Raise the minimum wage already.

[Metsie Casey]

This discussion thread was locked as off-topic by DonViejo (a host of the The DU Lounge forum).

More than 15. Everyone isn't capable of climbing the ladder. They should still be able to earn a good living from the start. Stop the greed already. [link:

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[Warpy]

1. Most capitalists only care about the ladder insofar as they'd like to pull it up

after them so that no competitors can use it.

The real reason America needs a raise is because the economy has stalled, middle level demand has dried up, and now shopping patterns reflect a small wealthy class and a large working class. Entrepreneurship in terms of opening small businesses has also dried up, although the tech sector is still managing do do a little of it, probably because wages are high enough there to support it.

The rich and corporate have simply forgotten the demand side of the equation. Without demand, all the mass produced crap made by robotics and delivered by self driving vehicles to automated warehouses will just sit there. The rich don't want that kind of stuff and the rest of us won't be able to afford a sufficient quantity of it to keep it from piling up, unsold.

This is really the capitalist endgame, when production far outstrips demand, both due to low demand and high wealth concentration. Either we're going to have to do another New Deal, skimming wealth off the top, making it more difficult to concentrate wealth, and creating demand through public works jobs paying living wages until entrepreneurship in the private sector took over. It's that or try to develop another economic paradigm, good luck to us and the Red Sox with that one.

[CitizenZero]

2. Increasing Wages

Providing consumers with more spending power is proven to boost the economy. If we increased the buying power of workers in America, those people will spend that money on cars, appliances, restaurant meals, all sorts of goods and services, home improvements, etc. Any American company that provides goods and/or services would ultimately benefit from a wage increase/boost of the minimum wage. It is a win all around.

[guillaumeb]

3. Change the framing.

Call it a living wage, and let the so-called right to life party explain that people have no right to a living wage.

[DonViejo]

4. Locking...

Our social forum. Relax with your friends and talk about off-topic stuff. The Lounge is supposed to be a friendly, welcoming place for everyone. No cliquish behavior. No drama. No political arguments. No whining about DU.