This Thursday (12/5/13) is the perfect day for going out to a local fast food restaurant and indulging yourself (and others if possible). While not the healthiest of diets, most of us can admit that we enjoy the tasty food at one or more of the fast food chains. And this Thursday you can help fight back against the Big Labor thugs that will be at these restaurants trying to strong-arm the chains into giving in on their wage increase demands.

No one "deserves" to make more money; if they want a higher income they need to work for it. An employer pays what the work is worth, and what it takes to get workers good enough to produce value and has nothing to do with the needs or wants of the workers. I guess if you are a Marxist at heart you would want everyone to earn what they "need"; a utopian and unworkable concept that would in truth make everyone poor.

One facet of the minimum wage issue that many of you might not be aware of is the provision in some union contracts to base their entry wage as a percentage of the minimum wage, i.e., workers would start at 150% of the current minimum wage. So increases in the minimum would automatically become increases for a lot of other folks, regardless of whether or not it makes economic sense to the owners of the businesses. And don't forget that labor unions have been decreasing in membership almost everywhere, so part of this "protest" is the never ending attempt to organize workers so that the unions can collect those monthly dues.

So do your part on Thursday and go buy some fast food and enjoy!

Think about this. How many other jobs that pay $10 to $15 an hour will also be affected if this socialist insanity starts to take hold.

I'm pretty sure the company I work for will lay some folks off. You can also bet prices will go up.


What ever happened to capitalism?

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LIVE FROM THE DAWGHOUSE

I worked at minimum wage in the lowest level clerical job in a hospital while I was a student. That experience led to me working in health care administration, and later to a Master's degree in hospital administration. Including my time in the military, I spent 47 of my 48 years of full-time employment in health care. None of that might have happened had I not had that first minimum wage job. And I never expected to stay in a minimum wage job and just see my compensation automatically increase to where I could support a family and myself on those wages. Even when I was a teenager, I understood that an employer pays what it is worth to the employer, not what the employee wants or needs. This system has led to the greatest economic system that has ever existed on earth for the greatest number of people. Socialism is evil and does not work; as Margaret Thatcher once said, "under socialism eventually you run out of other people's money".

My brother just lost his $100,000 a year job because of the insanity going on.

I wonder how these Mensa candidates, who have never run or owned a building, or made a payroll, would feel about paying 12 bucks for a Big Mac after this went into effect.
Jim

If the minimum wage for flipping burgers went to $15 per hr (about 100%) the price of burgers would go up 100%. And the price of everything else would also have to rise. How would that benefit the people earning minimum wage?

Of course if all you are qualified to do is flip burgers, but want higher wages go to N. Dakota. I've read burger flippers start at $16 per hr AND get a signing bounus if they agree to stay on the job at least 6 months.

Of course if you are able to do unskilled manual labor you can start at twice that in the oil fields. The bad news is, the cost of living is high.

This is a joke right? A guy named Vito is bashing labor unions!

Big Business is not following the historic wage/number employed model. They are extorting people using the current bad job market to leverage them to do the work of 1.5-2 persons for a little as they can pay them.

There has been no increase in the the real wages of the American Worker since the early 90's.

In the late 70's the average working American spent 50% of their disposable income on housing, food etc, the basics. Today it's 73% of their income.

Companies have zero loyalty towards their workers and are out for maximum profit to drive their sacred stock price. If they can figure out a way to do it without you or sub it out, bye.

The Banks borrowed our money, yet they lend to few, how's that reasonable?

All of the above are facts, Google it.

I'm not advocating paying fast food workers $15 an hour or some Government involvement in setting wages, I'm a free market guy, but the theory that companies pay a fair market wage is obsolete. That model ended about a decade ago.

The middle class is dying, 60-70% of the economy is consumer driven, yet the geniuses running companies are crippling the consumer. Something has to be done to help the middle class and level the playing field.

What's the solution, I wish I knew, I'd be raking the money in instead of standing on a soap box here.

I agree the fast food wage thing is ridiculous, but the Corporate America needs a wake up call.

There are so few "real" jobs out there that folk are trying to run whole households on "flipping burgers" type employment. To make that work requires a business model that won't go down well in the US.

Any burger place that starts paying $15 per hour will soon be out of business, and replaced by some place serving Chinese noodles. There is only so much the American public will pay for a greasy slab of high fat meat with wilted lettuce and tomatoes and an ever diminishing smaller bun. At some point people will just carry a ham and cheese with chips in a bag.

Most of the bare minimum wage jobs were meant to be for part time students, or as a starting position and not intended as a career opportunity. I had two such jobs. First was paperboy for a couple of years (I did have two routes), and the second was two + years bagging groceries and stocking for a grocery store which lasted until I graduated from high school. Back then minimum wage was one dollar per hour.

I cannot imagine an adult trying to make a living or raise a family on a minimum wage job.

By trying to raise the wage to $15 per hour they are trying to make a career out of flipping burgers and running a cash register. I don't think it will work. All it will do is put such places out of business.

I'm a union member. I won't be crossing any picket lines or discouraging any attempts to organize.

Strong unions are an essential part of the formula that created the most prosperous middle class in history. Times have changed and that middle class is disappearing, while the investor class has grown wealthy out of all proportion to anything we have seen before.

Organizing workers to fight for a bigger piece of the pie at the bottom of the wage scale is not socialism, but demonizing it as such is McCarthyism.

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Not in jail.

This will tell you how old I am but my first real job paid $.15 over minimum wage which at the time was $1.60/hr. Working my hind end off for $1.75 gave me the realization that this wasn't going to cut it and gave me the motivation to better myself. I used that job to help pay my way through college and earn two degrees.

The irony of the whole thing is that I still work for the company where I started at $1.75/hr but now instead of sweeping floors and cleaning up after everyone I manage the whole business. That doesn't mean I don't still have to clean up after everyone but it's a far cry from today's starting wage.

My opinion is that starting wage can either be an incentive or a disincentive depending on where it's set. Thank goodness for me I wasn't satisfied for $1.75 or I wouldn't be here talking about the things I enjoy. Those who decide these things for our economy need to go into it with both eyes wide open.

This is America, anybody who doesn't like making minimum wage can do as I did and make better of themselves. Problem is, it's just a whole lot easier to cry poverty and have the union extort you more $ than to actually do something about it themselves.
This whole argument, IMHO boils down to the growing numbers of whiners trying to overcome the shrinking number doers without actually working for it.

I'll shut up now.

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Dave

I own a small business where all of the employees (including myself) are in minimum wage positions. We all make quite a bit more than minimum wage.

If I had to raise my employees wages almost double I would be forced out of business. The only other option would be to raise prices to cover the higher payroll. I also believe that would force us out of business.

Wingmaster

People should not be encouraged to cross a union picket line. It upsets the unions.

I have not met any Mensa candidates that were in a labor union. In my youth, I went to several Mensa meetings. Members need to have an IQ of at least 131. Many had high IQ's but were clueless about the real world. Some were more down to earth. I passed the test but did not join.

The current regulatory climate and government overreach makes it difficult for a small company to survive. They do so by finding ways to get more work out of existing employees and by trying to minimize overhead. The fact that so many people are out of work makes the job market competitive. People will have to work more for less just to keep a job.

The other option is to go into business for yourself which is what I did 20 years ago. In today's job market, the only one that you can depend on is you.

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Corripe Cervisiam

Reading a couple of comments on here, someone needs to, so I guess I'll do it, point out it's not 1965, 75 etc, unless you were trying to get a job in the Depression, you having nothing to compare it to. The Country and what's left of the Economy has changed, 5 minutes of Googling the Economy shows it. The opportunities that were readily abundant for you are not there now, particularly for those with no more than a High School Degree. You can kid yourself all you want, but if you were 20 now with a H.S. Diploma, you would be hosed too, whether you worked hard or not.

I'm not part of the younger generation, but blaming the lack of opportunity on them being lazy ya da ya da sure is convenient isn't it? It's a lot easier than admitting we've let the economy the "Greatest Generation" built be destroyed. Yes, some of it's lack of motivation, but some of it truly is the worst economy since the Depression.

Meanwhile, as Marsh said, the rich keep getting richer.

Unions are out dated and unecessary in todays job world IMO. They did a good thing yrs ago by forcing employers to provide rights to the worker but in todays world with all the national state and local labor laws etc in place I see unions as a bad thing.

As for 15 dollar burger flippers well that idea is just plain silly

Actually, if you are unskilled and want a good paying job go up to Dakota and work in the oil fields, or down to south and central Texas and work in the oil fields. The construction company building the new causeway, a four year project, near where I live is begging for both skilled and unskilled labor. There are jobs available (unless the government can kill them) you just have to be willing to go where the jobs are.

GM had those high price unskilled labor jobs on the assembly line and look where it got them. I could have gone there to work in the 70s but I didn't want that kind of mind numbing job that wears your body out as I have family member that did just that.
Instead I took minimum wage jobs and learned a trade. Back in those days an apprentice didn't make much money in the private sector. I'd think that same opportunity is available today if a person applies themselves, goes to school and learn a trade in demand today.
I'm not bashing unions as my wife and I belonged to them for years as it was part of our employment requirements. I do think a burger flipping job should stay at minimum wage as it's an incentive to improve one's financial position and give them a job they'd rather do anyhow.
Sure I wish I'd had made the money GM paid for skilled workers and their retirement plan but I took my own path and am happy with that too. I did try and get into GM's skilled trades but they weren't hiring many white males back then.

I think burger workers are paid fine, now. Other regular restaurant workers, not so much. I think unions still have their place in many areas. Although, I don't vote with them. I have worked in places that needed a union to come in and make them have a safe working environment. I would also be quite tickled to see Wally World unionized.

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Wayne
Torn & Frayed

I had a kid make me a Subway sandwich the other day, and all he did was complain about his job, while doing it. I'm pretty sure he would complain about it - if he made $15 an hour - as well.

I respect people who do their job (whatever it is) well. My parents taught me that "anything worth doing, is worth doing well." You can hate your job (many people do), but don't complain about it to me. You are why you have that job. Change yourself, change the job, or both. If turning lug nuts on an assembly line is what makes you happy, go for it. I wouldn't do that job even if it paid $200 an hour. But that's just me. I like a challenge, and I like being happy with what I do for a living. Aside form providing for my family, the pay is secondary.

According to the Bureau of Labor Statistics, The Union is a non-entity in the private sector. Fewer than 11.3% of American adults belong to a union and only 6.6% of that 11.3% work in the private sector. That translates to three quarters of one percent. (0.75%).

Make no mistake, The American Labor Union has become a government union funded by government employees for government employees.

Sorry, but that's the reality.

Union Members Summary

IBTL.