I normally don't post "news", but I thought everyone should be reminded of this... http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20070723/ap_on_go_ot/minimum_wage
Actually, the minimum wage being so low could be a good thing. It may actually be an incentive for young people to want to compete/improve/retrain to NOT get paid minimum wage. Let's say minimum wage was $30/hr. 51% of the population would be happy being a cashier. If you make minimum wage $1 you scare people into studying/working smarter.
OTOH, increasing minimum wage makes the economy go. Why? Because poor people are poor cause they spend everything they make. They dont understand investing, etc (and if they did they don't have a chance to participate anyway). So, will more money in their pockets, the more LCD TVs etc will be sold.
I dont think young people consider making $7.25 (in today's dollars) any form of "winning" (which doesn't happen until 2009 and go knows how much more the dollar will be devalued then)
It is a sad commentary on the present state of American society that making more money is the only incentive for people to educate themselves.
"Money makes the world go round..." However if you educate yourself with the right methods and ideas, not only could you make yourself more wealthy, you'll also be infintely more knowledgable...which can also translate to wealth. Many who retrain are merely looking for the higher-paying job/skill or what's in demand "now." Not what they could be doing longer-term...
In some regards existing business knows a higher minimum wage will help keep competition down because it makes the risk of starting a business higher. So the democrats help the powerful stay powerful, the rich get richer, and increase the gap between rich and poor. The proper course would be to eliminate all payroll taxes for minimum wage worker. They lose almost 25% of their weekly take home pay. The amount of revenue lost for the gov't is very small.
A minimum wage worker will get most, if not all their payroll taxes refunded provided they properly fill out a tax return. Either way, I have no sympathy for a minimum wage worker. 1) If they're in high school, they're doing it just for some spending money, and chances are if minimum wage goes higher, those opportunities will decrease. Plus they're not using the money to support themself, so they can't complain. 2) If they're in college, by then they can get a better then minimum wage job. If they don't, then they're just stupid 3) If they didn't graduate college, but graduated high school, chances are you can STILL do better then minimum wage (you can cut lawns, do landscaping jobs, etc. those require minimum intelligence and earn at least $15 / hour) 4) If you didn't graduate high school and are earning minimum wage.. tough shit bottom feeder, you're stupid, and you're worthless. I know there were plenty of dumb fucks in my high school, and they still graduated. High school in the US is designed so any idiot can pass it. Anybody who didn't graduate high school should not even be given the right to vote, in my opinion. You can flame me for this comment, but it's the truth! The fact is, there's PLENTY of > minimum wage opportunities. Sure, you might have to take an unpleasant job (even the garbage men earn decent money), but if you're not willing to do that, then it's your own fault.