Dem Plan
 

Some of you are skeptical of whether the Dems really have an idea what they want to do. In reality, as I say, the Dems like government and know how to run one. In my view, more planning has been done by them in the last 24 hours than the current administration has done in the last six years.

Here is a partial list of my favorite expected outcomes of this voter-driven change of direction:

* The "president's" use of "signing statements" to simply sidestep a new law's effect on his agenda. This will cease.

* Enact September 11 Commission recommendations including stronger oversight of intelligence agencies and privacy-covil liberties issues. Declassify intelligence agency budgets. Finally insist on port, mass transit and chemical and nuclear plant security.

*Hearings on detainee policy and treatment.

* Reauthorize No Child Left Behind, but with some money this time. Increase access to college by lowering tuition costs. Increase education-based tax breaks.

* Repeal subsidies to the oil industry. Use the money on biodiesel, ethanol fuels and alternative energy sources such as wind, solar and geothermal.

And there are many others more minor. In areas such as

* Stem cell research
* Drug companies gouging Medicare and everyone else. Enable Medicare to negotiate directly with drug companies, for example. A forbidden activity under current "administration" policy.
* Hearings to learn about Iraq decisions, policy and especially (this is the good part) "administration" decisions and contracts and relationships with contractors.
* Eliminate current "administration" policies that encourage US companies to move jobs overseas.
* Minimum wage increase (full time employment at the federal minimum wage gets you about $900 per month in earnings before taxes. I'd like to hear from folks who live in a part of this nation where rent, heat, lights, and transportation can be found for this price. No, the typical minimum wage workers does NOT live at home with his parents.)

Et Cetera.........

I like a lot of your points but:

Minimum wage is a political gift and is inflationary. Min wage workers byand large are not family bread winners but mostly younger family members with obviously entry level positions.

If fetal stem cell research had any promise then the private sector would be investing there but they are not to any significant degree. It's not the business of the govt. to fund this kind of thing.

You will never see the border fence funded under the Dems and illegal immigration will only get worse. Amnesty will surely happen. IMO, this is perhaps the single most impt. issue in this country for several reasons.

That one's loaded! Ask a union guy what that means and it'll probably include everything the government has done in the last 40 years.

This is a common myth. The majority of minimum wage workers are adults living independently, and a surprisingly high proportion of them are heads of households. This being the case, taxpayers are subsidizing the expenses of these workers and minimum wage law simply places that burden on the employer where it belongs.

On a related note, someone recently decried the expected attempt by Dems to universalize health insurance. Ummmm.....we pay for health services for poor folks anyway. Emergency rooms are required to treat indigents. So, it's not a matter of whether these folks get health care. Just as it's not a matter of whether minimum wage workers get transported to work. The question is who pays and where the money comes from. Currently, taxpayers fund emergency rooms and mass transit. Those of you who would like private enterprise to handle this......need to support things like "living wage" regulations.

Candidly, economists seem to fairly regularly narrow down the "living wage" figure to about THREE TIMES the federal minimum wage. So while the employer pays $5, you taxpayers are subsidizing with an additional $10. And while the single mom is working three jobs to make ends meet for her two kids.......she's NEVER HOME. Don't pretend to be surprised when those kids fail to learn values from mom. She's either at work or sleeping!

You forgot to mention that you're including food service workers that although they technically make the minimum wage, their main source of income is tips.

Supe - I want some numbers here. I have read differently. If an employer becomes burdened - they will being firing folks - not giving them a raise.

Funny how when the topic of minimum wage comes up - nobody mentions -

A. Earned Income Tax Credit. Yes, you work and have a family - the Feds give you extra money every year.

B. Food Stamps, school lunches and other giveaways.

C. The millions of illegals that follow no laws and are often below the present minimum wage scale anyway.

Re: Dem Plan
 

No disagreement. I have never like these under _any_ administration.

Your girl Nancy voted against implementing the 9/11 commision reccomendations.

Just what Oil Company breaks are we talking about? Examples?

Stem cell research will not happen while Bush is President. He will Veto that and there will be not enough votes to over-ride.

Again, can I see examples of Drug companies gouging medicare and how the Bush administration caused it?

And tell, me which specific policies passed by Bush encourage campanies to move overseas and what you would specifically like done to fix it.

Hard to believe you're comfortable with the idea that some full time workers' earnings are so low the gubmit has to feed them and give them cash.

I don't understand your question, but if you're asserting that the sky will fall after a minimum wage hike.....we've heard it before. The sky is still in place. Frankly, the cost of a burger does not change much, or et all, even with a substantial rise in minumum wage.

You left out the resurrection of the assult weapon ban...

Here is a link, if demographics is your confusion. It says 1/4 of these workers are between 16 and 19 years old. That means 3/4 are older that 19.

http://www.bls.gov/cps/minwage2002.htm

Ohh Supe - sorry you have bought into the idea that some sort of minimum wage is going to fix the underclass in this country. What makes me uncomfortable is the idea that many adult workers do not have the education and skills to move beyond a low productivity job (i.e. a minimum wage one.) I see earned income as a good thing. Much better than paying welfare - and the experience of work will help them move up and out into better paying jobs.

And no - the sky is not going to fall.

Minimum wage increase is a political vote buying 'kiss' and will not fix anything. It will result in firing and/or not hiring or putting folks on part time. Benefits will be cut as well and prices will go up. This has been proven time after tme.

As for all the other points/promises mentioned in your first post..some sound good. The Republicans usually sound good too but little actually happened. We'll see if somehow these promises get forgotten. Actions do speak louder than words...esp. when it's re: a politician...the lowest form of human life IMO.

You think immigration will get fixed?...DTFO....as in dream the F' on.

When the libs proposed creating a minimum wage for the first time, as well as creating overtime payment for hours over forty per week, getting the under-14 age workers out of the work force and several other regulations.....the business community warned us of the same things you are warning us about. What really happened? Prosperity. Economics is not for folks who draw simple conclusions quickly.

Superman,

Here's a pretty good analysis for you:

www.ppic.org/main/pressrelease.asp?p=333

The minimum wage deal will hurt businesses, raise the prices of goods and buy the recipients an extra pair of tennis shoes or maybe an extra case of beer on the weekend. It will not result in less people on welfare.

The govt should have no say in wages. We will never agree on this one Supe.

Mark, I worked for my state's labor department, in the section that regulates wages. It was in that capacity that I became aware of the conservative think tank so-called "research" institutes. One of the moderators here worked for the CATO Institute. Reminds me of the CEO that's interviewing candidates for the CFO position. The question was "What is two plus two?" The successful candidate answered "What do you want it to be?"

I still laugh at my memory of the Evergree Freedom Foundation's conclusions regarding the impact of prevailing wage requirements here. They said it increased the cost of public works construction by fifty percent. If these guys talked to any engineer, they must have forgotten the discussion. Direct wage costs (including benefits) never exceed 30% of the cost of construction. Rule of thumb is 20%. So, if the workers worked for free, construction costs would fall by perhaps as much as 30%. And of course, if you use free construction labor, there might be some other costs popping up. I'm giggling as I write this. That study was SOOOOOOO laughable. It was however, written with some very professional-sounding sentences. Like the ones in the link you provided.

We had an economy that was free of labor regulations. Trust me, you don't want that again. Unless you like unions, that is.

But hey, if you like your tax dollars used this way, great. I don't.

You raise the minimum wage and everything else goes up in price to compensate, and no, that is not a myth.

If i, as joe grocer, have to pay all my employees an extra .50 an hour, guess what, i'm raising my prices to cover the expense.

Rep vs. Dem ;-)

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1163094783.jpg

Love is in the air. . .

http://forums.pelicanparts.com/uploa...1163094956.jpg

Ok Supe....I respect your right to disagree...but lots of smart folks with the education and experience to know agree with me. What else can I say.

Caption that!

This should be fun to watch !!

Economists happily confess they don't agree. I respect that. I've read quite a bit of research from both sides of the aisle on this one and yes, I have a fairly clear impression of the impact of wage hikes on things like prices. I'd probably assert that I am one of those people with the education and experience to know. It is a part of my vocation.

It's very easy to just draw the simple conclusion that prices go up, but that is, as I say, a simple conclusion. On our current project, an airport, the owner negotiated with the vendors that they would sell their wares, food especially, at regular street prices. Not the gouging prices often seen in airports. I asked whether the vendors requested a lease concession in order to recover the revenue lost due to the requirement that prices be reasonable. No, they didn't. Apparently, they make the difference up in volume. And they knew, going in, that they would make this difference up.

But the thing that I would, if I could get folks to be honest, insist on is consistency. Many folks here lambaste the "system" for subsidizing poor folks. Using taxpayer money to underwrite the lives of the 'working poor.' So which is it? Do you want these peoples' wages to cover their expenses.......or not. If not, then stop biotching about the cost to government and the taxpayer. If so, then let's insist that living wages be paid to workers.

It is my opinion that boosting minimum wage boosts the prices of everything at a nearly proportional rate, thereby effectively eliminating any increase in PPP of a minimum wage worker.

It is a cause and effect.

You force us to pay our workers more, we simply increase the price of our goods and services to match.

Thus, the status quo is maintained.

I happily confess we don't agree ;-)

Seriously, though, I do respect your position in your vocation and your experience. You sound like a very educated man....but there are others equally or more educated and experienced who disagree with you...like some of the aforementioned economists mentioned above.

So be it...

BTW, Supe, if you're at work are you being paid to be on this thread ...kidding ;-)

This statement would never be made by an economist.

Latest suggestion for the Dem Plan is that Pelosi will try to get illegal immigrant amnesty (at least the so-called immigrant groups hope so).

I lived in SF for quite a while. I can assure you the above statement is spot on. She's as liberal as they come and the SF libs love her. BTW, she is the richest person in Congress...or so I hear and always playing to the poooor. I find her disgusting and dangerous...but perhaps not quite as dangerous and Jerry 'Moonbeam' Brown as Calif Atty Gen. Now THAT scares me. Sadly, younger voters had no memory or knowledge of his whacked out politics from his days as Gov.

OOOh OOOh. OOOh.

OOOh. Mr Kotter


Won't raising the minimum wage make businesses seek employees....elsewhere?

I say they will seek LESS employees and raise unemployment levels,but I guess they can just collect welfare then!That will surely fix it!

Dem Plan

That's a good one, other oxymorons I like are Resident alien, Virtual Reality and Jumbo Shrimp.

Like all Democrat "plans"...it is more like "Fantasy Island." Promise a lot of expensive programs to buy votes but have nothing in the "plan" to pay for them.

If minimum wage goes up, I'm not sure prices will go up. A business owners margins might not be that elastic. Instead, they may have to fire a worker to maintain their margins.

From my limited experience, i find it hard to believe people work for minimum wage for any length as the bread winner. I know when I started working at minimum wage, it wasn't very long before I got a raise. I showed I was willing to hussle, work hard and wages went up.

Wouldn't an employer want to keep good workers. It's expensive to hire workers, especially if they are slackers an you have to fire and re-hire someone els. It would make more sense to pay your good workers more than minimum wage to keep them around, which is what I've experienced. (obviously not a large pool of experience to sample from. Just what I've seen from friends/family and my personal situation growin up.)

I think what we will likely see is that talk is cheap. When it really comes down to it, the Dems will not get much, if anthing, more accomplished than the previous party in power.

I think all politicians, both R and D alike, should take a lesson from the Brady Bunch. Remember the episode of broken campaign promises? :)

Maybe she shouldn't have had those kids? I'm all for social programs that aim high but is it my job to fund other folks families? Sure you could say that it's the Dad's fault for leaving, maybe he's a dead beat but um...the fact is she picked him didn't she? This single mother bears some responsibility for her own plight, helping these women ideally should be for charities dedicated to it (there are more than a few of them). The government in my mind could assist with child care and subsidizing her education but where should the subsidizing stop for these folks who often are poor decision makers? Something should be done to educate rather than just giving them a hand out. Educating a person does much more for them than handing them money to help out.

The minimum wage is not designed to give people enough money to live off of alone nor should it be changed to do so. Be realistic here, generally speaking people need to learn that they are responsible for their actions. If you have children with a douchbag and he leaves you - who is to blame? You would have us believe that it is the tax payer's responsibility to care for her children and I would suggest that it is her responsibility. She's the one who had sex with a douchbag; she should have been more careful.

I'm not saying don't help but I am saying the help should be in educating her to help herself rather than a handout. This is one democrat who thinks highly of capitalism and thinks ALL handouts should stop today.

Huh? This is Economics 101. Increase the cost of goods sold, raise the price to maintain your margin. When all your competitors also have their costs increased precisely the same, it's a no-brainer.

Or reduce your costs by laying people off.

The only "economists" who wouldn't agree with that are paid political hacks.

You missed one: Barbara Mikulski, (D) Maryland. Nasa is still working on a special lens filter to protect cameras from that woman. Fortunately, ear plugs work when she opens her mouth.

And one on the other side: Sarah Michelle Gellar - Republican

if we raise the minimum wage, all the jobs will go overseas.

oh wait, that already happened...

Know of her but luckily I've never seen her. I think there's enough fugliness in the bottom half of that pic to gag a skunk already. As for the Repubs...gimme Michelle Malkin any day....