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Say Hello to Full Employment

theatlantic.com

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Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#331

Post by user5994461 »

Veelox wrote: post #322
user5994461 wrote: post #307

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Forget about working in a park. It's a job that is too demanding physically. You misread the conclusion. There is no need to bring down the minimum wage for everyone, just because he doesn't need a full wage. He can simply work part time and get half the money.

I think we are disagreeing on terms. People support a living wage normally mean legally mandating that the minimum amount of money that is exchanged for an hour of labor is set to $X where X is higher than today's rate. I gave two examples where increasing the hourly rate would make it so that the business would not hire the worker because it would provide negative value to the company. Working half the hours does ch…

You were arguing for lowering the minimum wages. It doesn't need to be lowered in your examples.

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#332

Post by ChrisLomont »

pmiller2 wrote: post #326
ChrisLomont wrote: post #305

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>Real wages have been stagnant since the mid 60s. Most people working today were not working in the 1960s. They have seen their wages grow. Also as working demographics skew younger as boomers retire, the median worker is earlier in their career, so they earn less, making it look like wages are lower, yet for each person wages have increased. The higher paid cohort is retiring. All this is covered in Census reports.

Not true. Wages have been flat over the entire period from 1964 onwards. Individuals may experience wage growth through job changes and raises, but that doesn’t change the fact that overall real wages are stagnant. You can’t cherry pick the last 3 years of a 50-year trend and say it’s all good.

I never said it's all good. I said there has been real wage growth the past few years, with the highest year over year gain on record in 2014.

And again, most workers were not working 50 years ago. Many have seen real wage growth in their working lifetime.

You're still ignoring that there has been demographic changes also over the past 50 years. At the start of that many people didn't work, and were not counted in median wages. They were not looking for work and were not in the workforce. Since 1960 women and minorities entered the workforce in mass. Both of those groups have seen tremendous wage growth over the past 50 years.

So simply taking the median as you do, ignoring changes in the age and make up of the workforce, you miss a lot of gains.

You also ignore that total compensation, as measured by BLS stats, has increased far faster than wage growth. Currently wages only make up about 70% of total compensation [1]. Healthcare costs borne by employer are the simplest one to recognize - 50 years ago employers didn't pay much and costs were low. As healthcare costs increased, cost to employer increased far faster than wages, but this is still a benefit to the employee.

You also ignore that total cost to employ, again as measured by BLS has increased, due to regulations (many good) passing costs onto employer, things that also benefit workers. There has been significant federal legislation passed in the past 50 years that benefit workers, at a cost to employers. This cost results in benefits to workers but at a reduced wage.

BLS tracks all this in various indices.

So, if you simply look at median wage, ignore demographics, ignore increased benefits, ignore regulatory costs that benefit workers, then sure, things are not magically increasing. But all those other things are benefits to workers that do not show up in median wages. Adding them in gives a pretty big increase in total benefits to workers over the past 50 years.

So if you really want to argue more than I initially wrote, then let's do. But at least don't ignore factors counter to the narrative you want to spread.

You want to argue something else than what I posted.

[1] https://www.bls.gov/news.release/ecec.nr0.htm

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#333

Post by ChrisLomont »

chrisfinazzo wrote: post #95
ChrisLomont wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wars don't tend to grow economies, and QE stopped in 2014.

Tell me again how WWII didn't end the Depression because of the massive demand for workers and the associated economic activity they generated? Confused...

Cherry picking one case where one economy entered a war in a depression and exited out of a depression ignores all the other cases where wars made a country poorer.

Tell me again how WWII helped all the various economies involved and was not a net loss to the majority of them?

Confused...

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#334

Post by ChrisLomont »

ProAm wrote: post #34
ChrisLomont wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Wars don't tend to grow economies, and QE stopped in 2014.

QE stopped in 15, but the balance sheets were still full of them until the end of last year, we are just starting to get out of the effects of QE and to see how things will really look over the next few years [q] And war is very profitable and keeps money circulating, may not grow and economy but it will sure stabilize it while there are people to kill and things to break. [q] https://www.cnbc.com/2017/11/24/the-fed-…

That article does not state QE purchases were made in 2015.

QE "Purchases were halted on 29 October 2014" [1]

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quantitative_easing#US_QE1,_QE...

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#335

Post by Veelox »

user5994461 wrote: post #331
Veelox wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think we are disagreeing on terms. People support a living wage normally mean legally mandating that the minimum amount of money that is exchanged for an hour of labor is set to $X where X is higher than today's rate. I gave two examples where increasing the hourly rate would make it so that the business would not hire the worker because it would provide negative value to the company. Working half the hours does ch…

You were arguing for lowering the minimum wages. It doesn't need to be lowered in your examples.

I was arguing against setting the minimum wage to a living wage. I like the status quo of cities and states raising their minimum wage while the federal minimum lags behind. It's federalism in work.

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#336

Post by ChrisLomont »

kingbirdy wrote: post #44
ChrisLomont wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A large part is demographics, and the drop was known for decades before it happened, as mentioned in papers from Census. FRED reports also explain this. Another part is people staying in college longer (or going back to college) to get more education which is needed for a modern workforce, and the result of that is more lifetime earnings, not less. A third part is many people are opting for one income, since many cou…

> More people moving from the middle class did so by moving up rather than down. [Citation Needed]

Here's two [1,2]. There are plenty more you can find with a Google search.

[1] http://www.aei.org/publication/yes-the-us-middle-class-is-sh...

[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/is-the-middle-class-...

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#337

Post by ChrisLomont »

elvirs wrote: post #33
ChrisLomont wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A large part is demographics, and the drop was known for decades before it happened, as mentioned in papers from Census. FRED reports also explain this. Another part is people staying in college longer (or going back to college) to get more education which is needed for a modern workforce, and the result of that is more lifetime earnings, not less. A third part is many people are opting for one income, since many cou…

>A third part is many people are opting for one income, since many couples can now live on one income." I beg to differ, its quite the opposite actually. More people are in debt compared to past. Not sure if that's what you mean by 'climbing up'

Here's two sources showing more people are climbing up from middle class rather than down [1,2]. There are plenty more you can find with a Google search.

[1] http://www.aei.org/publication/yes-the-us-middle-class-is-sh...

[2] https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/is-the-middle-class-...

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#338

Post by downrightmike »

plasticchris wrote: post #216
downrightmike wrote: post #202

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Jobs are the wrong thing to focus on period. Focus needs to be on ownership.

Federating ownership is the opposite of convenient for the politican. Having a smaller number of people you need to please to get money is much better.

True. And most of their fundraising targets people who can afford to donate thousands of dollars. So whose problems do you think they are listening to and writing legislation to resolve? Put more people in the group that can donate makes more donors and gives us a larger pool of people who can afford to run for office.

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#339

Post by erikpukinskis »

vivekd wrote: post #290
erikpukinskis wrote: post #284

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What makes “that the wage gap numbers are not as significant as they are often presented” an important conversation for you? To me it seems like an uninteresting tautology. Like these others: “False statements about immigration numbers are often presented in discourse about naturalization policies” “Misleading financial figures are often presented in discourse about what stocks to buy.” It’s like... yah. So? All disc…

Well in this case the people who are wrong include most of academia, most of the popular media, and the former president of the United States. They were all touting the 77 cents figure I think that's a pretty big deal.

I see much more media disputing the 77 percent figure than presuming it. Don’t you?

(And as a side note, the existence of a raw 77% gap is factually true. Media would have to argue that it’s entirely due to sexism for them to step into territory you object to)

Re: Say Hello to Full Employment

#340

Post by austincheney »

flyingcircus3 wrote: post #319
austincheney wrote: post #289

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> What is freely asserted is freely dismissed. Then kindly leave it at that. It is, after all, the nature of friendly and disagreeable conversation. Crying to me about it certainly isn't productive.

You made an assertion that someone was being unreasonable in their requests for citations. You projected some buzzword made up by a webcomic, and then tried to associate it with something else entirely, as if demanding citations is the province of mouth breathers. You then misinterpreted my reply in the worst possible light, to fit the conspiracy that supports your original points. And now you're playing the victim c…

I think the misunderstanding here is that a conversation is not a contest. There aren't combatants or winners. But, there certainly is potential for harassment, emotion, and aggression of which all are unnecessary.

If you want a citation then go find it. Don't expect other people to do YOUR work for YOU. For more information on trolling: https://github.com/prettydiff/wisdom/blob/troll/Avoiding_Tro...

Anybody who anticipates a conversation is a thing that can be won, as in a contest or battle, is probably a troll.

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