What good is a minimum wage? Shouldn't the market set the pay rate?

Question

What percentage of minimum wages earners are heads of households with kids? How many are senior citizens? How many are teenagers?

Answer 1

its not i make just above minimum wage and at 40 hrs a week ends up less than 200 a week take home,,,with expenses they way they are it takes 3 incomes to support my family and pay the bills

i think an increase is called for at least 10 bucks an hr

Answer 2

Market does set the pay rate for wages over the minimum. But, minimum wage is needed because anything lower would cause a person to live in poverty. At this point, the government would have to step in and pay welfare. Minimum wage is supposed to save the government money. And remember, the more a person makes the more the government can tax.

Answer 3

They raised the minimum wage in Oregon, it caused a lot of small businesses to fire some workers so they could pay the others. Prices went up to cover the costs, so no one came out ahead. If the market set the rate of pay the market would then have to compete to get the good workers who deserve a higher pay rate for their skills. It's a tough dilemma because the uneducated need to make a living, too, and there will always be the s*** jobs for those unwilling to get educated in a field they desire. It's their choice, to large extent, to stay poor. Barter would be a better way for those folks.

Answer 4

no good at all. at least not until they raise it to reflect the cost of living. if you notice most small business's only pay the minimum. it keeps the poor - poor. it needs to be raised to reflect the cost of living which increases every year while the minimum wage has stayed the same for 10 years. the federal wage is set at $5.15 an hour. could you imagine trying to support yourself let alone others on a wage that low. you would have to work a little over a half an hour just to by a gallon of gas to get to work. it is ridiculous

Answer 5

A minimum wage isn't that good really. It tends to increase unemployment in the sector where it's already the highest, that is, mostly unskilled labor. On the other hand, a lot of those jobs occur in high-cost areas. The minimum wage is a the perfect political comprimise; it fails to pay enough to lift the worker out of poverty while simultaneously raising the unemployment rate.

Answer 6

1. $8.00 an hour.
2. No the market shouldn't set minimum wage. Fair Market doesn't work when talking about MINIMUM wage, because companies don't compete for the LOWEST paid worker.

Answer 7

The 'market' already receives many benefits it doesn't pay for, even in having an educated and ready workforce at their beck and call.

As a result, 'the market' must pay a minimum price for this benefit so that the workforce is not subsidizing the 'market,' as is the case with companies like Wal-Mart, or where illegal immigrants use community resources and tax base to supplement their subminimum wages.

Answer 8

Yes. A "minimimum wage" set by a government is the same as slavery. It tells workers they do not have the right to sell their labor services for whatever price they wish to charge.

Even Bismarck, the inventor of the welfare state believed minimum wage laws were immoral.

Answer 9

In my opinion, if there were no minimum wage, there would be no reference point, and I think business owners would be paying a heck of a lot less! On the flip side, these very reasons might just have consumer costs down in the world as well :)

Answer 10

no the market should not set the rate if wages were set that way you'd be making $1.00 an hour corporations look at the bottom line and that is profit so the less pay the more profit