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Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

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Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#231
post #7

Senator Bernie Sanders, for example, recently introduced legislation to end what he calls “corporate welfare” — and it’s pretty clear who he had in mind, since the bill was titled Stop Bad Employers by Zeroing Out Subsidies (BEZOS). Bernie out-marketing AMZN is pretty funny.

As someone who lives in a country which gives its laws sensible titles, I've never understood why Americans have such convoluted names for their legislation. It seems almost ridiculously childish, especially given how serious many of the acts are.

it's not childish, it's a control tactic. combined with making the laws themselves long and complex, it discourages the populace from trying to comprehend what is actually being done on their behalf. this leaves them in a position where they are more likely to just accept what their side says the legislation does at face value.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#232

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think turning your employees into welfare-dependent wage-slaves is far worse than unprofessional or bullying, but I guess that's just me and most decent people. CEOs of large public companies have to take public heat, by name, quite often. It's a huge part of their job; otherwise they'd be COOs.

> turning your employees into welfare-dependent wage-slaves I wasn't aware staying with a particular employer was compulsory.

You're out of touch with the job market and reality itself. It's not easy for these people to just "get a new job". They get paid minimum wage and are probably living paycheck to paycheck. If these people just "move jobs", they're out a paycheck for weeks and may lose their car, their home, not be able to eat, etc.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#233
post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you pay your employees $7.25 you deserve to be made fun off at least. Jeff Bezos recently also said Amazon deserved being scrutinised. I'm not saying this is what triggered them, but sometimes you have to take a strong position in order to be listened to.

> If you pay your employees $7.25... ...then you're paying the wage your employees are willing to work for. Basic economics in action. If you're making fun of this you need to take an econ 101 class.

Except it doesn't work like this. Employment is not an unlimited supply, and when you have the choice between starving (yes some people do not have any money saved) and working for $7.25, you choose to work for $7.25.

Almost nobody who goes to work for a minimum wage job can afford to say "it's okay, I will find a better, high paying job later".

"Basic economy" is not an argument.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#234
post #7

Senator Bernie Sanders, for example, recently introduced legislation to end what he calls “corporate welfare” — and it’s pretty clear who he had in mind, since the bill was titled Stop Bad Employers by Zeroing Out Subsidies (BEZOS). Bernie out-marketing AMZN is pretty funny.

Maybe I've got no sense of humour, but I think that's unprofessional and something like bullying, rather than funny. Legislation should surely not target one individual by name like that?

As a non-american leftist this is the first I've heard of it and it is hi-la-rious!

But maybe I just have a sense of humor.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#235
post #141
post #17

>In addition, the company also pledges its public policy team will lobby for an increase to the federal minimum wage from $7.25 — it doesn’t identify a specific wage that it’s targeting, but instead says, “We believe $7.25 is too low. We would look to Congress to decide the parameters of a new, higher federal minimum wage.” I'm going to take a wild guess and assume it will be $15/hour. That way they'll get to look pr…

> they'll get to look progressive for adopting this wage early, while mitigating their competitive disadvantage by forcing every other company to raise their wages too eventually. That's deeply cynical. In the process, they're actually paying real people more money. Which is sort of critically important if you care about this issue and not just taking pot shots at Amazon on HN.

I'm reluctant to say it's cynical because it's not necessarily negative or pessimistic so much as matter of fact. The Op isn't taking shots at Amazon by exposing their motivations.

A higher Minimum Wage is coming and possibly be a priority for Liberals and Progressives after the November Election. Amazon has been receiving a lot of negative press recently for labor conditions and wages. Regardless of the benefits to others, there is a direct benefit to Amazon.

Now if you want cynical... I think it's borderline delusional to think that a publicly traded multi-national corporation would do anything that isn't in it's business interest.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#236
post #180
post #141

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> they'll get to look progressive for adopting this wage early, while mitigating their competitive disadvantage by forcing every other company to raise their wages too eventually. That's deeply cynical. In the process, they're actually paying real people more money. Which is sort of critically important if you care about this issue and not just taking pot shots at Amazon on HN.

> In the process, they're actually paying real people more money Except the OP was talking specifically about the company's plan to lobby. Yes, they're actually paying people more money, but if everyone has that same amount of money then you get wage push inflation. Then everyone loses. This is also why minimum wage discussions always spiral out of control...there really is no good long term solution for setting mini…

It might not be easy to come up with perfect equation for regulating the minimum wage.

Bumping the minimum wage by law seems like an arbitrary temporary fix, that will need to be adjusted in another 25 years.

But a temporary somewhat arbitrary fix, might be better than nothing. Don't let perfect get in the way of good enough for now.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#237
post #218
post #17

>In addition, the company also pledges its public policy team will lobby for an increase to the federal minimum wage from $7.25 — it doesn’t identify a specific wage that it’s targeting, but instead says, “We believe $7.25 is too low. We would look to Congress to decide the parameters of a new, higher federal minimum wage.” I'm going to take a wild guess and assume it will be $15/hour. That way they'll get to look pr…

Wow, does the top comment always have to be cynical? This is exactly what everyone wanted Amazon to do. Maybe it's time to suck it up and give praise where praise is due? There are also benefits to paying more salary than your competitors (no hiring shortages, best employees, low turnover, etc), so I'm not going to blindly accept that it's now in Amazon's interest to drag the rest of the industry along with them. But…

Well in this respect: Amazon chooses to link the two discussions themselves. They could have easily made their communication less open to an easy attack by pledging $15 an hour while lobbying silently, or at least communicating that on another moment. They could have noble intentions with both moves. I'd even expect them to have noble intentions since $15 seems an unreasonable large increase from $7.25. Why link to two discussions? It's an error of their communication department IMHO. You've got to think as the receiving party. The receiving parties of both messages are separate: communicate them separately.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#238
post #67
post #47

Opponents of the minimum wage argue that it reduces employment by creating an artificial floor on wages, that jobs are lost because employers can't afford to pay the minimum. But if you can't pay the minimum, then you didn't really have a job to offer in the first place! By extension of this logic, employers could argue that they are losing jobs because they can only afford to pay someone who will work 12 hours a day…

There is no definition of "minimum", "basic living", "safe conditions", "fair hours" etc. Fair hours used to be 10 hours a day 6 days / week. Living used to be able to survive a famine. Safe conditions used to be hunting for animals. All it matters is people interacting voluntarily, that's the only argument against minimum wage. But it is disingenuous to suggest that just because there are people who would take such…

> All it matters is people interacting voluntarily

My point is that it is most certainly not voluntary. There are people in the world who are not as lucky or intelligent or resourceful as you, me, and most others on HN. Try to empathize and put yourself in the shoes of the disadvantaged, they do not know the world as we do, they cannot shop around for high paying jobs, and if they miss a paycheck, they may very well lose their housing.

Given this asymmetry, society absolutely needs to step in to enforce basic protections that the free market cannot solve.

Re: Amazon raises minimum wage to $15 for all US employees

#239

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> $15 an hour will push a lot of people out of being employable. Or maybe it will just force employers to pay better wages to those they employ already. $7.50 / hour is what they pay kids here to stock grocery chains.

Or maybe it will increase unemployment and will increase the inflation. Why stop at $15? Let's make it $50/hr, make everyone "rich".

I know you're joking.

But it's not true that rising the minimum wage would immediately be cancelled out by inflation. That would be true only if everybody was earning minimum wage.

Increasing the minimum wage from 5 to 50 dollars is unlikely to cause a 10x inflation, it more likely would cause a 3x or 5x inflation.

The poor would have more and the rich would have less.

It would likely reduce the spread of wealth in the society, improve social cohesion and in general may turn out to be a good thing.

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