McDonalds "Minimum wage isn't that bad, you just can't have heating, or gas, or insurance"

[Kanriel]

$100/month for food is basically pasta every day.

[Meresgi]

No one in the US will work for china level wages. There comes a point where it's just not worth working. And that point will be much higher here than in china.

Oh will it? Do you think the chinese dont value themselves as highly as Americans? If you were to let companies dictate how much they could pay people, the low paying menial type factory jobs/service jobs would be knocked down a down in terms of pay, and what then? People arnt going to bitch because just like now, they have to work it to make ends meet so they deal with that shit. My father and stepfather sure as shit didn't like being paid $12/hr after 20 yrs working in a leather mill but sometimes that's all you got.

People would bitch about getting $3/hr from McDonalds and you know what would happen? They'll fire that person and bring someone else in who won't bitch about the pay because $3/hr is better then $0.

Meanwhile the higher ups will be giving each other HUGE bonus checks for maximizing profit and the disparity will grow even more, unless you really think corporations would look out for their employees.

[hey]

Oh will it? Do you think the chinese dont value themselves as highly as Americans?

What's cost of living?

My father and stepfather sure as shit didn't like being paid $12/hr after 20 yrs working in a leather mill but sometimes that's all you got.

Hey! I wonder why they weren't payed less. After all, there was nothing stopping them from lowering wages, right? Right?

[Johnblaze]

Just saw this on CNN.com. I've only worked like 3 days at McD before I found some where better. But I never could see myself working there long term. Our system is fucked. That is all

[GoggleHead]

So you're saying that people should be happy if they end up with living conditions comparable to that of China?

[Headspace]

how is it that cream soda is the only one in this thread to mention room mates?

Because when we talk about low wages, we're discussing those who are more impacted: families.

[hey]

So you're saying that people should be happy if they end up with living conditions comparable to that of China?

I don't think anyone said that.

[Tweek]

I feel bad for families that have to rely on minimum wage jobs, that being said I've known families that have taken room mates. When I first moved out with my girlfriend we had to rent a room from a family of 3 with another room mate before we could afford to split an apartment with someone else. Like Cream Soda said, if you have a family you should try to shoot higher than minimum wage. I had something like 10 jobs from the time I was 14-18 and none of them were for minimum wage.

for once I agree with hey, he said it perfectly.

I think you're confusing needs with wants. You can't really expect to be comfortable working minimum wage.

[Jakson]

how is it that cream soda is the only one in this thread to mention room mates?

In many places, $600 is the cost of rent after being split with roommates.

Also, I think a lot of people are overestimating the number of people that work McJobs that are getting 20-39 hours, much less 40+.

[archibaldcrane]

The problem with a full-time minimum wage worker is that the company gets the benefit of that worker's, say, existence, but the company does not fully support their existence. The remainder of the support for that worker's existence (which benefits the company) is paid for by social services in the form of welfare, food stamps, health insurance subsidies, etc. etc.

The argument for raising the minimum wage is to place the true cost of a full-time worker's existence on the company that benefits from it.

[hey]

The problem with a full-time minimum wage worker is that the company gets the benefit of that worker's, say, existence, but the company does not fully support their existence. The remainder of the support for that worker's existence (which benefits the company) is paid for by social services in the form of welfare, food stamps, health insurance subsidies, etc. etc.

The argument for raising the minimum wage is to place the true cost of a full-time worker's existence on the company that benefits from it.

Someone who goes into McDonalds and orders a burger benefits from the existance of the person making their burger too, so should have to pay the person's full upkeep?

That doesn't really make much sense. Minimum wage covers far more than is needed to keep the person alive for the portion of their time spent working.

[BaneTheBrawler]

p.sure if you work at mc donalds you qualify to be my neighbor.

(I live in low-income housing)

[Seraph]

$100/month for food is basically pasta every day.

You can make it work, but yeah, it would be extremely crappy. You get about $3 a day, so you could buy some cheap pasta/sauce/bag of frozen veggies for about $1 each, but that would get old as shit after awhile. You could mix it up with eggs for more protein. However, this assumes you have access to a stove, and a fridge/freezer.

[Kanriel]

Someone who goes into McDonalds and orders a burger benefits from the existance of the person making their burger too, so should have to pay the person's full upkeep?

They do pay for that persons upkeep...via taxes.

[archibaldcrane]

For the time they spent working, yes - however as a society we have collectively decided that "full time work" is a thing that has meaning.

Costs rising for the things that minimum-wage workers produce is an acceptable part of lessening the burden for their existence on the state. As it is, welfare and such are corporate subsidies that make ultra-low wages possible - and I don't believe that companies should have a working model that allows them to provide for less than the minimum of needs for their full-time employees.

[archibaldcrane]

They do pay for that persons upkeep...via taxes.

Exactly - I'm all for pushing the burden of supporting the working poor from the taxpayers onto the companies they work for.

[Draginhikari]

How does it not? If someone is primarily supported by a spouse/family/etc, then making $5/hr isn't really a problem. Perhaps their spouse doesn't really make enough on their own to support both of them, but the little extra money gives them enough for what they need.

How about if someone loses their job, having the option of working for $4/hr until they find something better will make it significantly easier to stay afloat in the mean time than if they weren't making anything.

Let's not forget too that even if it doesn't affect the amount of welfare needed, having any job can still greatly improve the quality of life for people compared to not having any job. This is especially true for the people who most commonly make minimum wage: teenagers with no real expenses.

No one in the US will work for china level wages. There comes a point where it's just not worth working. And that point will be much higher here than in china.

What your assuming is based on a situation where those taking mininium wage are strictly people with no expenses, at one time this would have been a very safe to assume, these days it's not that simple. The state of the ecomony and the various things that can happen that have forced people into those situations. Simply offering lower wages for work isn't a solution either, you lower exepctations many companies ARE going to abuse them, you think McDonalds would not drop the wages to 5, 4, or 3 dollars an hour if they allowed to do so, of course they would. All you do is create a cycle where those in the higher income brackets get more and more and everyone else gets even less for even more work.

There are reasons regulations exist and generally when these regulations are lowered or removed does not generally create any good results for anyone expect the upper management of an organization.

[kuronosan]

For the time they spent working, yes - however as a society we have collectively decided that "full time work" is a thing that has meaning.

Costs rising for the things that minimum-wage workers produce is an acceptable part of lessening the burden for their existence on the state. As it is, welfare and such are corporate subsidies that make ultra-low wages possible - and I don't believe that companies should have a working model that allows them to provide for less than the minimum of needs for their full-time employees.

Everyone needs to understand that a fridge is a luxury.

edit: Also, about companies abusing expectations? Of course. They have little vested interest in doing anything but lining pockets. If expansion was much more gradual (over the course of years) instead of building a new store every 2 months and they saved money then they could probably pay employees more.

[hey]

What your assuming is based on a situation where those taking mininium wage are strictly people with no expenses, at one time this would have been a very safe to assume, these days it's not that simple.

I am making no such assumption.

The state of the ecomony and the various things that can happen that have forced people into those situations. Simply offering lower wages for work isn't a solution either, you lower exepctations many companies ARE going to abuse them, you think McDonalds would not drop the wages to 5, 4, or 3 dollars an hour if they allowed to do so, of course they would. All you do is create a cycle where those in the higher income brackets get more and more and everyone else gets even less for even more work.

Of course they would. And the only people who would work there are teenagers, people who have no real expenses, and people in between real jobs. $3-5/hr is just fine for such people. They probably won't be so happy about it, but they'll get by just fine. Anyone who can't get by on that probably won't be working so cheaply for very long.


This isn't abuse. It's market values. They are currently forced to pay more than the fair market value for labor because of minimum wage. Without the minimum wage, they would lower wages to the market value. It's no different than if a minimum price for pens was set at $5 per pen, and then subsequently removed. Once the price floor was removed, the price would drop to whatever it should have been all along.

There are reasons regulations exist and generally when these regulations are lowered or removed does not generally create any good results for anyone expect the upper management of an organization.

But in this case it does. Jobs can be hard for some people to find right now, even minimum wage jobs. Take a look at unemployment rates for young minorities. That shit is disgusting. If minimum wage were abolished, wages could be made low enough that literally anyone could have a job within a day if they needed it. It wouldn't be great, but they would have some money until they could find something better.

Exactly - I'm all for pushing the burden of supporting the working poor from the taxpayers onto the companies they work for.

Unfortunately this also pushes the burden onto those who will then lose their jobs, or not be able to find one in the first place.

[Plow]

Eh? I'm not getting the math here. Am I missing something?

Assuming both jobs are min. wage jobs, and a min wage of $8/hour, it looks like this:

- $2060 total income between both jobs
- $8/hour min wage
- $2060/8 = 257.5 hours worked for the month.
- The budget sample assumes an average of 30 days/month
- 257.5/30 = 8.58 hours/day, on average

Or, 60 hours a week.

I'm guessing you guys must only be including the McDonald's part of the wages to get those figures? Odds are though, if McDonald's is where you're getting most of your hours, your second job probably isn't much better in wages.

This is all using after-tax income too, by the way.

If you put that amount of income into federal tax brackets & RI's state tax brackets (for example), without claiming allowances, you would have to earn $2,785/month before-tax to end up with ~$2060 after tax.

Which, by the way, would require working 80 hours/week.

And yeah, you'd have a minimum of a good $1.5-2k tax refund that isn't accounted for there, but people don't typically have or space out tax refunds into a piece of the monthly budget.

Some shady numbers being used here for income (not just expenses).

McDonald's almost always starts at minimum wage, then moves up 25-50 cents every 90-120 days or so. I'm guessing if you got detail on how they're coming up with the numbers, they're claiming a pay rate closer to 10/hr.