Tag: minimum wage

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The California minimum employee wage is again in the news these days because several fast food restaurant chains just announced that they will be raising prices in California because the minimum wage for fast food workers will rise on April 1. By June 2024, the minimum employee wages in California will be Preview Open

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California’s Fast-Food Fumble

 

On September 5, California Governor Gavin Newsom lent his hearty endorsement to California’s FAST Recovery Act (short for Fast Food Accountability and Standards Recovery Act), which has been widely praised—and chastised—for its intention to raise minimum wages for the industry from $15 to as much as $22 per hour, the highest in the nation, with further increases in the offing. The major discussion over this new law has been directed to the perennial question of whether the loss in employment from its adoption will more than offset the salary gains to the workers able to maintain their positions within the industry. That is not likely, in my view, given the huge jump in mandated wages, which will make for a difficult transition period.

In dealing with this peculiar calculus, moreover, the inevitable losses in industry profits are given little or no weight in the economic evaluation of the law, on the implicit assumption that while the wage increases may put a dent in firm earnings, they will not drive all fast-food providers into bankruptcy—high-end operations are likely to be better able to weather the storm. It is also assumed that any increase in prices passed on to consumers will be borne with good grace, though many customers of the fast-food industry have marginal wage and income profiles not all that different from the workers (or at least those who retain their jobs) inside the industry.

The common assumption is that the only recourse available to deal with this new threat to the industry is a referendum to overturn the law, which would require the collection and validation of 623,000 signatures by December 4, 2022, for the referendum to appear on the ballot. Such an effort would attempt to replicate the successful 2020 initiative Proposition 22, which was designed to exempt companies like Uber, Lyft, and DoorDash from a California law that reclassified their drivers as employees entitled to all sorts of protections not made available to independent contractors.

Before their martini consumption, Jim and Greg remember Pearl Harbor 80 years after the Japanese attack that launched our nation into World War II and all the heroes who have served our nation. Then they go through new studies showing once again that raising the minimum wage leads to employees losing their jobs. They also recoil as the Biden White House tries to convince major media outlets that the president deserves much better coverage on the economy. And they get the popcorn ready as Chris Cuomo is reportedly preparing to sue CNN for the money remaining on his contract.

 

Join Jim and Greg as they welcome the Senate parliamentarian ruling that a minimum wage increase may not be included as part of the reconciliation process on a COVID relief bill. Jim updates the lingering problems as vaccines are being administered far slower than they are being produced. And they’re getting nervous as the last Senate Republican who could save the Neera Tanden nomination agrees to a one-on-one meeting with her.

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Raising the minimum wage is not about raising income for individuals and families, it’s about raising campaign funds for Democrat politicians. With the raise, almost all unions, public and private, will receive equivalent raises — some by contractual agreement. With that, unions can kick-back more campaign donations to politicians, almost exclusively in the Democrat party. […]

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Join Jim and Greg as they welcome the news that West Virginia Democrat Joe Manchin is opposing the nomination of Neera Tanden, President Biden’s choice for budget director, and two of the most moderate Republicans are already saying they’re voting against her as well. They also hammer California Democrat Ro Khanna, after the congressman says he doesn’t want small businesses that cannot afford to pay $15 per hour. And they follow the insane evolution of “the experts,” who are now saying that you will need to wear a mask long after the bulk of the population has been vaccinated.

Join Jim and Greg as they applaud Politico editors for defending their decision to have Ben Shapiro as a guest author and not caving to the liberal outrage in the newsroom. They also tell Joe Biden that this is the worst possible time to pursue a $15 per hour minimum wage, since it would kill even more jobs and probably more businesses. And they fume as a major study concludes lockdown policies did not help to stop the spread of the coronavirus.

It’s New Hampshire primary day! Get prepared with your Tuesday installment of the Three Martini Lunch. Join Jim and Greg as they applaud Supreme Court Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg for telling her fellow supporters of the Equal Rights Amendment that the effort died in 1982 and they need to start over again if they want to see it succeed. They also cringe as CNBC reminds us that Bernie Sanders would more than double federal spending every year due to his big government plans for health care, education, climate change and more. Meanwhile, Jim discusses the calculation from many on the right calculation that a Sanders nomination means an easy win for President Trump. And they roll their eyes as Tom Steyer tries to one-up the Democratic field by calling for a $22-per-hour minimum wage.

Edward L. Glaeser discusses how the proliferation of unfair laws and regulations is walling off opportunity in America’s greatest cities at the Manhattan Institute’s 2019 James Q. Wilson Lecture.

We like to think of American cities as incubators of opportunity, and this has often been true—but today’s successful city-dwellers are making it harder for others to follow their example. In this year’s Wilson Lecture, Glaeser addresses the conflict between entrenched interests and newcomers in its economic, political, geographic, and generational dimensions.

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Last week, I posted a story that I heard on the local TV news about how Walmart Greeters are being eliminated. It was a sad story about a senior, who also happened to be a veteran, at the local Walmart in the next county who was soon to be an eliminated greeter. This lead to […]

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There’s been a lot of media buzz and debate this week over Amazon’s decision to raise its internal minimum wage to $15 an hour for its 250,000 regular workers and 100,000 seasonal hires here in the United States. Conversations are flying back and forth about the long and short-term economic impact.  Will this force higher […]

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Dennis Prager on the Self-Righteously Suicidal West and False Morality

 

For this week’s Big Ideas with Ben Weingarten podcast, I had nationally syndicated radio host, columnist, author of numerous books, teacher, film producer and co-founder of PragerU, Dennis Prager, on the podcast to discuss among other things:

  • How Dennis Prager ended up a conservative as an Ivy League-educated Jewish intellectual from Brooklyn, New York — contrary to so many of his peers
  • How perceptions of human nature divide Left and Right
  • Whether government has filled the void of religion for the increasingly secular and progressive American coasts
  • How the good intentions that underlie Leftist policy prescriptions lead to horrendous outcomes — and emotion versus reason on the Left and Right
  • The false morality underlying European immigration policy with respect to the Muslim world, and Prager’s criticism of Jewish support of mass immigration consisting disproportionately of Jew-haters
  • The self-righteous suicidalism of the West
  • The Leftist bias of social media platforms and PragerU’s legal battle with YouTube/Google

You can find the episode on iTunes, everywhere else podcasts are found, download the episode directly here or read the transcript here.

Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America give credit to Senate Majority Leader Mitch McConnell for countering Democratic demands for a million pages of documents on Supreme Court nominee Brett Kavanaugh by suggesting the Senate vote on him may come just days before the election. They also mourn the impending loss of many entry-level jobs at places like McDonald’s due to minimum wage hikes and technological advancements. And they roll their eyes at the NFL’s inability to enforce a policy on kneeling during the anthem just days after the Miami Dolphins threatened to suspend players for not standing.

Long-term, persistent joblessness is the great American domestic crisis of our generation. In our 2017 special issue, “The Shape of Work to Come,” City Journal grappled with the problem, and our writers continue to explore it.

City Journal recently convened a panel of experts to talk about the future of work. Audio from their discussion is featured in this episode of 10 Blocks.

This week on Banter, Dr. Michael Strain discussed a variety of hot topics, including immigration, minimum wage laws, and the significance of the U.S. Census. Dr. Strain is the director of economic policy studies at AEI. His research focuses on labor economics, public finance, and social policies. Several of his papers have been published in peer-reviewed academic and policy journals, and he also writes frequently for popular audiences.

Learn More:

New Study Finds that Minimum Wage Hikes are Great News for Robot Workers

 

Back in 2014, I wrote a post that asked, “Why are minimum wage proponents dismissing automation risk?” I just wasn’t getting a sense from the “Fight for 15” crowd that it had thought much about the possibility that dramatically raising the minimum wage might worsen the competitive position of low-skill humans versus machines.

Or maybe it had, but the politics were so tantalizing that they took precedence over sound policy. My conclusion back then: “Pushing for an unprecedented boost in the minimum wage given both the weak economy and automation risk seems like foolhardy public policy.” That, especially given the low-risk alternative of raising and expanding the Earned Income Tax Credit.

Now comes the new NBER working paper, “People Versus Machines: The Impact of Minimum Wages on Automatable Jobs” by Grace Lordan and David Neumark (bold is mine):

Andy Puzder on Withdrawing as Labor Secretary

 

Andy PuzAndy Puzder joined us at Freedom Fest to discuss the minimum wage, small business regulations, his withdrawal from his Labor Secretary nomination, the poignant discussion he had with Mike Pence, and his last marketing effort at Carl’s Jr., creating possibly one of the greatest commercials in modern times (video below).

St. Louis Embraces Basic Economics and Lowers Minimum Wage

 

I’ve often highlighted the economic insanity of massive minimum wage hikes and the jobs lost as a result. But one Midwestern city is going the other direction. No, the mayor and aldermen of St. Louis didn’t decide to take an Economics 101 class at their local community college; the state government forced their second largest city back to sanity.

In 2015, the city raised its minimum wage from the state level of $7.70 an hour to $10. The Republican-dominated legislature passed a law mandating that all cities adhere to the Missouri standard. It goes into effect on Aug. 28.

Gov. Eric Greitens said that St. Louis’s $10 minimum wage would “kill jobs, and despite what you hear from liberals, it will take money out of people’s pockets.” He added, “government imposes an arbitrary wage, and small businesses either have to cut people’s hours or let them go.”

Jim Geraghty of National Review and Greg Corombos of Radio America discuss reports that President Trump revealed very sensitive intelligence during his meeting with Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov.  They also get a kick out of a lawsuit against the Democratic National Committee, alleging staffers weren’t paid the current minimum wage for their work in 2016.  And they have some fun with the news that a published photo of President Trump’s bodyguard revealed the personal cell phone number of Defense Sec. James Mattis.