Re: Help with a Minimum Wage Model

From: Lee Daniel Crocker (lee@piclab.com)
Date: Mon Apr 07 2003 - 16:50:54 MDT

  • Next message: Damien Sullivan: "Re: Help with a Minimum Wage Model"

    > >Why do we think it's somehow "right" to forbid contracts for pay that's
    > >not sufficient for living alone?
    >
    > Umm....because those poor people might get mad and riot and destroy
    > property and shut down commerce....just like they did back in the 20's
    > and 30's...which is how we got our labor laws in the first place?

    You have a bizarre recollection of history. The problem in the 20s
    and 30s was that everyone was so poor they couldn't even live as
    large families, much less alone. The minimum wage did nothing at all
    to fix that problem; indeed, it probably delayed recovery.

    The point of my question is this: why, if a person living with
    parents or roommates or some other cheap arrangement wishes to do
    a job that supply-and-demand happens to make worth less than the
    amount he'd need to live on his own do we think it's "right" to
    tell him that he isn't allowed to take that job?

    -- 
    Lee Daniel Crocker <lee@piclab.com> <http://www.piclab.com/lee/>
    "All inventions or works of authorship original to me, herein and past,
    are placed irrevocably in the public domain, and may be used or modified
    for any purpose, without permission, attribution, or notification."--LDC
    


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