Governor Taxed the Rich and Increased the Minimum Wage

Hide this one from Pris! , but I totally agree. On the planet Vulcan their motto was that the good of the many always outweigh the good of the few. If it worked on Vulcan, it can work here! I may have lost some of you with my Star Trek reference.

You do not have to watch Ster Trek to agree with that form of thought, that is for sure :-)

Yep, many people don't seem to realize that is how it works best, Cherry =p

Grrrrrrrrrr! Pris, but I knew that you would respond. As the devil's advocate, the government has talked about reducing Social Security or eliminating it. Millions have worked and when they retire, they should benefit from all the work that they have done. What do you think?

Cher . . . You just double Grrrrrrrrrrd Pris. If this forum only had one point of view it would be very boring. I put up with her and she puts up with me.

On a side-note, I would love it if athletes that make millions every year would have a much lower cap on what they can make. This may sound Socialistic to some, but there are too many struggling out there and can't even afford to attend a sporting event.

Hey, this is interesting.....let me know what you think. (Jen, if I am ever elected President - you are in my cabinet.)

Did you know that the US Treasury Department paid the major health insurance companies $3-billion (three thousand million) dollars in tax payer money to cover their out-of-pocket costs needed for them to give “free” health insurance to low income people.

You may agree that low income people deserve free insurance. But the US Constitution says that Congress must appropriate (authorize) this spending. Congress never did.

My point is that the unlawful exercise of Obamacare now has people in both government (the Obama administration’s executive branch and Treasury that made the payments) and the private sector (insurance companies for not returning the illegally acquired tax payer money) now operating outside the laws of the land.

This is the definition of a “banana republic”.

Yep, the minimum wage shoud be zero...and most people wouldn't work for that of course. But I'm not sure why mandating a rise in the cost of labor in a fast food restaurant helps. It may help the few workers but a profit margin must be maintained. So the cost of a hamburger most likely increases. I suspect that hurts the low income class more than the rich who probably frequent the fast food restaurants les anyway. And ultimately provides incentive to the business to invest in automation (electronic menus, fewer workers) hurting workers due to job elimination.

If a job requires little to no skills the pay is low. That incentives people to increase their jobs skills. Paying someone more for doing the same existing job and no real business reason doesn't.

Pris, I would accept that cabinet post! OK - here is another issue that we will agree on: Section 8 housing. My noisy next door neighbor is on Section 8, and yet owns a new Mercedes. I find that to be offensive. Just another example of a government program that started with good intentions, but has gone awry.

Cherry, yes in some cases businesses can and do offer programs that employees can use to increase their job skills. In fact where I work the company will reimburse an employee for both off and on-plant tuition costs. However if an employee decides to remain in the same job, his pay may in fact stagnate in some cases for several years. This stagnation occurs even for salaried personnel; the longer one is in the same job the smaller the yearly pay increase.

In smaller companies like the one you described it may be necessary for the bus driver to leave his company and perhaps find a driving job that will pay more. This may take additional training for larger vehicles or hazardous payloads. But the employee has options.

A business must stay competitive to remain viable. To me it seems essential to set a metric to gauge pay versus skill set.

It doesn't (benefit you). Places that employ low skill workers (fast food etc.) typically will have high turn-over rates. This is one problem that such employers face. And companies that require higher skills (technical etc.) must offer higher wages to keep their talented employees. But I can tell you already know that. It is sad to loose any good worker, high or low skill. But business is, well business. Now government,it doesn't follow good business policy much if at all.

I think the incompetence rule you cite is mostly true. I mean you are talking about men, true?

Ouch, was that a remark???

I think taxing the rich is a great idea...

Increasing minimum wage, not so much. Here's why:

Where we live, minimum wage is increasing, but my wage is not. Minimum wage is now 11$ and my base is 16.65 (this is without tokes which will bring it to 23-24$.)

There is a good chance that we won't be getting a raise any time soon as all government employees are on a wage freeze, yet they keep raising minimum wage. If I am only making a dollar over min wage, I am screwed because when minimum wage goes up, so does the cost of living.

When I was young and started working, the wage was at 6.85 for a long time. People were doing well, especially in my field partialy because the cost of living was lower. At this fast food restaurant where I worked for 7 years they started increasing the wage and I watched in the time I was there the cost of a basic meal go from 4.27 to almost 10$.

This is an example of everything else too. Groceries went up, gas sky rocketed, and us Canadians are paying one of the highest power bills around. My house is gas heated, it has to be because my power bill is still 97$, but that is just electricity . My house is heated by gas and that bill is 135$ a month. Water is 80$. When I lived in a house that was heated with baseboard heating, the bill was 300$ in the winter and our house was COLD!

BUT... the only thing that went up was minimum wage. In fact, many companies wages went down to new employees. The one company I worked at for 6 years I saw my wage go down every time I signed a new contract. I went from 28$ to 25$ to 23$. I started to go up again, but then they fired me and other employees were starting at 20$... which is now less than double the minimum wage. When I started there, minimum wage was 8$ an hour and I was making 28$, now its 11$ and new employees are making 20$.

So, even when you increase minimum wage you are not really helping the people at the bottom, it is only a temporary help because all the prices go up because companies need to cover the costs they are losing by raising everyone's wage. At the end of the day, minimum wage goes back to being barely enough to live on.

HOWEVER, the richer should be taxed more. I know in Ontario our taxes are on a sliding scale. Minimum wage you hardly get taxed anything, where as I get taxed 26%. Even for me though it is tough because even though on paper I am making 2.5 times more than a mim. wage employee, I am only taking home about 1.8 times more than one making the minimum. If I was on my straight salary of 16.65 I would only take home about 400$ more a month than one making minimum wage.

I think the top out for taxes here is 38%, but I could be wrong. I do believe there is a cap though. And I do get it to some degree. When you work so hard that you are making 6 figures, you shouldn't be taxed so much that your take home is the same as someone who isn't.

For example: This year on paper I made 46,000. I took home 36,000. At my last job one year I made 64,000 and my take home was 40,000. I worked harder and many more hours than I did where I am now and the difference was only 4,000 (now, I did get back another 1700 come income tax but still) with the amount I was slaving away, it actually wasn't worth it for me to make that much more.

I think the sliding tax scale should start at a higher income because I am really feeling the pinch when I don't think I should be.

Kacey M. would say "You're damned if you do and damned if you don't."

Although I borrowed that line from my favourite singer, it often times is true