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Post by aztec70 on Nov 17, 2013 13:24:28 GMT -8
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Post by AztecWilliam on Dec 5, 2013 6:57:28 GMT -8
It's easy for Robert Reich to tell Walmart to raise wages, but it's not that simple. Running a private business is always more complicated than collectivists on the Left think. And just how much should the Walmart worker's wages be raised? 1%? 5%? 10%? And what if you raise wages and that does not have the magic effect on the economy that Reich predicts? Should Walmart, it's net income having fallen due to higher labor costs, rescind those raises?
And this isn't 1914 (not sure of the exact year when Ford offered five bucks a day). In any event, Walmart should decide what is in the best interests of the company when deciding how much to pay its workers. If raising wages results in the company either losing market share, which would cause lots of workers to lose their jobs, or going out of business altogether, whom does that help?
Reich, who ought to know better, apparently thinks that private companies are social welfare agencies rather than for-profit corporations. He ought to know better, but obviously he does not.
AzWm
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Post by azteccc on Dec 5, 2013 7:35:45 GMT -8
^^ and WalMart workers should have the guaranteed right to collectively bargain for their own best interests, as well.
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Post by aztec70 on Dec 6, 2013 19:42:26 GMT -8
It's easy for Robert Reich to tell Walmart to raise wages, but it's not that simple. Running a private business is always more complicated than collectivists on the Left think. And just how much should the Walmart worker's wages be raised? 1%? 5%? 10%? And what if you raise wages and that does not have the magic effect on the economy that Reich predicts? Should Walmart, it's net income having fallen due to higher labor costs, rescind those raises? And this isn't 1914 (not sure of the exact year when Ford offered five bucks a year). In any event, Walmart should decide what is in the best interests of the company when deciding how much to pay its workers. If raising wages results in the company either losing market share, which would cause lots of workers to lose their jobs, or going out of business altogether, whom does that help? Reich, who ought to know better, apparently thinks that private companies are social welfare agencies rather than for-profit corporations. He ought to know better, but obviously he does not. AzWm From your comment I conclude you do not understand.
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Post by 78aztec82 on Dec 7, 2013 6:28:43 GMT -8
It's easy for Robert Reich to tell Walmart to raise wages, but it's not that simple. Running a private business is always more complicated than collectivists on the Left think. And just how much should the Walmart worker's wages be raised? 1%? 5%? 10%? And what if you raise wages and that does not have the magic effect on the economy that Reich predicts? Should Walmart, it's net income having fallen due to higher labor costs, rescind those raises? And this isn't 1914 (not sure of the exact year when Ford offered five bucks a year). In any event, Walmart should decide what is in the best interests of the company when deciding how much to pay its workers. If raising wages results in the company either losing market share, which would cause lots of workers to lose their jobs, or going out of business altogether, whom does that help? Reich, who ought to know better, apparently thinks that private companies are social welfare agencies rather than for-profit corporations. He ought to know better, but obviously he does not. AzWm From your comment I conclude you do not understand. Please elaborate as to how you concluded that. Thx Sent from my DROID RAZR using proboards
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Post by aztec70 on Dec 7, 2013 8:35:11 GMT -8
From your comment I conclude you do not understand. Please elaborate as to how you concluded that. Thx Sent from my DROID RAZR using proboards Ford saw his employees as consumers. Walmart sees their employees as costs.
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Post by aztecwin on Dec 7, 2013 13:24:12 GMT -8
Please elaborate as to how you concluded that. Thx Sent from my DROID RAZR using proboards Ford saw his employees as consumers. Walmart sees their employees as costs. So? That explains nothing! Business decisions that worked for Ford have what chance of working today? A full time assembly line worker back then equates to a part time or entry level worker in what ways? I am afraid you are the one who lacks an understanding of how things really work.
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Post by aztec70 on Dec 7, 2013 17:55:16 GMT -8
Ford saw his employees as consumers. Walmart sees their employees as costs. So? That explains nothing! Business decisions that worked for Ford have what chance of working today? A full time assembly line worker back then equates to a part time or entry level worker in what ways? I am afraid you are the one who lacks an understanding of how things really work. I know big concepts are hard for you so I will not try to explain. You should drink Margaritas until you get to your happy place. You will feel better.
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Post by aztecwin on Dec 8, 2013 6:46:44 GMT -8
So? That explains nothing! Business decisions that worked for Ford have what chance of working today? A full time assembly line worker back then equates to a part time or entry level worker in what ways? I am afraid you are the one who lacks an understanding of how things really work. I know big concepts are hard for you so I will not try to explain. You should drink Margaritas until you get to your happy place. You will feel better. You are stumped I see.
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Post by aztec70 on Dec 8, 2013 16:30:11 GMT -8
I know big concepts are hard for you so I will not try to explain. You should drink Margaritas until you get to your happy place. You will feel better. You are stumped I see. Feel better?
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Post by AztecWilliam on Jan 7, 2014 13:52:00 GMT -8
Please elaborate as to how you concluded that. Thx Sent from my DROID RAZR using proboards Ford saw his employees as consumers. Walmart sees their employees as costs.
Both are true. They are not mutually exclusive concepts. At any rate, a business should be free to pay its employees as much or as little as it (the business) thinks will result in a better outcome for that business. If the rate of compensation is about right, and if other factors fall into place, the business will thrive. If a company pays too little, it will lose it best workers (the less productive ones may well not be able to find better jobs). If the company pays too much, its bottom line will suffer and, ultimately, so will its workers. I remain totally convinced that "economists" on the Left are virtually clueless regarding how businesses actually operate in the real world. There is a lot of magical thinking done by those who believe that they can better run the economy than can the men and women who are actually responsible for making business decisions. AzWm PS: I have corrected my earlier post in which I said that Ford paid paid dollars a year to his workers. Of course, that should have been five dollars a day. I'm guessing that five bucks a day in today's money would be about $80.00.
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Post by azteccc on Jan 7, 2014 16:07:23 GMT -8
If the company pays too much, its bottom line will suffer and, ultimately, so will its workers. STOCKHOLDERS Just over $116. At today's $8/hr, you do the math...
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Post by AztecWilliam on Jan 7, 2014 18:09:08 GMT -8
If the company pays too much, its bottom line will suffer and, ultimately, so will its workers. STOCKHOLDERS Just over $116. At today's $8/hr, you do the math... Hours worked does not figure into my calculation. Five dollars per day is five dollars, no matter how hours were worked.. The critical issue in this case is how much value the U.S. dollar has declined due to inflation in the past century. My guess is that a dollar in 1914 would be worth about fifteen dollars Just reread this and realized that I mean to type $75.00 a day. a day now, but I could wrong. AzWm
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Post by AlwaysAnAztec on Jan 8, 2014 9:40:22 GMT -8
STOCKHOLDERS Just over $116. At today's $8/hr, you do the math... Hours worked does not figure into my calculation. Five dollars per day is five dollars, no matter how hours were worked.. The critical issue in this case is how much value the U.S. dollar has declined due to inflation in the past century. My guess is that a dollar in 1914 would be worth about fifteen dollars a day now, but I could wrong. AzWm You are wrong. He is correct. www.davemanuel.com/inflation-calculator.php
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Post by aztec70 on Jan 8, 2014 10:29:27 GMT -8
William, why do you "guess" when you have a computer?
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Post by AztecWilliam on Jan 21, 2014 18:59:12 GMT -8
William, why do you "guess" when you have a computer? If it were critical to the argument, I would have looked it up. The point is simply this; whether Ford paid his employees 5 bucks a day, or 50, or 500 is immaterial. The issue is who gets to decide how much employees earn and what effect on a company's fortunes are caused by a given level of compensation? Ford decided that his company would be helped by paying more to his workers. That's fine. Whether the higher pay actually caused more Model-Ts to be purchased is not clear. Undoubtedly, more Ford workers bought cars than they otherwise would not have. But Ford's workforce numbered in the thousands a century ago. Even if every one of those workers bought a new Ford every year, or even two or three every year, the effect on the company's bottom line would have been minor. Ford needed not thousands, or even tens of thousands, to buy his cars. He needed hundreds of thousands and eventually millions of people to buy Fords. Now, please, do not misunderstand. There were probably other positive results from the workers getting more money. Better paid workers are probably, in most cases, better workers. That is not a trivial thing. But merely paying better wages to his employees did not turn a company that built 1599 cars in 1906 into one that built 501,492 in 1915 and 1,275,618 in 1921. (Yes, I did look up those figures.) The Left believes that if you just pay workers more money the economy will improve. That's a gross simplification. To go back to Ford, if the Model-T had been an overpriced, poorly-performing, unreliable dog, the company would have tanked no matter how high Henry raised his worker's wages. The Model-T was none of those things. The workers had a lot to do with that, since the cars didn't assemble themselves. But they didn't design themselves, either, and it was not the average line worker who was responsible for that. Nor were they responsible for the many correct executive decisions made by Henry Ford and his lieutenants. AzWm
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Post by azteccc on Jan 21, 2014 20:00:03 GMT -8
If it were critical to the argument, I would have looked it up. The point at is simply this; whether Ford paid his employees 5 bucks a day, or 50, or 500 is immaterial. The issue is who gets to decide how much employees earn and what effect on a company's fortunes are caused by a given level of compensation? You have to decide whether you believe in a minimum wage, or not. A libertarian, such as yourself, surely believes the government has no role in mandating wage floors. If that is your position, I can respect it. If, however, you agree that a minimum wage/working condition/etc. should be set at some level by the government, then that wage should be periodically revisited, argued, and changed. The position of the left, which you seem to often have so much insight into, is that that wage should be enough that a full-time worker is not having to get food using an EBT card or health care through an emergency room/medicaid or diapers through WIC. When private industry is profiting at an all-time high, that wage should at least keep up with the cost of living and inflation - that much is inarguable. The left believes workers should also profit in the profit they are creating, at least to some minimal degree. The left believes any worker, sacrificing 40 hours + per week to a company making more money than ever, should make enough money to at least be above the poverty line. And the right, which you are undoubtedly a part of, fails to realize that by letting private industry profit on the backs of their workers, the burden falls on taxpayers to subsidize those who are doing everything in their power to not be the dreaded "taker".
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Post by aztecwin on Jan 22, 2014 5:39:17 GMT -8
Some how the idea that entry level low wage jobs are not meant to be careers escapes lefties.
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Post by AlwaysAnAztec on Jan 22, 2014 10:32:48 GMT -8
What I don't want to see happen is that the U.S. goes back to the day of the 'Robber Baron'. Unfortunately, that is where we seem to be going.
Henry Ford doubled his worker's daily wage to $5.00 per day in 1914. He was roundly condemned by his contemporaries for doing so. So, he went from $2.50 ($56.46 in 2012 dollars) to $5.00 ($112.93 in 2012 dollars).
$56.46 x 5 days/week x 52 weeks = $14,679.60 per year
$112.93 x 5 days/week x 52 weeks = $29,359.20 per year
The federal poverty guideline for a family of four (2013) is $23,550.00. The U.S. was basically a two class society in 1914. The average worker was really nothing more than a slave.
The real rise in the middle class didn't happen until after WWII. The peak in real earnings for the middle class happened around 1970 or so. Since then real earnings for the middle class have drastically decreased while the real earnings of the upper class have drastically increased.
The 'Robber Barons' of 2014 control the Republican party and, in my opinion, want to take this country back to pre-1914. When will the average Republican voter wake up and realize that every time they vote Republican they vote against their own economic interest.
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Post by aztec70 on Jan 22, 2014 12:24:14 GMT -8
Some how the idea that entry level low wage jobs are not meant to be careers escapes lefties. Why do righties think exploiting employees is a good idea?
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