobs.

About your story with the kid with a mental illness... companies get tax credits for hiring certain groups of people like handicapped, the mentally impaired, and felons. So the company is getting money returned on the back end from the government to make up for the kid not doing enough work to meet the value of his pay.

Edited to add a link: Work Opportunity Tax Credit | Internal Revenue Service

There are so many things I could correct with your statements, but I'm about to go to bed.

 

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

My experience happened to me and around 200 other black , white , yellow and brown men(saudis didnt allow women to work on their jets), who also, left the "comfort" of their homes to go on an adventure that made them hundreds of thousands of dollar but they had to leave the comforts of their homes. Liberal are to lazy, so must stay close to their parents, for security..

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend,

Wow, you cant think of anything that you could "create" that would bring lots of people to your area? You are a worthless fuck arent you....Again my bud has his own business, he brings the people to him....

Pretty simple, if people do not have money to spend, you can't sell your product or services. I see businesses come and go where I live ALL the time. The federal government even tries to build prisons in old coal towns to hopefully bring money into their economy with federal jobs while the feds get cheap land. Even those do not work, as most people that live around the prison do not qualify for a job. Not to mention if you know anything about prison federal jobs, the ones working at other prisons get first shot for a transfer and a lot do it because they will get top seniority there. Then those that transfer or get hired are mostly outside the community, and thus do not inject money into the local economy because they live and spend their money elsewhere... and that is not just an anecdotal story. Those are FACTS I learned during my graduate school courses in Criminology... that I did not earn in my parent's basement.

Then they should go get qualified. If there are no jobs where they are, they need to move.

It's not the Federal governments job, to bring wealth to your community.

When people immigrated here from Ireland to escape famine and joblessness... they were not doing that to come here to sit on their butts, and wait for the American government to feed them, anymore than waiting around for the British government.

They got off their butts, and moved to where the work was. And when they got here to the US, they got their butts in gear, and made a living for themselves.

This is a country where nearly anything is possible. Get qualified if you are not qualified. Get up and get moving, if there is no work where you are.

Stop sitting around waiting for something to improve, and go make something improve.

Go get qualified? With this shitty small town school system? They can't just pick up and move, they don't have the funds to do so. Hell many have long term health issues due to lack of insurance, a lot of which comes from improper diet or poor living conditions that include drinking water with lead in it from all the coal mines poisoning the water. Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia. If you did that then maybe you would understand a bit, but then again I doubt it because you have these ideas so ingrained in your mind.

I went 10 years without health insurance. Not having health insurance does not magically make you sick. And honestly, I know plenty of people WITH health insurance, and they still have health problems

Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia.

UGH....
Then how are these impoverished people from other countries able to get here, and be successful? Explain that.

People come here with NOTHING, and are able to make it, and be successful.

Yet born bred Americans can't? WHY?

I don't need to travel to Appalachia, because my entire extended family is from Appalachia. They all live along the Ohio river in West Virginia, and the Lake Jackson area.

My mother grew up in Appalachia, went to school in Appalachia, got her Masters degree in Appalachia, and Shawnee State college is still taking students.

Explain.... Please. Do tell, how no one in Appalachia can succeed? Given every single one of my relatives is successful, you'll have a hard time proving that crap.

The people who sit in Appalachia, unable to move up in life... are the ones who choose to sit in Appalachia, and not move up in life.

I've met them. I know them. I know why they are there. I know why they are poor. It's not because they don't have options. It's because they pick the option that leaves them there.

 

[Lewdog]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

My experience happened to me and around 200 other black , white , yellow and brown men(saudis didnt allow women to work on their jets), who also, left the "comfort" of their homes to go on an adventure that made them hundreds of thousands of dollar but they had to leave the comforts of their homes. Liberal are to lazy, so must stay close to their parents, for security..

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend,

Wow, you cant think of anything that you could "create" that would bring lots of people to your area? You are a worthless fuck arent you....Again my bud has his own business, he brings the people to him....

Pretty simple, if people do not have money to spend, you can't sell your product or services. I see businesses come and go where I live ALL the time. The federal government even tries to build prisons in old coal towns to hopefully bring money into their economy with federal jobs while the feds get cheap land. Even those do not work, as most people that live around the prison do not qualify for a job. Not to mention if you know anything about prison federal jobs, the ones working at other prisons get first shot for a transfer and a lot do it because they will get top seniority there. Then those that transfer or get hired are mostly outside the community, and thus do not inject money into the local economy because they live and spend their money elsewhere... and that is not just an anecdotal story. Those are FACTS I learned during my graduate school courses in Criminology... that I did not earn in my parent's basement.

Then they should go get qualified. If there are no jobs where they are, they need to move.

It's not the Federal governments job, to bring wealth to your community.

When people immigrated here from Ireland to escape famine and joblessness... they were not doing that to come here to sit on their butts, and wait for the American government to feed them, anymore than waiting around for the British government.

They got off their butts, and moved to where the work was. And when they got here to the US, they got their butts in gear, and made a living for themselves.

This is a country where nearly anything is possible. Get qualified if you are not qualified. Get up and get moving, if there is no work where you are.

Stop sitting around waiting for something to improve, and go make something improve.

Go get qualified? With this shitty small town school system? They can't just pick up and move, they don't have the funds to do so. Hell many have long term health issues due to lack of insurance, a lot of which comes from improper diet or poor living conditions that include drinking water with lead in it from all the coal mines poisoning the water. Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia. If you did that then maybe you would understand a bit, but then again I doubt it because you have these ideas so ingrained in your mind.

I went 10 years without health insurance. Not having health insurance does not magically make you sick. And honestly, I know plenty of people WITH health insurance, and they still have health problems

Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia.

UGH....
Then how are these impoverished people from other countries able to get here, and be successful? Explain that.

People come here with NOTHING, and are able to make it, and be successful.

Yet born bred Americans can't? WHY?

I don't need to travel to Appalachia, because my entire extended family is from Appalachia. They all live along the Ohio river in West Virginia, and the Lake Jackson area.

My mother grew up in Appalachia, went to school in Appalachia, got her Masters degree in Appalachia, and Shawnee State college is still taking students.

Explain.... Please. Do tell, how no one in Appalachia can succeed? Given every single one of my relatives is successful, you'll have a hard time proving that crap.

The people who sit in Appalachia, unable to move up in life... are the ones who choose to sit in Appalachia, and not move up in life.

I've met them. I know them. I know why they are there. I know why they are poor. It's not because they don't have options. It's because they pick the option that leaves them there.

You did not read my entire post or decided to selectively ignore it. They have to deal with worse health issues not just due to the lack of healthcare, but because they live in an area that is not healthy, with an example being the coal mines have poisoned the water they end up drinking. Another example is their poor diet from eating so many foods they buy at mom & pop stores or gas stations that are high in carbs, sugar, and highly processed. Not only that, but if they are on SNAP, they are paying higher prices because they do not have a Walmart or other large grocery store they can get to.

As far as poor people from other countries? You must not know much about that... as immigrants from other countries have access to more loans an funds than most U.S. citizens who have lived here their entire lives.

 

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Well first, as the original poster was pointing out, the value of the salary, and the value of the labor, are both flexible.

$50,000 a year in California is practically poverty, while being almost upper class in Mississippi.

At the same time, the value of your labor changes dramatically based on a host of things.

One of the big problems with all left-wing ideology, is that they constantly rely on a one-size-fits-all theory of governance.

The tax rate the works in California, should work everywhere. The regulations that work in New Jersey, should work everywhere.

The value of a job... whatever job... is the same everywhere.

Yet in their own lives they never think this way. Your in-laws say "Why don't live your life like we do. Our system works for us!", and you say... I'm not you, and you are not me, and what works for you doesn't work for me.

Right? It's like one-size-fits-all clothing, that everyone hates.

Well this is true of $7.25/hour. Is that an inflated wage? Well it depends. I think the implication that $7.25 can't be an inflated wage, is wrong.

You can be drastically over paid at $7.25. That's why businesses lay of employees, when they are only paying them $7.25 an hour.

The value of your labor is contingent on many.

The primary factor being, what profit you earn the person you are working for.

Let me give you an example. Near where I live is a bread bakery. More like a bread factory really. That's all they do, is make bread. They have big building, and they load up trucks, and deliver bread to all the grocery stores in the area.

They also have a tiny, about the size of a studio apartment, room with a sign in the window, where you can walk in and by fresh bread right from the ovens.

At this small micro-store at the bread bakery, you can get it 30 minutes after it was removed from the ovens.

So I actually knew a girl that worked there, at this micro-store. She would come in, sit at the register, and collect money for sitting. She would get a dozen to two dozen customers in an entire day.

How much in real profit were they getting from selling at most 30 loafs of bread, while paying her minimum wage? Roughly $2 a loaf, $60, and her wage was $58 for 8 hours at $7.25... not including taxes and the cost of benefits.

And honestly, is sitting there, watching TV, with an occasional "would you like that in a bag?", and sliding a credit card on a reader, really worth $7.25 an hour? No it's not.

Now you might ask why the company had such a store at all, if they were not really making a profit. In fact, almost impossible to make a profit, if you include the overhead.

Two reasons: One, the micro store was built 30 years ago, when far fewer stores existed in the area, and thus they had a many more customers. Two is because the micro-store does serve as a sort of advertisement for the brand. People would see the store, and eventually come in out of curiosity, have some really good bread, and then end up buying their brand of bread at the regulator grocery stores.

Regardless, I think you get my point. $7.25 can be a very inflated wage. It depends on many things.

In fact, the value of the labor can differ inside a company, even with exact same jobs.

So in the 90s, I was working at Wendy's, when the minimum wage was $5.25. I think I was getting $6.50 an hour, because I was full time (+50¢/hour), and I was cashier (+25¢/hour), and because you got 25¢/hour raise every six months, and I had been there one year.

So $6.50/hour. Well I found out that the store down town was paying cashiers $10/hours an hour to start. At the time, I had no idea why they paid so much more, but it was annoying to me that other people doing the exact same job, for the exact same company, were getting paid more.

Then one night, that store sent out an SOS for help. I forget what exactly they called it, there was a term for it at that time, where a store sent out a call for help, and any store that could send over spare employees, was supposed to do so, and would be compensated by corporate.

So they sent me.

That store was packed with customers, and 2 or 3 of their employees called off. Packed. Customers everywhere. And it stayed packed right up till closing. People were still trying to enter the store, when they were flipping chairs up on tables, and turning the dining room lights off.

This was entirely different from the Suburban Wendy's I was used to. We had a lunch rush that lasted from 11:30 to 1 PM, and then a dinner stream of people from 5 PM till 7 PM. Before lunch, or between If you had a dozen cars from 10 AM till lunch, or between lunch and dinner... that was busy day.

Place was dead most of the day.

Again, the value of the labor depends on the profits. How much profit is there when your employees are standing around largely idle for half the working day? Not much. So wages are low.

How much profit is there, when the store has people waiting outside the story when the doors open, and is packed the entire day, and still has people trickling in up till closing time? Tons.
So wages are high.

There are many aspects to the value of labor. But the answer is yes, $7.25 can be way over priced. Which is why when the minimum wage went up, tons of people lost their jobs.

In your bread story, you are TOTALLY off base. The work being done by the girl is not HER value. The onus of the situation is the bad business decision of the bakery to continue to have the store despite the low number of customers and sales. The work value of the employee in the store is going to be the same for anyone you put in there due to outside influences they have zero control over. You could put Jeff Bezos in there and he would give the same amount of labor to profit ratio as the girl. So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So I would agree with everything you said... except that final conclusion. Everything you said is correct.... generally.

There are aspects that the girl can control. People who don't show up on time, or do lousy work, sometimes are still worth employing at a lower wage.

One example was at a company where they hired a guy with mental issues. So he could only be counted on to clean the floors. And honestly, that was about it. Well of course they are not going to pay him a regular wage, when he wasn't able to do a regular job. So he needed a job of any kind, and they needed the floors cleaned, so they created a contract position, where he was paid about $10,000 a year, to clean the floors, and that's it.

And this is true throughout all business. Even in minimum wage jobs, you can have this. I've seen it a few times.

I told you that you got an automatic pay raise if you worked consistently for 6 months or more. Well that automatic pay increase, was still dependent on performance. We had people that worked 'full time' but showed up late, left early, disappeared for smoke breaks in the middle of their shift.

They would have their automatic pay raise waived, and be really angry that a year later, they were still earning minimum wage. There is a spot between not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to pay more.

So there are aspects to the value of your labor.

So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So here is the real crux of the problem. What you just said was contradictory. You said it's about running a business that is no longer profitable.... but the reason it is no longer profitable, isn't just because of reduced number of customers.

It is also because the cost of labor has been pushed above the value of the labor. The labor value has gone down some.... at the same time the cost of the labor has increased because of the minimum wage.

Result: Business isn't profitable.

Remember, when they opened that business, the minimum wage was $4.25. You think they could sell enough bread even today, to make a profit if the minimum wage was $4.25? Sure. And it is a perfect job for a high school student, who wants some experience to put on their resume for a future better job, and some spending money during their high school years.

Or even a retiree, that could do this as a retirement job.

And here in the state of Ohio, the minimum wage has been indexed with automatic increases. The Ohio Minimum wage has increased every single year since 2010.

So every single year, that little store is getting less and less profitable, until they finally close it. In fact, I have not been over that way in 10 years now, and I wouldn't be surprised if they closed it already.

When that happens, if it hasn't already, people that could be employed, won't be.

The value of the labor does not increase, just because the minimum wage does. And when the cost of the labor exceed the profitability of the business... people lose their jobs.

About your story with the kid with a mental illness... companies get tax credits for hiring certain groups of people like handicapped, the mentally impaired, and felons. So the company is getting money returned on the back end from the government to make up for the kid not doing enough work to meet the value of his pay.

Edited to add a link: Work Opportunity Tax Credit | Internal Revenue Service

There are so many things I could correct with your statements, but I'm about to go to bed.

I'd love to hear your thoughts, even though I will likely disagree. As long as you are decent and polite in responding, I'm more than happy to discuss whatever you would like to say.

Yes, I know about the tax credit. It's 50% off on the first $10,000 of expenses. The max credit is I think just $5,000 dollars. Which isn't exactly massive given a Subway generates $400,000 in revenue.

It's not like they are making a killing hiring a mental person.

Then you have to consider how much value they are actually generating. If you hire a guy for minimum wage full time, that's $15,000, minus the tax credit of $5,000... you are still spending $10,000 plus benefit costs and taxes, on someone who doesn't do that much work.

Depending on how much they actually contribute, you could still be losing money on the employment.

 

[Lewdog]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Well first, as the original poster was pointing out, the value of the salary, and the value of the labor, are both flexible.

$50,000 a year in California is practically poverty, while being almost upper class in Mississippi.

At the same time, the value of your labor changes dramatically based on a host of things.

One of the big problems with all left-wing ideology, is that they constantly rely on a one-size-fits-all theory of governance.

The tax rate the works in California, should work everywhere. The regulations that work in New Jersey, should work everywhere.

The value of a job... whatever job... is the same everywhere.

Yet in their own lives they never think this way. Your in-laws say "Why don't live your life like we do. Our system works for us!", and you say... I'm not you, and you are not me, and what works for you doesn't work for me.

Right? It's like one-size-fits-all clothing, that everyone hates.

Well this is true of $7.25/hour. Is that an inflated wage? Well it depends. I think the implication that $7.25 can't be an inflated wage, is wrong.

You can be drastically over paid at $7.25. That's why businesses lay of employees, when they are only paying them $7.25 an hour.

The value of your labor is contingent on many.

The primary factor being, what profit you earn the person you are working for.

Let me give you an example. Near where I live is a bread bakery. More like a bread factory really. That's all they do, is make bread. They have big building, and they load up trucks, and deliver bread to all the grocery stores in the area.

They also have a tiny, about the size of a studio apartment, room with a sign in the window, where you can walk in and by fresh bread right from the ovens.

At this small micro-store at the bread bakery, you can get it 30 minutes after it was removed from the ovens.

So I actually knew a girl that worked there, at this micro-store. She would come in, sit at the register, and collect money for sitting. She would get a dozen to two dozen customers in an entire day.

How much in real profit were they getting from selling at most 30 loafs of bread, while paying her minimum wage? Roughly $2 a loaf, $60, and her wage was $58 for 8 hours at $7.25... not including taxes and the cost of benefits.

And honestly, is sitting there, watching TV, with an occasional "would you like that in a bag?", and sliding a credit card on a reader, really worth $7.25 an hour? No it's not.

Now you might ask why the company had such a store at all, if they were not really making a profit. In fact, almost impossible to make a profit, if you include the overhead.

Two reasons: One, the micro store was built 30 years ago, when far fewer stores existed in the area, and thus they had a many more customers. Two is because the micro-store does serve as a sort of advertisement for the brand. People would see the store, and eventually come in out of curiosity, have some really good bread, and then end up buying their brand of bread at the regulator grocery stores.

Regardless, I think you get my point. $7.25 can be a very inflated wage. It depends on many things.

In fact, the value of the labor can differ inside a company, even with exact same jobs.

So in the 90s, I was working at Wendy's, when the minimum wage was $5.25. I think I was getting $6.50 an hour, because I was full time (+50¢/hour), and I was cashier (+25¢/hour), and because you got 25¢/hour raise every six months, and I had been there one year.

So $6.50/hour. Well I found out that the store down town was paying cashiers $10/hours an hour to start. At the time, I had no idea why they paid so much more, but it was annoying to me that other people doing the exact same job, for the exact same company, were getting paid more.

Then one night, that store sent out an SOS for help. I forget what exactly they called it, there was a term for it at that time, where a store sent out a call for help, and any store that could send over spare employees, was supposed to do so, and would be compensated by corporate.

So they sent me.

That store was packed with customers, and 2 or 3 of their employees called off. Packed. Customers everywhere. And it stayed packed right up till closing. People were still trying to enter the store, when they were flipping chairs up on tables, and turning the dining room lights off.

This was entirely different from the Suburban Wendy's I was used to. We had a lunch rush that lasted from 11:30 to 1 PM, and then a dinner stream of people from 5 PM till 7 PM. Before lunch, or between If you had a dozen cars from 10 AM till lunch, or between lunch and dinner... that was busy day.

Place was dead most of the day.

Again, the value of the labor depends on the profits. How much profit is there when your employees are standing around largely idle for half the working day? Not much. So wages are low.

How much profit is there, when the store has people waiting outside the story when the doors open, and is packed the entire day, and still has people trickling in up till closing time? Tons.
So wages are high.

There are many aspects to the value of labor. But the answer is yes, $7.25 can be way over priced. Which is why when the minimum wage went up, tons of people lost their jobs.

In your bread story, you are TOTALLY off base. The work being done by the girl is not HER value. The onus of the situation is the bad business decision of the bakery to continue to have the store despite the low number of customers and sales. The work value of the employee in the store is going to be the same for anyone you put in there due to outside influences they have zero control over. You could put Jeff Bezos in there and he would give the same amount of labor to profit ratio as the girl. So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So I would agree with everything you said... except that final conclusion. Everything you said is correct.... generally.

There are aspects that the girl can control. People who don't show up on time, or do lousy work, sometimes are still worth employing at a lower wage.

One example was at a company where they hired a guy with mental issues. So he could only be counted on to clean the floors. And honestly, that was about it. Well of course they are not going to pay him a regular wage, when he wasn't able to do a regular job. So he needed a job of any kind, and they needed the floors cleaned, so they created a contract position, where he was paid about $10,000 a year, to clean the floors, and that's it.

And this is true throughout all business. Even in minimum wage jobs, you can have this. I've seen it a few times.

I told you that you got an automatic pay raise if you worked consistently for 6 months or more. Well that automatic pay increase, was still dependent on performance. We had people that worked 'full time' but showed up late, left early, disappeared for smoke breaks in the middle of their shift.

They would have their automatic pay raise waived, and be really angry that a year later, they were still earning minimum wage. There is a spot between not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to pay more.

So there are aspects to the value of your labor.

So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So here is the real crux of the problem. What you just said was contradictory. You said it's about running a business that is no longer profitable.... but the reason it is no longer profitable, isn't just because of reduced number of customers.

It is also because the cost of labor has been pushed above the value of the labor. The labor value has gone down some.... at the same time the cost of the labor has increased because of the minimum wage.

Result: Business isn't profitable.

Remember, when they opened that business, the minimum wage was $4.25. You think they could sell enough bread even today, to make a profit if the minimum wage was $4.25? Sure. And it is a perfect job for a high school student, who wants some experience to put on their resume for a future better job, and some spending money during their high school years.

Or even a retiree, that could do this as a retirement job.

And here in the state of Ohio, the minimum wage has been indexed with automatic increases. The Ohio Minimum wage has increased every single year since 2010.

So every single year, that little store is getting less and less profitable, until they finally close it. In fact, I have not been over that way in 10 years now, and I wouldn't be surprised if they closed it already.

When that happens, if it hasn't already, people that could be employed, won't be.

The value of the labor does not increase, just because the minimum wage does. And when the cost of the labor exceed the profitability of the business... people lose their jobs.

About your story with the kid with a mental illness... companies get tax credits for hiring certain groups of people like handicapped, the mentally impaired, and felons. So the company is getting money returned on the back end from the government to make up for the kid not doing enough work to meet the value of his pay.

Edited to add a link: Work Opportunity Tax Credit | Internal Revenue Service

There are so many things I could correct with your statements, but I'm about to go to bed.

I'd love to hear your thoughts, even though I will likely disagree. As long as you are decent and polite in responding, I'm more than happy to discuss whatever you would like to say.

Yes, I know about the tax credit. It's 50% off on the first $10,000 of expenses. The max credit is I think just $5,000 dollars. Which isn't exactly massive given a Subway generates $400,000 in revenue.

It's not like they are making a killing hiring a mental person.

Then you have to consider how much value they are actually generating. If you hire a guy for minimum wage full time, that's $15,000, minus the tax credit of $5,000... you are still spending $10,000 plus benefit costs and taxes, on someone who doesn't do that much work.

Depending on how much they actually contribute, you could still be losing money on the employment.

But the fact the business will hire a mentally handicapped person is priceless when it comes to the reputation they can portray to the public and government.

 

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

My experience happened to me and around 200 other black , white , yellow and brown men(saudis didnt allow women to work on their jets), who also, left the "comfort" of their homes to go on an adventure that made them hundreds of thousands of dollar but they had to leave the comforts of their homes. Liberal are to lazy, so must stay close to their parents, for security..

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend,

Wow, you cant think of anything that you could "create" that would bring lots of people to your area? You are a worthless fuck arent you....Again my bud has his own business, he brings the people to him....

Pretty simple, if people do not have money to spend, you can't sell your product or services. I see businesses come and go where I live ALL the time. The federal government even tries to build prisons in old coal towns to hopefully bring money into their economy with federal jobs while the feds get cheap land. Even those do not work, as most people that live around the prison do not qualify for a job. Not to mention if you know anything about prison federal jobs, the ones working at other prisons get first shot for a transfer and a lot do it because they will get top seniority there. Then those that transfer or get hired are mostly outside the community, and thus do not inject money into the local economy because they live and spend their money elsewhere... and that is not just an anecdotal story. Those are FACTS I learned during my graduate school courses in Criminology... that I did not earn in my parent's basement.

Then they should go get qualified. If there are no jobs where they are, they need to move.

It's not the Federal governments job, to bring wealth to your community.

When people immigrated here from Ireland to escape famine and joblessness... they were not doing that to come here to sit on their butts, and wait for the American government to feed them, anymore than waiting around for the British government.

They got off their butts, and moved to where the work was. And when they got here to the US, they got their butts in gear, and made a living for themselves.

This is a country where nearly anything is possible. Get qualified if you are not qualified. Get up and get moving, if there is no work where you are.

Stop sitting around waiting for something to improve, and go make something improve.

Go get qualified? With this shitty small town school system? They can't just pick up and move, they don't have the funds to do so. Hell many have long term health issues due to lack of insurance, a lot of which comes from improper diet or poor living conditions that include drinking water with lead in it from all the coal mines poisoning the water. Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia. If you did that then maybe you would understand a bit, but then again I doubt it because you have these ideas so ingrained in your mind.

I went 10 years without health insurance. Not having health insurance does not magically make you sick. And honestly, I know plenty of people WITH health insurance, and they still have health problems

Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia.

UGH....
Then how are these impoverished people from other countries able to get here, and be successful? Explain that.

People come here with NOTHING, and are able to make it, and be successful.

Yet born bred Americans can't? WHY?

I don't need to travel to Appalachia, because my entire extended family is from Appalachia. They all live along the Ohio river in West Virginia, and the Lake Jackson area.

My mother grew up in Appalachia, went to school in Appalachia, got her Masters degree in Appalachia, and Shawnee State college is still taking students.

Explain.... Please. Do tell, how no one in Appalachia can succeed? Given every single one of my relatives is successful, you'll have a hard time proving that crap.

The people who sit in Appalachia, unable to move up in life... are the ones who choose to sit in Appalachia, and not move up in life.

I've met them. I know them. I know why they are there. I know why they are poor. It's not because they don't have options. It's because they pick the option that leaves them there.

You did not read my entire post or decided to selectively ignore it. They have to deal with worse health issues not just due to the lack of healthcare, but because they live in an area that is not healthy, with an example being the coal mines have poisoned the water they end up drinking. Another example is their poor diet from eating so many foods they buy at mom & pop stores or gas stations that are high in carbs, sugar, and highly processed. Not only that, but if they are on SNAP, they are paying higher prices because they do not have a Walmart or other large grocery store they can get to.

As far as poor people from other countries? You must not know much about that... as immigrants from other countries have access to more loans an funds than most U.S. citizens who have lived here their entire lives.

Again... all of the my relatives, all of them... their parents lived there, grew up there, and worked there, and they lived there, grew up there, and work there. Even to this day. All over that area of Appalachia.

Why didn't the lead water wreck their lives? Why didn't the lack of a walmart cause higher prices to wreck their lives? Why didn't they all end up fat and unhealthy from eating high sugar, carb, processed stuff?

Now I get it that some people are dealt a bad hand. I'm not saying there isn't someone somewhere, that nature had some bad rolls for them. I get that.

But you are saying that there are roughly 25 million people who live in Appalachia, and that there is this magical curse that all those people can't escape poverty.

Yet my entire extended family that has spent their entire lives in Appalachia, and their parents, and their parents parents, all lived in Appalachia... and yet not one was affected by this poverty curse? Not one?

Are my parents all super-humans from a Marvel comic, that are magically immune to the Appalachia curse? They learned skills, got degrees, found jobs, moved up, bought land, some opened businesses.

By the way, if you are wondering how I know all this, every single year, we have a family reunion on Thanksgiving. We all to to a family owned lake house, built from cinder-blocks on Lake Jackson Ohio. Everyone knows everyone in the entire town to.

Regardless... Are there poor impoverished people in that area of Appalachia? Sure of course there are.

So what made the magical difference? Why were my relatives all able to move on, and those poor people were not?

I can't tell you why. I've met them. I've talked to them.

The guy that lived next door to my grandmother, he worked for the train yard, and hurt his thumb. He successfully got disability, and he hasn't worked outside the home since then. Of course disability is nearly poverty. That didn't stop him from climbing his house, and re-shingling the roof.

He's in poverty because he chooses to be. He could quit that disability to today, and go get a full time job, and move up the corporate ladder, or even start his own roofing company, given he is obviously able to do it.

Another guy mowed lawns. He worked as little as possible. Made roughly $10,000 a year mowing lawns. We asked him (because he was mowing my grandmothers lawn when she got too old to mow), why he didn't... you know either mow more lawns and start earning some real money, or even work for a lawn care service, and make more money.

Well he just liked to relax, and 5 lawns a week, was more than enough.

He's poor on purpose. He's making a choice.

And I could go on down the list. My relatives, carpenters, doctors, engineers, pipefitters, company workers. All of them earn good money.

There is no difference between them, and the poor people around them, except they made difference choices.

They drink the same water. Went to the same schools. I don't buy this, magic lead poisoning for everyone who didn't make it, excuse.

 

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Well first, as the original poster was pointing out, the value of the salary, and the value of the labor, are both flexible.

$50,000 a year in California is practically poverty, while being almost upper class in Mississippi.

At the same time, the value of your labor changes dramatically based on a host of things.

One of the big problems with all left-wing ideology, is that they constantly rely on a one-size-fits-all theory of governance.

The tax rate the works in California, should work everywhere. The regulations that work in New Jersey, should work everywhere.

The value of a job... whatever job... is the same everywhere.

Yet in their own lives they never think this way. Your in-laws say "Why don't live your life like we do. Our system works for us!", and you say... I'm not you, and you are not me, and what works for you doesn't work for me.

Right? It's like one-size-fits-all clothing, that everyone hates.

Well this is true of $7.25/hour. Is that an inflated wage? Well it depends. I think the implication that $7.25 can't be an inflated wage, is wrong.

You can be drastically over paid at $7.25. That's why businesses lay of employees, when they are only paying them $7.25 an hour.

The value of your labor is contingent on many.

The primary factor being, what profit you earn the person you are working for.

Let me give you an example. Near where I live is a bread bakery. More like a bread factory really. That's all they do, is make bread. They have big building, and they load up trucks, and deliver bread to all the grocery stores in the area.

They also have a tiny, about the size of a studio apartment, room with a sign in the window, where you can walk in and by fresh bread right from the ovens.

At this small micro-store at the bread bakery, you can get it 30 minutes after it was removed from the ovens.

So I actually knew a girl that worked there, at this micro-store. She would come in, sit at the register, and collect money for sitting. She would get a dozen to two dozen customers in an entire day.

How much in real profit were they getting from selling at most 30 loafs of bread, while paying her minimum wage? Roughly $2 a loaf, $60, and her wage was $58 for 8 hours at $7.25... not including taxes and the cost of benefits.

And honestly, is sitting there, watching TV, with an occasional "would you like that in a bag?", and sliding a credit card on a reader, really worth $7.25 an hour? No it's not.

Now you might ask why the company had such a store at all, if they were not really making a profit. In fact, almost impossible to make a profit, if you include the overhead.

Two reasons: One, the micro store was built 30 years ago, when far fewer stores existed in the area, and thus they had a many more customers. Two is because the micro-store does serve as a sort of advertisement for the brand. People would see the store, and eventually come in out of curiosity, have some really good bread, and then end up buying their brand of bread at the regulator grocery stores.

Regardless, I think you get my point. $7.25 can be a very inflated wage. It depends on many things.

In fact, the value of the labor can differ inside a company, even with exact same jobs.

So in the 90s, I was working at Wendy's, when the minimum wage was $5.25. I think I was getting $6.50 an hour, because I was full time (+50¢/hour), and I was cashier (+25¢/hour), and because you got 25¢/hour raise every six months, and I had been there one year.

So $6.50/hour. Well I found out that the store down town was paying cashiers $10/hours an hour to start. At the time, I had no idea why they paid so much more, but it was annoying to me that other people doing the exact same job, for the exact same company, were getting paid more.

Then one night, that store sent out an SOS for help. I forget what exactly they called it, there was a term for it at that time, where a store sent out a call for help, and any store that could send over spare employees, was supposed to do so, and would be compensated by corporate.

So they sent me.

That store was packed with customers, and 2 or 3 of their employees called off. Packed. Customers everywhere. And it stayed packed right up till closing. People were still trying to enter the store, when they were flipping chairs up on tables, and turning the dining room lights off.

This was entirely different from the Suburban Wendy's I was used to. We had a lunch rush that lasted from 11:30 to 1 PM, and then a dinner stream of people from 5 PM till 7 PM. Before lunch, or between If you had a dozen cars from 10 AM till lunch, or between lunch and dinner... that was busy day.

Place was dead most of the day.

Again, the value of the labor depends on the profits. How much profit is there when your employees are standing around largely idle for half the working day? Not much. So wages are low.

How much profit is there, when the store has people waiting outside the story when the doors open, and is packed the entire day, and still has people trickling in up till closing time? Tons.
So wages are high.

There are many aspects to the value of labor. But the answer is yes, $7.25 can be way over priced. Which is why when the minimum wage went up, tons of people lost their jobs.

In your bread story, you are TOTALLY off base. The work being done by the girl is not HER value. The onus of the situation is the bad business decision of the bakery to continue to have the store despite the low number of customers and sales. The work value of the employee in the store is going to be the same for anyone you put in there due to outside influences they have zero control over. You could put Jeff Bezos in there and he would give the same amount of labor to profit ratio as the girl. So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So I would agree with everything you said... except that final conclusion. Everything you said is correct.... generally.

There are aspects that the girl can control. People who don't show up on time, or do lousy work, sometimes are still worth employing at a lower wage.

One example was at a company where they hired a guy with mental issues. So he could only be counted on to clean the floors. And honestly, that was about it. Well of course they are not going to pay him a regular wage, when he wasn't able to do a regular job. So he needed a job of any kind, and they needed the floors cleaned, so they created a contract position, where he was paid about $10,000 a year, to clean the floors, and that's it.

And this is true throughout all business. Even in minimum wage jobs, you can have this. I've seen it a few times.

I told you that you got an automatic pay raise if you worked consistently for 6 months or more. Well that automatic pay increase, was still dependent on performance. We had people that worked 'full time' but showed up late, left early, disappeared for smoke breaks in the middle of their shift.

They would have their automatic pay raise waived, and be really angry that a year later, they were still earning minimum wage. There is a spot between not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to pay more.

So there are aspects to the value of your labor.

So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So here is the real crux of the problem. What you just said was contradictory. You said it's about running a business that is no longer profitable.... but the reason it is no longer profitable, isn't just because of reduced number of customers.

It is also because the cost of labor has been pushed above the value of the labor. The labor value has gone down some.... at the same time the cost of the labor has increased because of the minimum wage.

Result: Business isn't profitable.

Remember, when they opened that business, the minimum wage was $4.25. You think they could sell enough bread even today, to make a profit if the minimum wage was $4.25? Sure. And it is a perfect job for a high school student, who wants some experience to put on their resume for a future better job, and some spending money during their high school years.

Or even a retiree, that could do this as a retirement job.

And here in the state of Ohio, the minimum wage has been indexed with automatic increases. The Ohio Minimum wage has increased every single year since 2010.

So every single year, that little store is getting less and less profitable, until they finally close it. In fact, I have not been over that way in 10 years now, and I wouldn't be surprised if they closed it already.

When that happens, if it hasn't already, people that could be employed, won't be.

The value of the labor does not increase, just because the minimum wage does. And when the cost of the labor exceed the profitability of the business... people lose their jobs.

About your story with the kid with a mental illness... companies get tax credits for hiring certain groups of people like handicapped, the mentally impaired, and felons. So the company is getting money returned on the back end from the government to make up for the kid not doing enough work to meet the value of his pay.

Edited to add a link: Work Opportunity Tax Credit | Internal Revenue Service

There are so many things I could correct with your statements, but I'm about to go to bed.

I'd love to hear your thoughts, even though I will likely disagree. As long as you are decent and polite in responding, I'm more than happy to discuss whatever you would like to say.

Yes, I know about the tax credit. It's 50% off on the first $10,000 of expenses. The max credit is I think just $5,000 dollars. Which isn't exactly massive given a Subway generates $400,000 in revenue.

It's not like they are making a killing hiring a mental person.

Then you have to consider how much value they are actually generating. If you hire a guy for minimum wage full time, that's $15,000, minus the tax credit of $5,000... you are still spending $10,000 plus benefit costs and taxes, on someone who doesn't do that much work.

Depending on how much they actually contribute, you could still be losing money on the employment.

But the fact the business will hire a mentally handicapped person is priceless when it comes to the reputation they can portray to the public and government.

..... yeah.... maybe. I don't know if that is universally true. My last job, they hired a guy, and he screwed some stuff up, that made it to the customer, and I don't think "well we had a mentally handicapped person work on it", is going to boast your reputation.

Might get you a glowing review in the papers, but when customers stop buying from you, no amount of good press helps.

Decades ago, I worked at a really really tiny company, and the government contacted us, about the benefits of using handicapped people. We tried it, and they just sat there doing almost nothing. We lost tons of money on those people, and there was no benefit to it at all.

Customers don't care, if you don't provide the product.

So I don't know specifically. Other than that guy who mopped the floors all day long, no amount of tax credits make up for people who take your money, but do little work.

 

[Lewdog]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

My experience happened to me and around 200 other black , white , yellow and brown men(saudis didnt allow women to work on their jets), who also, left the "comfort" of their homes to go on an adventure that made them hundreds of thousands of dollar but they had to leave the comforts of their homes. Liberal are to lazy, so must stay close to their parents, for security..

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend,

Wow, you cant think of anything that you could "create" that would bring lots of people to your area? You are a worthless fuck arent you....Again my bud has his own business, he brings the people to him....

Pretty simple, if people do not have money to spend, you can't sell your product or services. I see businesses come and go where I live ALL the time. The federal government even tries to build prisons in old coal towns to hopefully bring money into their economy with federal jobs while the feds get cheap land. Even those do not work, as most people that live around the prison do not qualify for a job. Not to mention if you know anything about prison federal jobs, the ones working at other prisons get first shot for a transfer and a lot do it because they will get top seniority there. Then those that transfer or get hired are mostly outside the community, and thus do not inject money into the local economy because they live and spend their money elsewhere... and that is not just an anecdotal story. Those are FACTS I learned during my graduate school courses in Criminology... that I did not earn in my parent's basement.

Then they should go get qualified. If there are no jobs where they are, they need to move.

It's not the Federal governments job, to bring wealth to your community.

When people immigrated here from Ireland to escape famine and joblessness... they were not doing that to come here to sit on their butts, and wait for the American government to feed them, anymore than waiting around for the British government.

They got off their butts, and moved to where the work was. And when they got here to the US, they got their butts in gear, and made a living for themselves.

This is a country where nearly anything is possible. Get qualified if you are not qualified. Get up and get moving, if there is no work where you are.

Stop sitting around waiting for something to improve, and go make something improve.

Go get qualified? With this shitty small town school system? They can't just pick up and move, they don't have the funds to do so. Hell many have long term health issues due to lack of insurance, a lot of which comes from improper diet or poor living conditions that include drinking water with lead in it from all the coal mines poisoning the water. Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia. If you did that then maybe you would understand a bit, but then again I doubt it because you have these ideas so ingrained in your mind.

I went 10 years without health insurance. Not having health insurance does not magically make you sick. And honestly, I know plenty of people WITH health insurance, and they still have health problems

Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia.

UGH....
Then how are these impoverished people from other countries able to get here, and be successful? Explain that.

People come here with NOTHING, and are able to make it, and be successful.

Yet born bred Americans can't? WHY?

I don't need to travel to Appalachia, because my entire extended family is from Appalachia. They all live along the Ohio river in West Virginia, and the Lake Jackson area.

My mother grew up in Appalachia, went to school in Appalachia, got her Masters degree in Appalachia, and Shawnee State college is still taking students.

Explain.... Please. Do tell, how no one in Appalachia can succeed? Given every single one of my relatives is successful, you'll have a hard time proving that crap.

The people who sit in Appalachia, unable to move up in life... are the ones who choose to sit in Appalachia, and not move up in life.

I've met them. I know them. I know why they are there. I know why they are poor. It's not because they don't have options. It's because they pick the option that leaves them there.

You did not read my entire post or decided to selectively ignore it. They have to deal with worse health issues not just due to the lack of healthcare, but because they live in an area that is not healthy, with an example being the coal mines have poisoned the water they end up drinking. Another example is their poor diet from eating so many foods they buy at mom & pop stores or gas stations that are high in carbs, sugar, and highly processed. Not only that, but if they are on SNAP, they are paying higher prices because they do not have a Walmart or other large grocery store they can get to.

As far as poor people from other countries? You must not know much about that... as immigrants from other countries have access to more loans an funds than most U.S. citizens who have lived here their entire lives.

Again... all of the my relatives, all of them... their parents lived there, grew up there, and worked there, and they lived there, grew up there, and work there. Even to this day. All over that area of Appalachia.

Why didn't the lead water wreck their lives? Why didn't the lack of a walmart cause higher prices to wreck their lives? Why didn't they all end up fat and unhealthy from eating high sugar, carb, processed stuff?

Now I get it that some people are dealt a bad hand. I'm not saying there isn't someone somewhere, that nature had some bad rolls for them. I get that.

But you are saying that there are roughly 25 million people who live in Appalachia, and that there is this magical curse that all those people can't escape poverty.

Yet my entire extended family that has spent their entire lives in Appalachia, and their parents, and their parents parents, all lived in Appalachia... and yet not one was affected by this poverty curse? Not one?

Are my parents all super-humans from a Marvel comic, that are magically immune to the Appalachia curse? They learned skills, got degrees, found jobs, moved up, bought land, some opened businesses.

By the way, if you are wondering how I know all this, every single year, we have a family reunion on Thanksgiving. We all to to a family owned lake house, built from cinder-blocks on Lake Jackson Ohio. Everyone knows everyone in the entire town to.

Regardless... Are there poor impoverished people in that area of Appalachia? Sure of course there are.

So what made the magical difference? Why were my relatives all able to move on, and those poor people were not?

I can't tell you why. I've met them. I've talked to them.

The guy that lived next door to my grandmother, he worked for the train yard, and hurt his thumb. He successfully got disability, and he hasn't worked outside the home since then. Of course disability is nearly poverty. That didn't stop him from climbing his house, and re-shingling the roof.

He's in poverty because he chooses to be. He could quit that disability to today, and go get a full time job, and move up the corporate ladder, or even start his own roofing company, given he is obviously able to do it.

Another guy mowed lawns. He worked as little as possible. Made roughly $10,000 a year mowing lawns. We asked him (because he was mowing my grandmothers lawn when she got too old to mow), why he didn't... you know either mow more lawns and start earning some real money, or even work for a lawn care service, and make more money.

Well he just liked to relax, and 5 lawns a week, was more than enough.

He's poor on purpose. He's making a choice.

And I could go on down the list. My relatives, carpenters, doctors, engineers, pipefitters, company workers. All of them earn good money.

There is no difference between them, and the poor people around them, except they made difference choices.

They drink the same water. Went to the same schools. I don't buy this, magic lead poisoning for everyone who didn't make it, excuse.

If you are talking about people that lived there YEARS ago, that is a non sequitur. The coal industry has come to almost a dead stop in many places NOW, including the mining company in Harlan County, KY that recently filed bankruptcy while owing its employees a ton of money.

" On July 29, about 50 coal miners in Cumberland, Kentucky, banded together to stop a moving train. They blocked the tracks, refusing to allow the train, carrying $1 million worth of coal, to pass, according to Newsweek. They did the same thing the next day, and the next — literally putting their bodies on the line. Their protest began because Blackjewel, the company where they had until recently been employed, filed for bankruptcy in early July without paying the approximately $5 million in back pay the company owes to 1,700 miners, an attorney for the group told CNN."

Appalachia’s Long, Proud Tradition of Labor Militancy

Coal miners in the area known as “Bloody Harlan” are currently blocking trains in a mass protest.

www.teenvogue.com

A story about the water: A toxic crisis in America’s coal country

Even the federal government scrapped plans to build a prison in Eastern Kentucky due to the fact the old mining site they intended to use was too toxic.

"Some opponents claim the new prison, to be built on a former mountaintop-removal coal mine, would pose serious health and environmental problems. They cite such issues as drinking water quality, exposure to radon or chemicals from mining waste, hazards from a dozen natural gas wells operating nearby, potential burdens on local infrastructure and interference with the habitat of endangered or otherwise protected species."

DOJ Backs Away from New Prison Planned for Eastern Kentucky

DOJ Backs Away from New Prison Planned for Eastern Kentucky

www.huffpost.com

Also from article in 2019, "Kentucky has 54 counties in Appalachia as defined by the Appalachian Regional Commission.
38 of them are distressed, meaning they fall into the bottom ten percent of the nation's counties when looking at the poverty rate, per capita income, and three-year unemployment average."

Kentucky Home to Some of Countries Poorest Counties

38 Kentucky counties are among the poorest

spectrumnews1.com

So let me point this out again very clearly from that article, THIRTY-EIGHT counties in Kentucky fall within the bottom 10% of the POOREST counties in the ENTIRE country. So feel free to point out how a $7.25 minimum wage is inflated. We aren't talking about a single town, or a single county, it is THIRTY EIGHT out of 54 counties. That's systematic poverty full of quicksand.

 

[Markle]

I'm not a Democrat, but your argument is totally wrong. Liberals are those consistently asking for a hike on the minimum wage while conservatives want to keep it where it is and allow business to set their own pay. Once again you are wrong and just spouting partisan arguments.

You obviously took great pride in your post showing the map of the states with their respective minimum wage.

Gracious, they're all different, according to the needs of their state. State Sovereignty, isn't that how our Republic is supposed to work?

 

[Elton]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Here in Nevada the fast food places pay around 10 bucks an hour for a starting wage. That's the only way they can get people to work for them. I can't think of a single place that actually pays as low as minimum. Warehouse jobs start at 17 per hour, anything requiring skill is around 20 per hour.

Most places that pay minimum wage are small businesses which affects smaller cities more than others. It is just ignorant however to think that all states have a minimum wage of $10 for ALL jobs. It is just not true.

Nevada's minimum wage is 8 bucks. I can't think of any work place that pays that low. I am just giving my local observations.

 

[Elton]

I'm going to see if the OP gets the point of this.

According to the BLS, the average hourly wage of a doctor is roughly $89. The hourly wage is higher for some specialties and lower for other specialties. Anesthesiologists average about $113 an hour, surgeons average about $111 an hour, internists average about $91 an hour, and pediatricians average about $81 an hour.

How do these compare to other health professionals? A general dentist has an average hourly salary of about $77; some dental specialties were compensated significantly higher. For example, an Oral and Maxillofacial Surgeon pockets about $105 per hour. A podiatrist averages about $64 an hour. An optometrist and pharmacist both average just above $50 an hour. Physician Assistants and Physical Therapists make $43 and $39 per hour respectively. A Registered Nurse makes about $33 an hour.

The lowest-paid 10 percent of lawyers received $26.11 per hour or less in 2012, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics. The is the equivalent of $54,310 in full-time annual income. The lowest-earning 25 percent of lawyers received $36 per hour or less, equivalent to $74,880 annually. The BLS multiplies hourly income by 2,080 to calculate annual income.

Median and Average Earners
The median pay for lawyers in 2012 was $54.58 per hour, or $113,530 per year, according to the BLS. On the other hand, their average annual pay was $62.93 per hour, which comes to $130,880 per year. Median pay means half earn more and half earn less. The average, also called the arithmetic mean, is calculated by adding together all workers' salaries and dividing by the number of workers. As a result, the average pay is higher than the median when there are some extremely high earners.

An entry-level Electrician with less than 1 year experience can expect to earn an average total compensation (includes tips, bonus, and overtime pay) of $15.02 based on 251 salaries. An early career Electrician with 1-4 years of experience earns an average total compensation of $17.91 based on 3,432 salaries. A mid-career Electrician with 5-9 years of experience earns an average total compensation of $22.79 based on 2,576 salaries. An experienced Electrician with 10-19 years of experience earns an average total compensation of $25.21 based on 3,151 salaries. In their late career (20 years and higher), employees earn an average total compensation of $27.

Plumbers made a median salary of $53,910 in 2018. The best-paid 25 percent made $71,140 that year, while the lowest-paid 25 percent made $40,250

A little research into the average and minimum wage of just about any trade, skilled, or college trained job is NOT 7.25 per hour.

You can cut and paste. Now go find the stats on the number of post-high school educated individuals who are working at minimum wage jobs because they cannot find employment in their field of expertise.

But whose fault is that? Students need to choose a field that will pay them what they wish. If you decide to specialize in a field that no one cares about other than academia, and even they only have 100 of them in the field, then the student is the one who screwed up.

There are far too many worthless college degrees, and that is the fault of the academics who screw over the students to line their pockets.

 

[Markle]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

So how does WY get away with less than the federal mandated minimum to the tune of over $2 an hour?

If the Federal minimum wage is above the states, the Federal takes precedence. Obviously, the state in question does not have a need for a higher minimum wage for their state. How is that your business?

 

[Markle]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Here in Nevada the fast food places pay around 10 bucks an hour for a starting wage. That's the only way they can get people to work for them. I can't think of a single place that actually pays as low as minimum. Warehouse jobs start at 17 per hour, anything requiring skill is around 20 per hour.

Most places that pay minimum wage are small businesses which affects smaller cities more than others. It is just ignorant however to think that all states have a minimum wage of $10 for ALL jobs. It is just not true.

Look at the job boards the states with a higher minimum wage pay minimum wage, the lower the minimum wage is the more people get ahead of the game

Oh, yah, they're really making bank down in Mississippi.

Of course you wouldn't look..


In Boise for example a dishwasher makes $10 an hour + $2.75 over state minimum wage


In Oregon they make $12 an hour right at the states new minimum wage

I am so glad I have not washed dishes for wage since 16. I couldn't make it on minimum, even though debt free and no kids living at home. Hard to relate to minimum wage.

Me too, but that was before you were even born!

 

[Markle]

People come here with NOTHING, and are able to make it, and be successful.

Yet born bred Americans can't? WHY?

Outstanding point intentionally overlooked by the far-left.

 

[Markle]

But whose fault is that? Students need to choose a field that will pay them what they wish. If you decide to specialize in a field that no one cares about other than academia, and even they only have 100 of them in the field, then the student is the one who screwed up.

There are far too many worthless college degrees, and that is the fault of the academics who screw over the students to line their pockets.

I disagree. In my opinion, a good many kids have parents who are either absent, don't care or want to be their kid's friend instead of their parent. Any parents first and foremost job is to prepare their kid for the next phase of their life.

 

[Andylusion]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

My experience happened to me and around 200 other black , white , yellow and brown men(saudis didnt allow women to work on their jets), who also, left the "comfort" of their homes to go on an adventure that made them hundreds of thousands of dollar but they had to leave the comforts of their homes. Liberal are to lazy, so must stay close to their parents, for security..

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend,

Wow, you cant think of anything that you could "create" that would bring lots of people to your area? You are a worthless fuck arent you....Again my bud has his own business, he brings the people to him....

Pretty simple, if people do not have money to spend, you can't sell your product or services. I see businesses come and go where I live ALL the time. The federal government even tries to build prisons in old coal towns to hopefully bring money into their economy with federal jobs while the feds get cheap land. Even those do not work, as most people that live around the prison do not qualify for a job. Not to mention if you know anything about prison federal jobs, the ones working at other prisons get first shot for a transfer and a lot do it because they will get top seniority there. Then those that transfer or get hired are mostly outside the community, and thus do not inject money into the local economy because they live and spend their money elsewhere... and that is not just an anecdotal story. Those are FACTS I learned during my graduate school courses in Criminology... that I did not earn in my parent's basement.

Then they should go get qualified. If there are no jobs where they are, they need to move.

It's not the Federal governments job, to bring wealth to your community.

When people immigrated here from Ireland to escape famine and joblessness... they were not doing that to come here to sit on their butts, and wait for the American government to feed them, anymore than waiting around for the British government.

They got off their butts, and moved to where the work was. And when they got here to the US, they got their butts in gear, and made a living for themselves.

This is a country where nearly anything is possible. Get qualified if you are not qualified. Get up and get moving, if there is no work where you are.

Stop sitting around waiting for something to improve, and go make something improve.

Go get qualified? With this shitty small town school system? They can't just pick up and move, they don't have the funds to do so. Hell many have long term health issues due to lack of insurance, a lot of which comes from improper diet or poor living conditions that include drinking water with lead in it from all the coal mines poisoning the water. Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia. If you did that then maybe you would understand a bit, but then again I doubt it because you have these ideas so ingrained in your mind.

I went 10 years without health insurance. Not having health insurance does not magically make you sick. And honestly, I know plenty of people WITH health insurance, and they still have health problems

Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia.

UGH....
Then how are these impoverished people from other countries able to get here, and be successful? Explain that.

People come here with NOTHING, and are able to make it, and be successful.

Yet born bred Americans can't? WHY?

I don't need to travel to Appalachia, because my entire extended family is from Appalachia. They all live along the Ohio river in West Virginia, and the Lake Jackson area.

My mother grew up in Appalachia, went to school in Appalachia, got her Masters degree in Appalachia, and Shawnee State college is still taking students.

Explain.... Please. Do tell, how no one in Appalachia can succeed? Given every single one of my relatives is successful, you'll have a hard time proving that crap.

The people who sit in Appalachia, unable to move up in life... are the ones who choose to sit in Appalachia, and not move up in life.

I've met them. I know them. I know why they are there. I know why they are poor. It's not because they don't have options. It's because they pick the option that leaves them there.

You did not read my entire post or decided to selectively ignore it. They have to deal with worse health issues not just due to the lack of healthcare, but because they live in an area that is not healthy, with an example being the coal mines have poisoned the water they end up drinking. Another example is their poor diet from eating so many foods they buy at mom & pop stores or gas stations that are high in carbs, sugar, and highly processed. Not only that, but if they are on SNAP, they are paying higher prices because they do not have a Walmart or other large grocery store they can get to.

As far as poor people from other countries? You must not know much about that... as immigrants from other countries have access to more loans an funds than most U.S. citizens who have lived here their entire lives.

Again... all of the my relatives, all of them... their parents lived there, grew up there, and worked there, and they lived there, grew up there, and work there. Even to this day. All over that area of Appalachia.

Why didn't the lead water wreck their lives? Why didn't the lack of a walmart cause higher prices to wreck their lives? Why didn't they all end up fat and unhealthy from eating high sugar, carb, processed stuff?

Now I get it that some people are dealt a bad hand. I'm not saying there isn't someone somewhere, that nature had some bad rolls for them. I get that.

But you are saying that there are roughly 25 million people who live in Appalachia, and that there is this magical curse that all those people can't escape poverty.

Yet my entire extended family that has spent their entire lives in Appalachia, and their parents, and their parents parents, all lived in Appalachia... and yet not one was affected by this poverty curse? Not one?

Are my parents all super-humans from a Marvel comic, that are magically immune to the Appalachia curse? They learned skills, got degrees, found jobs, moved up, bought land, some opened businesses.

By the way, if you are wondering how I know all this, every single year, we have a family reunion on Thanksgiving. We all to to a family owned lake house, built from cinder-blocks on Lake Jackson Ohio. Everyone knows everyone in the entire town to.

Regardless... Are there poor impoverished people in that area of Appalachia? Sure of course there are.

So what made the magical difference? Why were my relatives all able to move on, and those poor people were not?

I can't tell you why. I've met them. I've talked to them.

The guy that lived next door to my grandmother, he worked for the train yard, and hurt his thumb. He successfully got disability, and he hasn't worked outside the home since then. Of course disability is nearly poverty. That didn't stop him from climbing his house, and re-shingling the roof.

He's in poverty because he chooses to be. He could quit that disability to today, and go get a full time job, and move up the corporate ladder, or even start his own roofing company, given he is obviously able to do it.

Another guy mowed lawns. He worked as little as possible. Made roughly $10,000 a year mowing lawns. We asked him (because he was mowing my grandmothers lawn when she got too old to mow), why he didn't... you know either mow more lawns and start earning some real money, or even work for a lawn care service, and make more money.

Well he just liked to relax, and 5 lawns a week, was more than enough.

He's poor on purpose. He's making a choice.

And I could go on down the list. My relatives, carpenters, doctors, engineers, pipefitters, company workers. All of them earn good money.

There is no difference between them, and the poor people around them, except they made difference choices.

They drink the same water. Went to the same schools. I don't buy this, magic lead poisoning for everyone who didn't make it, excuse.

If you are talking about people that lived there YEARS ago, that is a non sequitur. The coal industry has come to almost a dead stop in many places NOW, including the mining company in Harlan County, KY that recently filed bankruptcy while owing its employees a ton of money.

" On July 29, about 50 coal miners in Cumberland, Kentucky, banded together to stop a moving train. They blocked the tracks, refusing to allow the train, carrying $1 million worth of coal, to pass, according to Newsweek. They did the same thing the next day, and the next — literally putting their bodies on the line. Their protest began because Blackjewel, the company where they had until recently been employed, filed for bankruptcy in early July without paying the approximately $5 million in back pay the company owes to 1,700 miners, an attorney for the group told CNN."

Appalachia’s Long, Proud Tradition of Labor Militancy

Coal miners in the area known as “Bloody Harlan” are currently blocking trains in a mass protest.

www.teenvogue.com

A story about the water: A toxic crisis in America’s coal country

Even the federal government scrapped plans to build a prison in Eastern Kentucky due to the fact the old mining site they intended to use was too toxic.

"Some opponents claim the new prison, to be built on a former mountaintop-removal coal mine, would pose serious health and environmental problems. They cite such issues as drinking water quality, exposure to radon or chemicals from mining waste, hazards from a dozen natural gas wells operating nearby, potential burdens on local infrastructure and interference with the habitat of endangered or otherwise protected species."

DOJ Backs Away from New Prison Planned for Eastern Kentucky

DOJ Backs Away from New Prison Planned for Eastern Kentucky

www.huffpost.com

Also from article in 2019, "Kentucky has 54 counties in Appalachia as defined by the Appalachian Regional Commission.
38 of them are distressed, meaning they fall into the bottom ten percent of the nation's counties when looking at the poverty rate, per capita income, and three-year unemployment average."

Kentucky Home to Some of Countries Poorest Counties

38 Kentucky counties are among the poorest

spectrumnews1.com

So let me point this out again very clearly from that article, THIRTY-EIGHT counties in Kentucky fall within the bottom 10% of the POOREST counties in the ENTIRE country. So feel free to point out how a $7.25 minimum wage is inflated. We aren't talking about a single town, or a single county, it is THIRTY EIGHT out of 54 counties. That's systematic poverty full of quicksand.

Again, why don't they move? Do you know how little money it takes to move? Honestly.
Sell all your junk, and throw the rest away. Have a tag sale. Get into your car, drive to where you want to be. Find cheap apartment. Rent cheap Apartment, get job.

I've done this. I have literally done this. My first apartment was a tiny dinky little place, for $325 a month. Got a job for $9/hour.

How do you suppose people in Haiti, who live in places like below, are able to move to the US, and get a job, and get an apartment, and survive? How does that work if people born in Kentucky that know English, can't?

They live there... in object poverty, and are able to come to the US, and find a place to live, and a job. FYI, that's a river. A river of pollution in Haiti. People live there. We complain about how capitalism pollutes, just look at non-capitalist based societies, and tell me how much better it is.

But those born bred American in Kentucky can't?

So I had a friend years back that lived in Kentucky. She moved from poverty, and moved to where a Walmart was, which hired her. She talked to the land lord, who allowed her one month to pay, where she worked at Walmart to put money on that first month.

She used Walmarts tuition reimbursement program, to go to college, and get a degree, and now she's a civil engineer.

Why can't those miners do that? Maybe not civil engineer, although I wager they could. But why are sitting around on a train track, when they know for a fact that the company is broke, meaning there simply isn't any money?

What's the point of that?

If the Irish in the 1800s, had sat around blocking trade routes that potatoes were moved on, they would have starved to death, instead of immigrating to the US to get jobs, and earn a living.

I know a girl who came here from Somalia. She shared a studio apartment with another women. $300 divided by 2 people a month. Can you handle that on minimum wage?

That was years ago, but I just checked, and they still advertise studio apartments for $400 here.

I understand that these people are losing their careers, and they love mining, and they love their little towns, and they don't want to move.

I get it. I get that some might be losing their homes. I understand that it sucks. I've been there. I had 5 years, where all I did was work for the bank. I owed tons of money, and I just worked for the banks paying off debt. One of the reason I have no debt at all anywhere. I won't borrow money.

But... I also understand that laying on a train track doesn't fix your life. YOU have to fix your life. YOU have to find a new career. YOU have to make your life better.

If there is ANYTHING that I have learned about this awful life we live, it is that nothing fixes itself, and no one will fix it for you. If you have something broken in your life YOU have to fix it.

For those miners.... based on what you told me.... they need a new life plan. They need to stop crying and waiting around for others to fix their lives, and start moving forward themselves, and that means a new career path.

If immigrants from Mexico that don't know English can walk across the border with nothing but the clothes on their backs, and they can end up succeeding, then I don't want to hear excuses why Americans can't.

I have a lady friend from Germany who moved her for her husband (they live in kentucky somwhere, but I don't know if it is near the Appalachia area or not), and years back she was talking about her kids and her husband, and how they were in a big problems getting their citizenship cards. Her son was in his 20s and never worked a job, and her two daughters were getting up in their teens, and none of them were legal to work yet, and never held a job doing anything. They had been in this country for almost 10 years, and still didn't even have just a work permit. They said they needed money to file the paperwork.

They were subsisting on his military income, and barely making it, and they kept on saying how they needed help, and no help was coming.

As a friend of the family, I finally got them and their son, and I said look you are making America look terrible. You've been here for years, and you have taken responsibility for your lives, to show him what an adult taking responsibility looks like.

Your son is going to end up an unemployed bum that no one cares about, begging for money, because you haven't shown him that you don't sit around waiting for others to fix your life.

Now if you don't get your act together, then your son had better start working off the books, to get the money to pay for his own citizenship.

Her son piped up "But that's illegal"

And I said back I know, but Mexicans are coming over here, earning a living, and buying homes, and raising families, and you are living in your girlfriends basement like a bum without a citizenship card, after being here for years. What model are you for your sisters? (his two sisters were not in this conversation).

I told them straight up.

You know what they did? They started doing odd jobs, saved up the money, all got their citizenship, the lady friend is going to college, her son now has a job, and he's going to college too, and her daughters now act like they have a future.

And we're still friends.

I absolutely do not believe this "We can't make it" crap. People come here with NOTHING... and end up millionaires. But born Americans can't?

As soon as I kicked those friends of mine in the butt, their "we can't make it" attitude changed, and it was like magic.... now they can make it. Wow. How crazy, when you stop making excuses, suddenly you can do stuff.

 

[Mikeoxenormous]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Well first, as the original poster was pointing out, the value of the salary, and the value of the labor, are both flexible.

$50,000 a year in California is practically poverty, while being almost upper class in Mississippi.

At the same time, the value of your labor changes dramatically based on a host of things.

One of the big problems with all left-wing ideology, is that they constantly rely on a one-size-fits-all theory of governance.

The tax rate the works in California, should work everywhere. The regulations that work in New Jersey, should work everywhere.

The value of a job... whatever job... is the same everywhere.

Yet in their own lives they never think this way. Your in-laws say "Why don't live your life like we do. Our system works for us!", and you say... I'm not you, and you are not me, and what works for you doesn't work for me.

Right? It's like one-size-fits-all clothing, that everyone hates.

Well this is true of $7.25/hour. Is that an inflated wage? Well it depends. I think the implication that $7.25 can't be an inflated wage, is wrong.

You can be drastically over paid at $7.25. That's why businesses lay of employees, when they are only paying them $7.25 an hour.

The value of your labor is contingent on many.

The primary factor being, what profit you earn the person you are working for.

Let me give you an example. Near where I live is a bread bakery. More like a bread factory really. That's all they do, is make bread. They have big building, and they load up trucks, and deliver bread to all the grocery stores in the area.

They also have a tiny, about the size of a studio apartment, room with a sign in the window, where you can walk in and by fresh bread right from the ovens.

At this small micro-store at the bread bakery, you can get it 30 minutes after it was removed from the ovens.

So I actually knew a girl that worked there, at this micro-store. She would come in, sit at the register, and collect money for sitting. She would get a dozen to two dozen customers in an entire day.

How much in real profit were they getting from selling at most 30 loafs of bread, while paying her minimum wage? Roughly $2 a loaf, $60, and her wage was $58 for 8 hours at $7.25... not including taxes and the cost of benefits.

And honestly, is sitting there, watching TV, with an occasional "would you like that in a bag?", and sliding a credit card on a reader, really worth $7.25 an hour? No it's not.

Now you might ask why the company had such a store at all, if they were not really making a profit. In fact, almost impossible to make a profit, if you include the overhead.

Two reasons: One, the micro store was built 30 years ago, when far fewer stores existed in the area, and thus they had a many more customers. Two is because the micro-store does serve as a sort of advertisement for the brand. People would see the store, and eventually come in out of curiosity, have some really good bread, and then end up buying their brand of bread at the regulator grocery stores.

Regardless, I think you get my point. $7.25 can be a very inflated wage. It depends on many things.

In fact, the value of the labor can differ inside a company, even with exact same jobs.

So in the 90s, I was working at Wendy's, when the minimum wage was $5.25. I think I was getting $6.50 an hour, because I was full time (+50¢/hour), and I was cashier (+25¢/hour), and because you got 25¢/hour raise every six months, and I had been there one year.

So $6.50/hour. Well I found out that the store down town was paying cashiers $10/hours an hour to start. At the time, I had no idea why they paid so much more, but it was annoying to me that other people doing the exact same job, for the exact same company, were getting paid more.

Then one night, that store sent out an SOS for help. I forget what exactly they called it, there was a term for it at that time, where a store sent out a call for help, and any store that could send over spare employees, was supposed to do so, and would be compensated by corporate.

So they sent me.

That store was packed with customers, and 2 or 3 of their employees called off. Packed. Customers everywhere. And it stayed packed right up till closing. People were still trying to enter the store, when they were flipping chairs up on tables, and turning the dining room lights off.

This was entirely different from the Suburban Wendy's I was used to. We had a lunch rush that lasted from 11:30 to 1 PM, and then a dinner stream of people from 5 PM till 7 PM. Before lunch, or between If you had a dozen cars from 10 AM till lunch, or between lunch and dinner... that was busy day.

Place was dead most of the day.

Again, the value of the labor depends on the profits. How much profit is there when your employees are standing around largely idle for half the working day? Not much. So wages are low.

How much profit is there, when the store has people waiting outside the story when the doors open, and is packed the entire day, and still has people trickling in up till closing time? Tons.
So wages are high.

There are many aspects to the value of labor. But the answer is yes, $7.25 can be way over priced. Which is why when the minimum wage went up, tons of people lost their jobs.

In your bread story, you are TOTALLY off base. The work being done by the girl is not HER value. The onus of the situation is the bad business decision of the bakery to continue to have the store despite the low number of customers and sales. The work value of the employee in the store is going to be the same for anyone you put in there due to outside influences they have zero control over. You could put Jeff Bezos in there and he would give the same amount of labor to profit ratio as the girl. So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So I would agree with everything you said... except that final conclusion. Everything you said is correct.... generally.

There are aspects that the girl can control. People who don't show up on time, or do lousy work, sometimes are still worth employing at a lower wage.

One example was at a company where they hired a guy with mental issues. So he could only be counted on to clean the floors. And honestly, that was about it. Well of course they are not going to pay him a regular wage, when he wasn't able to do a regular job. So he needed a job of any kind, and they needed the floors cleaned, so they created a contract position, where he was paid about $10,000 a year, to clean the floors, and that's it.

And this is true throughout all business. Even in minimum wage jobs, you can have this. I've seen it a few times.

I told you that you got an automatic pay raise if you worked consistently for 6 months or more. Well that automatic pay increase, was still dependent on performance. We had people that worked 'full time' but showed up late, left early, disappeared for smoke breaks in the middle of their shift.

They would have their automatic pay raise waived, and be really angry that a year later, they were still earning minimum wage. There is a spot between not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to pay more.

So there are aspects to the value of your labor.

So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So here is the real crux of the problem. What you just said was contradictory. You said it's about running a business that is no longer profitable.... but the reason it is no longer profitable, isn't just because of reduced number of customers.

It is also because the cost of labor has been pushed above the value of the labor. The labor value has gone down some.... at the same time the cost of the labor has increased because of the minimum wage.

Result: Business isn't profitable.

Remember, when they opened that business, the minimum wage was $4.25. You think they could sell enough bread even today, to make a profit if the minimum wage was $4.25? Sure. And it is a perfect job for a high school student, who wants some experience to put on their resume for a future better job, and some spending money during their high school years.

Or even a retiree, that could do this as a retirement job.

And here in the state of Ohio, the minimum wage has been indexed with automatic increases. The Ohio Minimum wage has increased every single year since 2010.

So every single year, that little store is getting less and less profitable, until they finally close it. In fact, I have not been over that way in 10 years now, and I wouldn't be surprised if they closed it already.

When that happens, if it hasn't already, people that could be employed, won't be.

The value of the labor does not increase, just because the minimum wage does. And when the cost of the labor exceed the profitability of the business... people lose their jobs.

About your story with the kid with a mental illness... companies get tax credits for hiring certain groups of people like handicapped, the mentally impaired, and felons. So the company is getting money returned on the back end from the government to make up for the kid not doing enough work to meet the value of his pay.

Edited to add a link: Work Opportunity Tax Credit | Internal Revenue Service

There are so many things I could correct with your statements, but I'm about to go to bed.

company is getting money returned on the back end from the government

The government produces NOTHING, but Takes money from companies and working individuals. A company who is regulated and taxed more than what it can take in, is the fault of the government not the people...

 

[Lewdog]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

My experience happened to me and around 200 other black , white , yellow and brown men(saudis didnt allow women to work on their jets), who also, left the "comfort" of their homes to go on an adventure that made them hundreds of thousands of dollar but they had to leave the comforts of their homes. Liberal are to lazy, so must stay close to their parents, for security..

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

If you're an adult making minimum wage you need to sit down and figure out where you fucked up in life. I haven't made minimum wage since I was 16.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc. Up until 50 years ago, a person could work a minimum wage job 40 hours a week and be able to house, feed, and take care of their family without any type of federal assistance. There is ZERO chance that can happen today, and people like you have here, just assume everyone can do what you have done and get to the position in life you have. I'm not sure why it is so hard to understand not everyone is the same or in the same situation you are.

Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc.

Would you say this person was very lacking in skills do to his physical disability?

You aren't too bright or you are just a troll. I clearly posted more than just physical disabilities. Hawking obviously does not have any type of learning disability.

"Not all people are able to learn skills and trades to make higher wages whether it be due to lack of learning skills, physical disabilities, etc."

Have you ever heard of Melwood? You are such a dickwad...All you want to do is sit in your parents basement collect your welfare smoke dope, and bitch and moan how unfair you miserable liberal life is. We who have worked hard and saved up so we can live better than shitfucks like you, dont give a shit anymore, because you vote for the very people who keep you poor....

https://www.melwood.org/community-s...tanf-temporary-assistance-for-needy-families1

Statistics

• The Melwood JOBs Program has served 282 participants since July 1, 2017; where 148 participants are employed
• 86% of participants remain employed for one year or longer
• Average Hourly wage is $14.53

Ad hominem attacks will get you no where. In what you just said about me, you got exactly zero correct. You just posted about a program with 282 participants in a country of close to 331 MILLION. In Harlan County Kentucky they started a program to help unemployed coal miners to learn how to code so they could work remotely and be able to make money while not having to move out of their community. Sounds like a great program huh? Well Trump and the Republicans worked to take the budget money away to reduce and possibly eventually stop the program altogether.

So if you want to save the poor, then you start a business instead of being nothing more than a liberal bitcher and moaner. I grew up in a small town, but as i said before, instead of falling for the liberal, oh poor me, liberal, it got skills that made me very valuable. My bud in the picture, he is his own businessman. Got a problem with that also.


Funny how people will look at another person and think "damn , that dude is just stupid or he cant do shit because he is too handicapped. Then when i proved to you how people over come their "victimhood" they can do great things like Steven. You lefties are such wretched creatures, go crawl back into your hole..

What kind of bad business is that? You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend, and who are unlikely to even be hire-able due to one of many reasons including a criminal record due to opioid addiction, lack of proper skills because of the poor education they received, or because there is ZERO public transportation and they do not have a vehicle because they can not afford one along with the required insurance. That makes a ton of sense.

You continue to make one of the most obvious logical fallacies. YOUR experience is unique to YOU. It is called Anecdotal Evidence Fallacy. Not everyone has the same living situation and resources.

You open a business in an area of people with no money to spend,

Wow, you cant think of anything that you could "create" that would bring lots of people to your area? You are a worthless fuck arent you....Again my bud has his own business, he brings the people to him....

Pretty simple, if people do not have money to spend, you can't sell your product or services. I see businesses come and go where I live ALL the time. The federal government even tries to build prisons in old coal towns to hopefully bring money into their economy with federal jobs while the feds get cheap land. Even those do not work, as most people that live around the prison do not qualify for a job. Not to mention if you know anything about prison federal jobs, the ones working at other prisons get first shot for a transfer and a lot do it because they will get top seniority there. Then those that transfer or get hired are mostly outside the community, and thus do not inject money into the local economy because they live and spend their money elsewhere... and that is not just an anecdotal story. Those are FACTS I learned during my graduate school courses in Criminology... that I did not earn in my parent's basement.

Then they should go get qualified. If there are no jobs where they are, they need to move.

It's not the Federal governments job, to bring wealth to your community.

When people immigrated here from Ireland to escape famine and joblessness... they were not doing that to come here to sit on their butts, and wait for the American government to feed them, anymore than waiting around for the British government.

They got off their butts, and moved to where the work was. And when they got here to the US, they got their butts in gear, and made a living for themselves.

This is a country where nearly anything is possible. Get qualified if you are not qualified. Get up and get moving, if there is no work where you are.

Stop sitting around waiting for something to improve, and go make something improve.

Go get qualified? With this shitty small town school system? They can't just pick up and move, they don't have the funds to do so. Hell many have long term health issues due to lack of insurance, a lot of which comes from improper diet or poor living conditions that include drinking water with lead in it from all the coal mines poisoning the water. Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia. If you did that then maybe you would understand a bit, but then again I doubt it because you have these ideas so ingrained in your mind.

I went 10 years without health insurance. Not having health insurance does not magically make you sick. And honestly, I know plenty of people WITH health insurance, and they still have health problems

Some of you people arguing about this REALLY need to travel Appalachia.

UGH....
Then how are these impoverished people from other countries able to get here, and be successful? Explain that.

People come here with NOTHING, and are able to make it, and be successful.

Yet born bred Americans can't? WHY?

I don't need to travel to Appalachia, because my entire extended family is from Appalachia. They all live along the Ohio river in West Virginia, and the Lake Jackson area.

My mother grew up in Appalachia, went to school in Appalachia, got her Masters degree in Appalachia, and Shawnee State college is still taking students.

Explain.... Please. Do tell, how no one in Appalachia can succeed? Given every single one of my relatives is successful, you'll have a hard time proving that crap.

The people who sit in Appalachia, unable to move up in life... are the ones who choose to sit in Appalachia, and not move up in life.

I've met them. I know them. I know why they are there. I know why they are poor. It's not because they don't have options. It's because they pick the option that leaves them there.

You did not read my entire post or decided to selectively ignore it. They have to deal with worse health issues not just due to the lack of healthcare, but because they live in an area that is not healthy, with an example being the coal mines have poisoned the water they end up drinking. Another example is their poor diet from eating so many foods they buy at mom & pop stores or gas stations that are high in carbs, sugar, and highly processed. Not only that, but if they are on SNAP, they are paying higher prices because they do not have a Walmart or other large grocery store they can get to.

As far as poor people from other countries? You must not know much about that... as immigrants from other countries have access to more loans an funds than most U.S. citizens who have lived here their entire lives.

Again... all of the my relatives, all of them... their parents lived there, grew up there, and worked there, and they lived there, grew up there, and work there. Even to this day. All over that area of Appalachia.

Why didn't the lead water wreck their lives? Why didn't the lack of a walmart cause higher prices to wreck their lives? Why didn't they all end up fat and unhealthy from eating high sugar, carb, processed stuff?

Now I get it that some people are dealt a bad hand. I'm not saying there isn't someone somewhere, that nature had some bad rolls for them. I get that.

But you are saying that there are roughly 25 million people who live in Appalachia, and that there is this magical curse that all those people can't escape poverty.

Yet my entire extended family that has spent their entire lives in Appalachia, and their parents, and their parents parents, all lived in Appalachia... and yet not one was affected by this poverty curse? Not one?

Are my parents all super-humans from a Marvel comic, that are magically immune to the Appalachia curse? They learned skills, got degrees, found jobs, moved up, bought land, some opened businesses.

By the way, if you are wondering how I know all this, every single year, we have a family reunion on Thanksgiving. We all to to a family owned lake house, built from cinder-blocks on Lake Jackson Ohio. Everyone knows everyone in the entire town to.

Regardless... Are there poor impoverished people in that area of Appalachia? Sure of course there are.

So what made the magical difference? Why were my relatives all able to move on, and those poor people were not?

I can't tell you why. I've met them. I've talked to them.

The guy that lived next door to my grandmother, he worked for the train yard, and hurt his thumb. He successfully got disability, and he hasn't worked outside the home since then. Of course disability is nearly poverty. That didn't stop him from climbing his house, and re-shingling the roof.

He's in poverty because he chooses to be. He could quit that disability to today, and go get a full time job, and move up the corporate ladder, or even start his own roofing company, given he is obviously able to do it.

Another guy mowed lawns. He worked as little as possible. Made roughly $10,000 a year mowing lawns. We asked him (because he was mowing my grandmothers lawn when she got too old to mow), why he didn't... you know either mow more lawns and start earning some real money, or even work for a lawn care service, and make more money.

Well he just liked to relax, and 5 lawns a week, was more than enough.

He's poor on purpose. He's making a choice.

And I could go on down the list. My relatives, carpenters, doctors, engineers, pipefitters, company workers. All of them earn good money.

There is no difference between them, and the poor people around them, except they made difference choices.

They drink the same water. Went to the same schools. I don't buy this, magic lead poisoning for everyone who didn't make it, excuse.

If you are talking about people that lived there YEARS ago, that is a non sequitur. The coal industry has come to almost a dead stop in many places NOW, including the mining company in Harlan County, KY that recently filed bankruptcy while owing its employees a ton of money.

" On July 29, about 50 coal miners in Cumberland, Kentucky, banded together to stop a moving train. They blocked the tracks, refusing to allow the train, carrying $1 million worth of coal, to pass, according to Newsweek. They did the same thing the next day, and the next — literally putting their bodies on the line. Their protest began because Blackjewel, the company where they had until recently been employed, filed for bankruptcy in early July without paying the approximately $5 million in back pay the company owes to 1,700 miners, an attorney for the group told CNN."

Appalachia’s Long, Proud Tradition of Labor Militancy

Coal miners in the area known as “Bloody Harlan” are currently blocking trains in a mass protest.

www.teenvogue.com

A story about the water: A toxic crisis in America’s coal country

Even the federal government scrapped plans to build a prison in Eastern Kentucky due to the fact the old mining site they intended to use was too toxic.

"Some opponents claim the new prison, to be built on a former mountaintop-removal coal mine, would pose serious health and environmental problems. They cite such issues as drinking water quality, exposure to radon or chemicals from mining waste, hazards from a dozen natural gas wells operating nearby, potential burdens on local infrastructure and interference with the habitat of endangered or otherwise protected species."

DOJ Backs Away from New Prison Planned for Eastern Kentucky

DOJ Backs Away from New Prison Planned for Eastern Kentucky

www.huffpost.com

Also from article in 2019, "Kentucky has 54 counties in Appalachia as defined by the Appalachian Regional Commission.
38 of them are distressed, meaning they fall into the bottom ten percent of the nation's counties when looking at the poverty rate, per capita income, and three-year unemployment average."

Kentucky Home to Some of Countries Poorest Counties

38 Kentucky counties are among the poorest

spectrumnews1.com

So let me point this out again very clearly from that article, THIRTY-EIGHT counties in Kentucky fall within the bottom 10% of the POOREST counties in the ENTIRE country. So feel free to point out how a $7.25 minimum wage is inflated. We aren't talking about a single town, or a single county, it is THIRTY EIGHT out of 54 counties. That's systematic poverty full of quicksand.

Again, why don't they move? Do you know how little money it takes to move? Honestly.
Sell all your junk, and throw the rest away. Have a tag sale. Get into your car, drive to where you want to be. Find cheap apartment. Rent cheap Apartment, get job.

I've done this. I have literally done this. My first apartment was a tiny dinky little place, for $325 a month. Got a job for $9/hour.

How do you suppose people in Haiti, who live in places like below, are able to move to the US, and get a job, and get an apartment, and survive? How does that work if people born in Kentucky that know English, can't?

View attachment 358083

They live there... in object poverty, and are able to come to the US, and find a place to live, and a job. FYI, that's a river. A river of pollution in Haiti. People live there. We complain about how capitalism pollutes, just look at non-capitalist based societies, and tell me how much better it is.

But those born bred American in Kentucky can't?

So I had a friend years back that lived in Kentucky. She moved from poverty, and moved to where a Walmart was, which hired her. She talked to the land lord, who allowed her one month to pay, where she worked at Walmart to put money on that first month.

She used Walmarts tuition reimbursement program, to go to college, and get a degree, and now she's a civil engineer.

Why can't those miners do that? Maybe not civil engineer, although I wager they could. But why are sitting around on a train track, when they know for a fact that the company is broke, meaning there simply isn't any money?

What's the point of that?

If the Irish in the 1800s, had sat around blocking trade routes that potatoes were moved on, they would have starved to death, instead of immigrating to the US to get jobs, and earn a living.

I know a girl who came here from Somalia. She shared a studio apartment with another women. $300 divided by 2 people a month. Can you handle that on minimum wage?

That was years ago, but I just checked, and they still advertise studio apartments for $400 here.

I understand that these people are losing their careers, and they love mining, and they love their little towns, and they don't want to move.

I get it. I get that some might be losing their homes. I understand that it sucks. I've been there. I had 5 years, where all I did was work for the bank. I owed tons of money, and I just worked for the banks paying off debt. One of the reason I have no debt at all anywhere. I won't borrow money.

But... I also understand that laying on a train track doesn't fix your life. YOU have to fix your life. YOU have to find a new career. YOU have to make your life better.

If there is ANYTHING that I have learned about this awful life we live, it is that nothing fixes itself, and no one will fix it for you. If you have something broken in your life YOU have to fix it.

For those miners.... based on what you told me.... they need a new life plan. They need to stop crying and waiting around for others to fix their lives, and start moving forward themselves, and that means a new career path.

If immigrants from Mexico that don't know English can walk across the border with nothing but the clothes on their backs, and they can end up succeeding, then I don't want to hear excuses why Americans can't.

I have a lady friend from Germany who moved her for her husband (they live in kentucky somwhere, but I don't know if it is near the Appalachia area or not), and years back she was talking about her kids and her husband, and how they were in a big problems getting their citizenship cards. Her son was in his 20s and never worked a job, and her two daughters were getting up in their teens, and none of them were legal to work yet, and never held a job doing anything. They had been in this country for almost 10 years, and still didn't even have just a work permit. They said they needed money to file the paperwork.

They were subsisting on his military income, and barely making it, and they kept on saying how they needed help, and no help was coming.

As a friend of the family, I finally got them and their son, and I said look you are making America look terrible. You've been here for years, and you have taken responsibility for your lives, to show him what an adult taking responsibility looks like.

Your son is going to end up an unemployed bum that no one cares about, begging for money, because you haven't shown him that you don't sit around waiting for others to fix your life.

Now if you don't get your act together, then your son had better start working off the books, to get the money to pay for his own citizenship.

Her son piped up "But that's illegal"

And I said back I know, but Mexicans are coming over here, earning a living, and buying homes, and raising families, and you are living in your girlfriends basement like a bum without a citizenship card, after being here for years. What model are you for your sisters? (his two sisters were not in this conversation).

I told them straight up.

You know what they did? They started doing odd jobs, saved up the money, all got their citizenship, the lady friend is going to college, her son now has a job, and he's going to college too, and her daughters now act like they have a future.

And we're still friends.

I absolutely do not believe this "We can't make it" crap. People come here with NOTHING... and end up millionaires. But born Americans can't?

As soon as I kicked those friends of mine in the butt, their "we can't make it" attitude changed, and it was like magic.... now they can make it. Wow. How crazy, when you stop making excuses, suddenly you can do stuff.

Why doesn't a family move that has no money and nothing but junk? Who are they going to sell their junk to? You don't realize how many people in these areas don't even have a car. You think they can afford $100+ a month for car insurance along with the $150 a year in taxes and registration? Here in Kentucky cops like to set up roadblocks once a month or even sometimes once a week. They say it is for catching impaired drivers but it is mostly to check who has proper tags and insurance. So then if the people are driving illegally they get a ticket, and sometimes have their car towed. What happens then? Either they can't pay their ticket and get added fines until they get a warrant, or they lose their car because they can't afford to pay to get it out of impound.

Seriously, you are so far out of touch of the real world. I can refute what you say all day and all night, but your statement of "I absolutely do not believe this "We can't make it" crap. People come here with NOTHING... and end up millionaires. But born Americans can't?" shows me it is just a waste of time. I TOLD YOU why an immigrant can come here with nothing and make it, and you totally ignored what I said. One day when you want to open up your mind and pay and listen let me know.

 

[Lewdog]

Unfortunately there are posters ( andaronjim ) on this forum who are misinformed and do not understand that minimum wage is different in each state across the country. The federal government sets a floor for a wage which is currently $7.25. This map shows the minimum wage of each state across the country. It is important to understand because each stat might have living conditions that are much higher than other states. The $13 minimum wage in California where even those making $20+ an hour cannot afford to live where they work, could fund raising a family in Kentucky, however the minimum wage here is $7.25, almost HALF of that in California. So please remember this when making your argument.

View attachment 357833

The actual minimum wage is $0.00

It's what you get if machines take over your job, or if your boss can now hire a person worth the extra money he has to spend to pay you to do a job YOU are not providing the worth for at the inflated salary.

$7.25 is an inflated salary?

Well first, as the original poster was pointing out, the value of the salary, and the value of the labor, are both flexible.

$50,000 a year in California is practically poverty, while being almost upper class in Mississippi.

At the same time, the value of your labor changes dramatically based on a host of things.

One of the big problems with all left-wing ideology, is that they constantly rely on a one-size-fits-all theory of governance.

The tax rate the works in California, should work everywhere. The regulations that work in New Jersey, should work everywhere.

The value of a job... whatever job... is the same everywhere.

Yet in their own lives they never think this way. Your in-laws say "Why don't live your life like we do. Our system works for us!", and you say... I'm not you, and you are not me, and what works for you doesn't work for me.

Right? It's like one-size-fits-all clothing, that everyone hates.

Well this is true of $7.25/hour. Is that an inflated wage? Well it depends. I think the implication that $7.25 can't be an inflated wage, is wrong.

You can be drastically over paid at $7.25. That's why businesses lay of employees, when they are only paying them $7.25 an hour.

The value of your labor is contingent on many.

The primary factor being, what profit you earn the person you are working for.

Let me give you an example. Near where I live is a bread bakery. More like a bread factory really. That's all they do, is make bread. They have big building, and they load up trucks, and deliver bread to all the grocery stores in the area.

They also have a tiny, about the size of a studio apartment, room with a sign in the window, where you can walk in and by fresh bread right from the ovens.

At this small micro-store at the bread bakery, you can get it 30 minutes after it was removed from the ovens.

So I actually knew a girl that worked there, at this micro-store. She would come in, sit at the register, and collect money for sitting. She would get a dozen to two dozen customers in an entire day.

How much in real profit were they getting from selling at most 30 loafs of bread, while paying her minimum wage? Roughly $2 a loaf, $60, and her wage was $58 for 8 hours at $7.25... not including taxes and the cost of benefits.

And honestly, is sitting there, watching TV, with an occasional "would you like that in a bag?", and sliding a credit card on a reader, really worth $7.25 an hour? No it's not.

Now you might ask why the company had such a store at all, if they were not really making a profit. In fact, almost impossible to make a profit, if you include the overhead.

Two reasons: One, the micro store was built 30 years ago, when far fewer stores existed in the area, and thus they had a many more customers. Two is because the micro-store does serve as a sort of advertisement for the brand. People would see the store, and eventually come in out of curiosity, have some really good bread, and then end up buying their brand of bread at the regulator grocery stores.

Regardless, I think you get my point. $7.25 can be a very inflated wage. It depends on many things.

In fact, the value of the labor can differ inside a company, even with exact same jobs.

So in the 90s, I was working at Wendy's, when the minimum wage was $5.25. I think I was getting $6.50 an hour, because I was full time (+50¢/hour), and I was cashier (+25¢/hour), and because you got 25¢/hour raise every six months, and I had been there one year.

So $6.50/hour. Well I found out that the store down town was paying cashiers $10/hours an hour to start. At the time, I had no idea why they paid so much more, but it was annoying to me that other people doing the exact same job, for the exact same company, were getting paid more.

Then one night, that store sent out an SOS for help. I forget what exactly they called it, there was a term for it at that time, where a store sent out a call for help, and any store that could send over spare employees, was supposed to do so, and would be compensated by corporate.

So they sent me.

That store was packed with customers, and 2 or 3 of their employees called off. Packed. Customers everywhere. And it stayed packed right up till closing. People were still trying to enter the store, when they were flipping chairs up on tables, and turning the dining room lights off.

This was entirely different from the Suburban Wendy's I was used to. We had a lunch rush that lasted from 11:30 to 1 PM, and then a dinner stream of people from 5 PM till 7 PM. Before lunch, or between If you had a dozen cars from 10 AM till lunch, or between lunch and dinner... that was busy day.

Place was dead most of the day.

Again, the value of the labor depends on the profits. How much profit is there when your employees are standing around largely idle for half the working day? Not much. So wages are low.

How much profit is there, when the store has people waiting outside the story when the doors open, and is packed the entire day, and still has people trickling in up till closing time? Tons.
So wages are high.

There are many aspects to the value of labor. But the answer is yes, $7.25 can be way over priced. Which is why when the minimum wage went up, tons of people lost their jobs.

In your bread story, you are TOTALLY off base. The work being done by the girl is not HER value. The onus of the situation is the bad business decision of the bakery to continue to have the store despite the low number of customers and sales. The work value of the employee in the store is going to be the same for anyone you put in there due to outside influences they have zero control over. You could put Jeff Bezos in there and he would give the same amount of labor to profit ratio as the girl. So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So I would agree with everything you said... except that final conclusion. Everything you said is correct.... generally.

There are aspects that the girl can control. People who don't show up on time, or do lousy work, sometimes are still worth employing at a lower wage.

One example was at a company where they hired a guy with mental issues. So he could only be counted on to clean the floors. And honestly, that was about it. Well of course they are not going to pay him a regular wage, when he wasn't able to do a regular job. So he needed a job of any kind, and they needed the floors cleaned, so they created a contract position, where he was paid about $10,000 a year, to clean the floors, and that's it.

And this is true throughout all business. Even in minimum wage jobs, you can have this. I've seen it a few times.

I told you that you got an automatic pay raise if you worked consistently for 6 months or more. Well that automatic pay increase, was still dependent on performance. We had people that worked 'full time' but showed up late, left early, disappeared for smoke breaks in the middle of their shift.

They would have their automatic pay raise waived, and be really angry that a year later, they were still earning minimum wage. There is a spot between not bad enough to fire, but not good enough to pay more.

So there are aspects to the value of your labor.

So that is NOT about the wages, it is about continuing to run a business that is no longer profitable.

So here is the real crux of the problem. What you just said was contradictory. You said it's about running a business that is no longer profitable.... but the reason it is no longer profitable, isn't just because of reduced number of customers.

It is also because the cost of labor has been pushed above the value of the labor. The labor value has gone down some.... at the same time the cost of the labor has increased because of the minimum wage.

Result: Business isn't profitable.

Remember, when they opened that business, the minimum wage was $4.25. You think they could sell enough bread even today, to make a profit if the minimum wage was $4.25? Sure. And it is a perfect job for a high school student, who wants some experience to put on their resume for a future better job, and some spending money during their high school years.

Or even a retiree, that could do this as a retirement job.

And here in the state of Ohio, the minimum wage has been indexed with automatic increases. The Ohio Minimum wage has increased every single year since 2010.

So every single year, that little store is getting less and less profitable, until they finally close it. In fact, I have not been over that way in 10 years now, and I wouldn't be surprised if they closed it already.

When that happens, if it hasn't already, people that could be employed, won't be.

The value of the labor does not increase, just because the minimum wage does. And when the cost of the labor exceed the profitability of the business... people lose their jobs.

About your story with the kid with a mental illness... companies get tax credits for hiring certain groups of people like handicapped, the mentally impaired, and felons. So the company is getting money returned on the back end from the government to make up for the kid not doing enough work to meet the value of his pay.

Edited to add a link: Work Opportunity Tax Credit | Internal Revenue Service

There are so many things I could correct with your statements, but I'm about to go to bed.

company is getting money returned on the back end from the government

The government produces NOTHING, but Takes money from companies and working individuals. A company who is regulated and taxed more than what it can take in, is the fault of the government not the people...

You obviously haven't been reading the entire conversation. The argument was about an employee's work amount compared to their wages. It had NOTHING to do with the amount of taxes they PAID to the government.