If minimum wage goes up to 15 bucks an hour?

Do not forget about that pesky thing named, Inflation!

 

As the lower paying jobs gain pay the higher level jobs raise with them. Right now the market is moving labor costs higher everywhere with or without a minimum wage hike. I predict the minimum wage will be 15 dollars an hour roughly when McDonalds is paying 15 bucks an hour... And here in Louisville they are already paying 12.50/hr so that day isn't as far off as you would think.

Interestingly I think this is a big part of why the stock market is overvalued. Currently the stock market is trading at a significantly higher multiple (of profit per year) than normal precisely when corporate profit margins are going to get squeezed by higher labor costs. Which is fine. People who have a lot of money in the stock market have been making eye popping returns since 2009 largely because the stocks they owned have been turning huge profits by lowering labor costs through attrition, layoffs, and generally getting every employee to do 2-3 people worth of job. I think that trend is turning around because the labor market is a market and it could only go so far before enough people quit working that the labor market became tight again- driving up payroll costs.

So yeah... Working for a living is, for a brief moment, kicking owning stuff for a living in the pants. No need to worry the plutocrats though (as long as they didn't get too greedy), soon automation will have hit another major milestone and the shoe will be on the other foot all over again.

 

That's a pretty impossible if. My wife is a nurse and the average wages for the lowest level of nurse (an LPN) have gone from 20 bucks an hour to 28 bucks an hour in the last 2-3 years. Nursing, like truck driving, is not a particularly easy job. I think it's pretty obvious that these mid tier lower middle class occupations will continue to pay significantly better than minimum wage jobs.

 

let me put it to you this way. i have only been in this industry for just over 35 years. the pay is still (at least not to me) higher than it should be. what should it be? well in my opinion at the very least, $25.00 per hour for the local hourly wage earners.

many have left this industry and gotten better jobs in other fields, that's for sure.\

if you are doing a solid days worth of work, and as a professional too by the way, then you should be paid a higher wage, period.

minimum wage was NEVER to be a wage that someone has to live on, it was (if i recall) a wage for students and homemakers to do a few hours worth of work weekly. but today's world, many DO USE a minimum wage job to support thier families.

i DO SEE "some" older people working the fast food industry and other "low wage/minimum wage jobs", but i think the consensus or overall population of minimum wage earners are still YOUNG people under the age of 25 (or again, students and home makers) that need "some cash".

if ANY truck driver is working someplace and the company DOES NOT start paying at the very least $25.00 per hour, then get the heck out of this business and work someplace else.

maybe go back to some sort of trade or technical schooling for welding, plumbing, electrical, HVAC, where one should be paid more per hour than a lowly trucker does.

as a plumber or e,k,ectrician, you get paid just to walk in the doors of the house, then the hourly rates apply.

as a welder, you can get a job at one of the submarine-building companies or metal fabrication shops.

 

What these idiots making minimum wage don't comprehend is inflation. Sure they'll make more money, but their cost of living is gonna go up too. Back to square one within a year.

 

If truckers wages perform like nurses they will probably get more than 1$ per $ the minimum wagers get. It will be closer to the % difference change (but still below) than a direct 1 for 1 increase.