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Legal
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Minimum WageMinimum Wage Should Not Be A Living WageMinimum wage is a starter wage not a living wage. It is intended to allow the inexperienced and unskilled to gain some entry-level experience and to learn a payable skill. Minimum wage should be used to encourage new workers to improve themselves so they can command and demand higher wages for their experience and skills. Minimum wage should never be viewed as an end wage but only as a starting wage. Politicians are trying to convert the minimum wage into a basic living wage. While it is true that some employers will pay the least they can, most employers soon realize that good, steady, honest, and reliable employees don’t stay when poor wages are offered. So what these employers end up with are people who really don’t want to work and who usually cost the employer more than they make in wages. By raising the minimum wage, politicians are not really helping the inexperienced and unskilled worker; however, politicians use the minimum wage to improve their vote-pulling power. Increasing the minimum wage only encourages more workers to remain where they are rather than to try to gain experience, education, and skills. As long as these unskilled people can make a poor living wage some will be satisfied. Minimum wage should create a dissatisfaction in those that receive it. Minimum wage should encourage self-improvement not complacency. Workers should be protected from employer abuse. Things like working conditions, number of hours, and worker safety should be regulated. Minimum wage should be part of the open market based on the employer’s needs and the employee’s willingness to stay or go. The cost of having to constantly train new employees will force most employers to raise their starting minimum wage as soon as they determine they have found a good employee. Minimum wage doesn’t just effect the young and inexperienced. Many older and retired people are working just to make ends meet and some just to keep themselves active. A low-paying, dead-end job is viewed as better than vegetating in front of a TV all day long. Most of these older people are happy to have a part-time, productive, low-paying job at least until they reach retirement age so their income doesn’t effect their social security checks. Raising the minimum wage effects both ends of the working spectrum. Increasing the minimum wage does not improve the quality of the available workers but it often decreases the number of workers an employer can afford to carry and to train. If politicians really want to help, they should eliminate all state and federal taxes on minimum wages, including all FICA deductions. However, politicians would rather raise the minimum wage because it appears to be helpful to the wage earner and they can brag about how they have helped the poor. Eliminating taxes on minimum wages would do more good but would not give the politicians a "cause" every few years. Minimum wage should not be determined by politicians who usually care more for the votes than the results. Minimum wage should be determined by the supply of workers and the local need for those workers. Afterword Author: Don Miller
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2006 Articles |
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