There's been oodles of commentary about a $15.00 Minimum Wage over the past few months. Oodles. BTW, "oodles" is an oldie-timey word meaning..."lots."
Anyway, the O'Biden Administration has been promising, PROMISING its voters that they'd be earning $15.00 an hour for scooping ice cream. And flipping burgers. All they had to do was vote for him. They did, it seems. Do they get their $15.00 an hour? Just wait a bit. It's coming, they're told. Won't be too long now...
Exxxceppppttt, increasing the Federal "MinWage" to $15.00 an hour would represent an increase of $8.75 over the present $7.25. A more-than-doubling of our mandated Federal wage.
Do these people have s**t for brains?
Oh, I'm sorry. That was a rhetorical question.
Does not the O'Biden Administration understand that the Federal Minimum Wage was installed back in 1938 as a part of the "Fair Labor Standards Act." The idea was to use it...and its mandated 25 cents per hour...to help the U.S. crawl out of a nagging depression. It's been used ever since to try and keep employers from screwing Little Johnnie and Sweet Suzie when they take their first jobs at Baskin-Robbins. And Mickey D's. And Carl's Jr. For the MinWage has been intended for first jobs for teenagers so they could learn how to get to work on time and keep their noses clean and earn a few bucks so they could put gas in the Family Truckster for that big Friday night date. (Yeah, I know. Longish sentence. But it worked, so I went with it.)
It was never intended as the source of a Living Wage. Let me repeat:
It was never, ever intended that our Fed MinWage could support a family.
Not a family of four. Or even two. Not even one! That's why it's so low. But they, our friends on the Left, want to raise it so that John and Juan and JoAnn can go to work at Mickey D's and Carl's Jr. and 31 Flavors and feed a family of four. And have a nice place to live. And a car. However, it's rather interesting that nobody sought the advice and council of Mickey or Carl or any of the other flavors! And what's surprisingly lacking in the conversation is how Baskin-Robbins could possibly afford to pay Juan or John $30,000 a year for scooping ice cream? For if it were, these Ivory Tower, lily-livered functionaries who come up with these wet dream ideas would come to understand that the OWNER of that Baskin-Robbins might consider himself lucky in these challenging times if he earns that same $30,000 a year off the franchise he mortgaged his house to purchase.
Something tells me most days he's scooping his own ice cream...
And we don't even have to talk about the $10.00 sundae that would result from this economic foolishness (BTW, I, The Chuckmeister, actually have a degree in economics, and actually know how it's supposed to work!). And the fact that no one would be buying them at such an artificially inflated price. Which would then result in B-R going bankrupt. And little Johnnie and Suzie losing their jobs. As well as the franchise owner. Got it? I knew you would.
Some factoids for your reading pleasure: The average restaurant in America is lucky if it earns a 2% net profit. And that presumes no impediment, natural or manufactured, on "throughput." In other words, nothing preventing the turnstyle from turning. Which means no pandemics, for example. Not 20%, 2%! Also, according to the Haaaavid Business Review, only one in two new restaurants make it an entire year. And only one in five lasts five years. And only one in 20 makes it to a twentieth anniversary. A restaurant's largest cost of operation is labor. That can mean up to 50% of gross sales. So if labor costs go up, all other things being equal, the restaurant either has to increase prices to cover the shortfall, or lose money. And losing money isn't in the Game Plan. So, the Government's imposition of artificial increases in the cost of labor by approving a $15.00 an hour wage rate could mean a Mickey D's $6.99 Meal Deal could now cost $10.99. Or even more. And when folks won't pay the higher price? Yes, what?
The Office of Management and Budget has already come out with its opinion on this prospective debacle. The OMB states that passing the $15 MinWage would result in the direct loss of more than 1.5 Million Jobs. And in my erstwhile opinion, another indirect loss of up to another 3 Million More.
And while we're at it here, let us not forget that these newly-minted "middle class" workers at Mickey's or Carl's will then be earning so much they'll be needing the services of a union to protect their economic interests. Like the SEIU, I'd say. You know, the champion of the hotel maids? The $10 an hour types? Hundreds of thousands of them? So how about a million or two more? And how about O'Biden's planned welcoming of up to 11,000,000 new "DACA" recipients? Perhaps more like 22,000,000! Could be 30,000,000! Nobody knows for sure! And they'd all be making $15 an hour the day after wading across the Border!
The SEIU has spent more than $40 Million Dollars of its members' union dues so far on its campaign to force the Mickey's and the Carl's to fork over $15.00 an hour. Which they corporately CANNOT do, as they are franchisors, and their stores are franchisees. And the franchise laws in America prevent corporate parents from being legally able to dictate to their franchisees any operational demands at all. So somehow I'm thinking that at least 10% will be scraped off the top of these wages to feed the union maw. Plus these newly "rich" will then be under scrutiny by the IRS. First time taxpayers? Perhaps. Boy, it sure does cause trouble when you try and earn a living wage scooping ice cream, don't it? You start making some real money cranking out those Jamocha Almond Fudge Hot Fudge Sundaes and they just won't leave you alone, now will they?
What sort of hubris makes elected representatives somehow figure that they have the authority, much less the right, to decide what a Korean grocer should pay his stock boy for a couple of hours work after school each day? Or a Chinese restaurant pays its dish washers? The MinWage was created in a hot-hiring market to make sure employers didn't cheat their pimply-faced recruits. Was it smart then? No. Is it smart now? No. Do we now need a New Class of MinWage? One designed for full-time, permanent, fully-qualified workers? Separate and distinct from our current setup? Perhaps. But I suggest that what we really need is to simply eliminate it entirely! Wite-Out the MinWage! Get rid of it. We don't need it. Instead of increasing it, just forget it. Let the bargain struck between those who hire and those who are hired stay between them. Get the Government out of their bargain. Especially now with nearly 800,000 out of work. The Government has no place injecting its massive self into a financial arrangement between free men. Except for taking its "pound of flesh" from both the employer's and the workers' pay, of course. Gotta' have that, now don't we?
Either eliminate the Federal Minimum Wage, which is the smart thing to do, or just mandate that all jobs start at $30,000 a year. And be prepared for a massive recession. Or even a depression. But be sure to tie the MinWage to what we pay our Social Security retirees. Doing so could result in a doubling of what they are currently earning. And be sure to include our new military recruits in that deal. They've been paid only $20,170 a year for defending our freedom, which is far less than the $15.00 an hour the bozo braniacs are demanding. Imagine, while our soldiers protect us, and our seniors are struggling to keep body and soul together, they're arguing over scoops of ice cream...
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