Why work?

gulfbeachbandit wrote:http://dailycaller.com/2013/08/20/study-welfare-pays-more-than-work-in-most-states/

Sal wrote:The findings of this study may very well be valid, but the conclusion drawn from them in the article you post is erroneous.

The article concludes that because welfare benefits pay more than entry level jobs, the lazy, shiftless poorz are receiving too many benefits.

The correct conclusion would be that entry level jobs don't pay shit in this country.

That is because our economy has been distorted into a system that rewards oligarchs at the expense of regular Americans by valuing asset inflation over wage growth and economic stability.

]Corporations could create jobs and pay living wages, but they are only interested in inflating their stock prices.

Recently, it was shown that McDonalds could double its employees salaries by raising the price of a Big Mac by little more than 50c.

Corporate America has lost touch with Henry Ford's logic that it makes good business sense to pay your employees enough to buy your product.

The real travesty rests in the success the corporatists have had in convincing middle and working class "conservatives" that the poorz and their fellow workers are the problem.

We shouldn't resent civil servants because they have health benefits and pensions.

All working Americans should have health benefits and pensions.

We should be venting our anger and frustration at Wall Street, not our fellow workers.



That's what Occupy was all about.

Nekochan wrote:I saw fast food workers on TV a couple of weeks ago saying that they deserve $15 an hour.  They said you cannot support a family on entry level wages.  They are correct.  Entry level employees at McDonalds shouldn't be trying to support a family.

Sal wrote:The findings of this study may very well be valid, but the conclusion drawn from them in the article you post is erroneous.

The article concludes that because welfare benefits pay more than entry level jobs, the lazy, shiftless poorz are receiving too many benefits.

The correct conclusion would be that entry level jobs don't pay shit in this country.

That is because our economy has been distorted into a system that rewards oligarchs at the expense of regular Americans by valuing asset inflation over wage growth and economic stability.

Corporations could create jobs and pay living wages, but they are only interested in inflating their stock prices.

Recently, it was shown that McDonalds could double its employees salaries by raising the price of a Big Mac by little more than 50c.

Corporate America has lost touch with Henry Ford's logic that it makes good business sense to pay your employees enough to buy your product.

The real travesty rests in the success the corporatists have had in convincing middle and working class "conservatives" that the poorz and their fellow workers are the problem.

We shouldn't resent civil servants because they have health benefits and pensions.

All working Americans should have health benefits and pensions.

We should be venting our anger and frustration at Wall Street, not our fellow workers.

That's what Occupy was all about.



You're absolutely right Sal.  The minimum wage should have been raised to at least $9 an hour a long time ago. Working American's income does not keep up with inflation.

Actually,you're always absolutely right so far as I can see.


The only difference I might make in your post would be that McDonalds wouldn't really have to  raise prices to raise the pay of their workers. Just cut into that corporate profit a little bit and they could do it.

Sal wrote:The findings of this study may very well be valid, but the conclusion drawn from them in the article you post is erroneous.

The article concludes that because welfare benefits pay more than entry level jobs, the lazy, shiftless poorz are receiving too many benefits.

The correct conclusion would be that entry level jobs don't pay shit in this country.

That is because our economy has been distorted into a system that rewards oligarchs at the expense of regular Americans by valuing asset inflation over wage growth and economic stability.

Corporations could create jobs and pay living wages, but they are only interested in inflating their stock prices.

Recently, it was shown that McDonalds could double its employees salaries by raising the price of a Big Mac by little more than 50c.

Corporate America has lost touch with Henry Ford's logic that it makes good business sense to pay your employees enough to buy your product.

The real travesty rests in the success the corporatists have had in convincing middle and working class "conservatives" that the poorz and their fellow workers are the problem.

We shouldn't resent civil servants because they have health benefits and pensions.

All working Americans should have health benefits and pensions.

We should be venting our anger and frustration at Wall Street, not our fellow workers.

That's what Occupy was all about.

Nekochan wrote:I saw fast food workers on TV a couple of weeks ago saying that they deserve $15 an hour.  They said you cannot support a family on entry level wages.  They are correct.  Entry level employees at McDonalds shouldn't be trying to support a family.

PkrBum wrote:There will be govt solutions... please ignore the results.

Sal wrote:    This Wal-Mart low-prices, low-wages thing isn’t working out so well — even for Wal-Mart.

   The company released its quarterly numbers last week, and they weren’t pretty. Same-store sales declined by 0.3 percent, and the company lowered its earnings-per-share forecast. Bad news wasn’t limited to Wal-Mart. At the low end of the retail consumer market, Kohl’s reported similarly bad news; Macy’s, a little higher up the food chain, lowered its earnings forecast as well.

   While Americans with money are boosting both the housing and auto markets, the growing number of Americans without are curtailing their shopping. As Douglas McMillon, chief executive of Wal-Mart International, noted last week, “When we do see good things in the economy, sometimes they don’t immediately flow through to a paycheck. Remember how the average American lives.”

   And who signs more paychecks than any private-sector employer on the planet? Ah, yes: Wal-Mart…

   This is not the first time U.S. mass retailers have faced the problem of under-consumption. In the 1920s, as U.S. cities swelled, the low incomes of the new urban consumers posed a constant challenge to merchants. In contrast to today’s Walton family heirs, however, some of those merchants realized that the solution was to raise workers’ incomes.

   In the ’20s, Edward Filene, whose family owned both its eponymous chain and the Federated Department stores, called for the establishment of a minimum wage, unemployment insurance, a five-day workweek, legalized unions and cooperatives where people could do their banking. (He helped establish some of the first banking co-ops himself.) The Straus family, which owned Macy’s, and shoe-magnate Milton Florsheim endorsed similar measures and were among the more prominent business leaders who supported Franklin Roosevelt’s New Deal. They were well compensated for their clear understanding of how to make an economy thrive: During the 30 years of broadly shared prosperity that the New Deal reforms made possible, department stores catering to the vast middle class were a smashing success….

http://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/harold-meyerson-for-retailers-low-wages-arent-working-out/2013/08/20/5fbb66ee-09c9-11e3-8974-f97ab3b3c677_story.html