No of course not. False assumption on your part. It is this simple. If someone is hired, and they are not doing the best that they can...yet they get the job done, they stay hired. If someone is hired, and they are doing the very best that they can...yet they can't get the job done, they get fired. In either case, both deserve a minimum wage in the beginning, and the company can then determine if their effort is sufficient to keep them in the job.
How do you propose that the minum wage should be set? What standard of living should a person be entitled to just because they have a job? This is the part that I am getting hung up on.
I don't recall this being answered in quantifiable terms. Perhaps you could point me to where this is?
Are you saying that the minimum wage should be set so that a person working full time (i.e. 40-hrs a week) will be paid an hourly rate that will allow them to be at or above the poverty threshold?
Federal poverty level is $9,800/yr. If a person works 50 weeks per year at 40hr/s a week their hourly wage is $4.90. So from this I would assume that you are for lowering the minimum wage instead of increasing it? I could buy in to a minimum wage that is tied to the federal poverty level. The only problem with that is that now instead of people trying to raise the minimum wage they will try to raise poverty thresholds. But since poverty thresholds play a big role in determining federal and state aid availability to persons their would probably be more thought into raising the poverty level as opposed to the minimum wage. However remember that $4.90 in Arkansas is a lot different than $4.90 in LA or NYC.
Under the table, no taxes, FICA, etc. $4.90... However, in real life, $4.90 doesn't cut it, nor does $5.15...for legals... Do the math...
Then what measuring stick should be used to set minimum wage if not the federal poverty levels as you previously suggested?