actually that's a good point... :-D
offcourse rasing the minimumwage arbitrarily to 100$ or 2.000.000$ or... is a BAD idea...
in any economy rasing it too high will cause inflation...
what I SHOULD have said was nowhere in the history of minimumwages has HAVING (not a rise in) a minimumwage caused unimployment...
so where should it be without causing damage to the economy...
well the idea behind a minimumwage is to make sure that even the lowest paying fulltime job can support a decent living for a person (so there's no need for a second or third job to survive)...
so the math would look like this...
(minimumwage)$ * (full time job)hours/week * 52 weeks / 12 month = (decent living)$
now what a decent living is can be discussed but it should make you able to afford a decent place to live and food for you and your family and healthcare and clothes as a minimum... :-D
in denmark we have a minimumwage of 17$/hour and a work week of 35.5hours/week so a decent living have been set at...
17$ * 35.5hours/week * 52 weeks / 12month = 2615.17$/month
for 2615.17$/month you can live a decent life in denmark so i think it's set fair... that doesn't meen that everybody gets that... most gets more (i'm a highschool teacher and I make 6000$/month)... but no matter what you do you will not starve or be homeless or die of preventable deceases on the minimumwage...
in the states you have a federal minimumwage of 7.25$/hour (but it can go as low as 2.65$/hour in kansas... but lets take the federalstandard... and the US have a (average since you don't have specific rules of how much a workweek should be) workweek of 42hours/week...
so your idea of a decent living is...
7.25$ * 42hours/week * 52weeks / 12 month = 1319.5$/month...
whether you can support yourself and your family in the US on that I don't know but it seems you can't since many seem to have to take both second and third jobs just to make ends meet... so mayby you should rase it a little... :-D
how much you should rase it is up to you but if people on minimumwages need 2 jobs to make ends meet mayby you should double it to 14.5$/hour or if they need 3 jobs to make ends meet you should tripple it to 21.75$/hour...
but again that's up to you :-D
but to answer your question... NO it should not be set arbitrarily but you should have a minimumwage and it should cover living expenses on just 1 full time job :-D
Love Thothlike
by
Thothlike on
11/14/2009 10:58:05 PM EST
[
Parent ]
