How do you translate that into numbers? If $15/hr is better than $14/hr, wouldn’t $150/hr be 10x better, and if so, what’s wrong with a comfortable $1,500/hr?
I think that’s where economists start to differ.
What exactly is the benefit of wholly depriving the putative worker of a job vs. making up the difference with something like food stamps and Medicaid?
What exactly is "livable" anyways? Millions of people live every day with only a couple of dollars a day.
Not in the USA they don't. There is no possible way that an individual could pay for food, clothing, and shelter on that income.
When you pay for yourself, you're price sensitive and try to choose what makes sense for you. When you're not price sensitive, you run into a major incentive problem. If your life is funded by taxpayers, you have no reason not to argue that basic subsistence requires a lifestyle as expensive as you can get away with.
Decent.
Roosevelt:
""" In my Inaugural I laid down the simple proposition that nobody is going to starve in this country. It seems to me to be equally plain that no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country.
By business I mean the whole of commerce as well as the whole of industry; by workers I mean all workers, the white collar class as well as the men in overalls; and by living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level-I mean the wages of decent living.
"""
> A smartphone?
Yes
> A recent one?
Define "recent". One that has internet connectivity, allows you to install apps that are increasingly required today (banks, school, mail, auth etc.)
> What standard of medical care?
All of it except cosmetic. A.k.a. universal healthcare.
> What about entertainment?
What about it? Define entertainment. Let's do this way more broadly: how about vacations, sick leaves and parental leave?
> What if someone wants only to eat organic, fair trade food?
Yes. The poor cannot escape bad eating habits because (especially in the US) more often than not they have no access to healthy food, and healthy food is much more expensive than current government assistance can cover.
BTW: Are you American, and do you by any chance identify as Christian? Because I've only seen two groups of people so hellbent on never helping their fellow man. American Christians and American libertarians.
I've yet to see an austerity measure that strips away even the most basic protections the way US does.
> this kind of behavior on a large scale.
The US: 40 million people one month away from eviction. 30 million people are one medical emergency away from life-time of crippling debt.
Americans: oh, look at austerity measures in Europe.
No, disagreeing with your must mean I want people to stay in poverty forever...
Learn from immigrants: they earn their way to a better life by applying themselves and helping each other.
Also OCASM: You can't make me help other people, it's slavery
I really wish people were more educated about this. In 2013, the US Government spent $4,981 PER PERSON (only $4,500 was privately funded per person) [1].
That is more government money per person than Sweden, Germany, Canada, Great Britain, Australia, etc (more than almost every first-world country).
The US has a pricing problem and a healthy-living problem. Almost 2/3 of all healthcare spending goes toward the obese 1/3 of the population [2].
Under 45, costs are less than 3k per person per year on average. The next 2 decades see prices soar to over double at almost 6.5k and over 65 they almost double again to 11.3k [3].
Why should I have to pay twice as much because someone else is overeating?
Put more interestingly, if obese people were denied government funds, the current amount of government spending at current prices would not only pay for EVERYONE, but would even have money left over (most likely gradually reaching equilibrium as those people lost weight to gain coverage).
[1] https://www.visualcapitalist.com/u-s-spends-public-money-hea...
[2] https://ajph.aphapublications.org/doi/pdf/10.2105/AJPH.89.8....
[3] https://www.registerednursing.org/healthcare-costs-by-age/
Why do you pay for car insurance just because someone is driving recklessly? ;)
Also: as you correctly pointed out, the US spends more on healthcare than any other country. But people in those countries pay for obese people, too. And still...
Healthcare is a complex problem which should also include solutions for crazy amounts of sugar in American foods and drinks, better food in schools, better access to healthy foods for low-income families etc. etc.
I've paid much higher premiums than my sister simply because of my sex. If I get a speeding ticket, reckless driving, at-fault accident, or any number of things, my insurance will skyrocket enough to cover my added costs to the system (interesting, in my earlier years with my perfect record and despite my sister's many speeding tickets, I still wound up paying more for insurance for an equivalent vehicle).
EVERY insurance increases premiums for high-risk situations EXCEPT health insurance because reasons.
> But people in those countries pay for obese people, too. And still...
Obesity in the US happens at a much higher rate than other countries. My main point was that we are already super-socialized and the real issue lies elsewhere.
Of course, because reasons. Because health is a bit more complex than "you get a speeding ticket, you're a bad driver"
> My main point was that we are already super-socialized
You mean to say that the US already has super-socialized medical care? Erm, no. It's nowhere even close to being "super-socialized".
> and the real issue lies elsewhere.
Indeed. And I mentioned this in my comment:
Healthcare is a complex problem which should also include solutions for crazy amounts of sugar in American foods and drinks, better food in schools, better access to healthy foods for low-income families etc. etc.
Before punishing obese people the US should take quite a few steps towards helping people not become obese. Because even fast food is healthier in Europe: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZMaW6TamNAc
I think the better solution is to set a reasonable rate, fix it to inflation, and use corporate taxes to fund social safety nets.
I wonder why states/municipalities don't just leave it at that - a specific consumption basket whose cost is recalculated annually, vs having recurrent loud debates about it with some arbitrary round numbers.
Because the level at which it is safe to set local minimum wage without net adverse effects from job loss depends on a variety of conditions besides price levels, including prevailing low-end wages in localities that compete to attract employment. Building a formula that fully addresses this is nontrivial, and even with one that worked locally there would be a reason for broader regional/national campaigns to kick the floor up.
No, the government is subsidizing the worker, and in a system of means-tested aid doing so less than it would be without the job.
If you can't employ people at wages that don't get them fully off public aid, then people can't get the jobs that let them build the skills to be employable at decent wages. Your plan is a recipe for (1) killing businesses and tax revenue that support public assistance, and (2) killing people's ability to move up and off of public assistance, so that for any given minimum standard of living we’ll need more public funds to reach it but have less available.
It's much better to tax capital returns and use the proceeds to support the un- and under-employed (whether permanent or transitional) then it is to block the onramps to people becoming employable at wages that are livable.
And that's even ignoring that Medicaid and other public assistance usually aren't based solely on individual income but household circumstance, so that the required minimum wage by that standard would be dependent on household circumstances, which is problematic.
There's always talk about market failures when many times government failures are the true causal mechanism.
A minimum wage is not set in a vacuum, and high numbers that ignore this fact do not illustrate anything useful.