Kort Explores conundrums of the human condition

Raising the minimum wage has become a politically popular ploy, but does this intervention into the free market actually do what its promoters claim? The advocates claim that raising the minimum wage is a compassionate measure that ensures that those at the bottom of the ladder get a "fair" share of the wealth of the nation. But does this emotionally appealing intervention actually help or hurt those it is claimed to benefit?

Regulations and agreements officially intended to protect and improve jobs almost inevitably become primary contributing factors in their elimination. The minimum wage selectively impacts most heavily entry level and low value unskilled employment. Advocates of raising the minimum wage claim that the continued upward trend of the major employment indicators proves that their past raises have not caused a loss of jobs. But this simplistic approach ignores the damage that is being selectively done to a very important segment of the economy - low wage jobs for the minimally skilled and those just entering the workforce. The fact that our dynamic economy continues to create new high quality jobs at the other end of the spectrum has nothing to do with validating the destruction of low value jobs by making them economically unjustifiable.

When it comes down to it, the business of business is still business. Any employer that tries to ignore this fact rapidly becomes irrelevant to the problem by going out of business. Every additional cost and restriction imposed on business in the name of social engineering just provides additional motivation to replace expensive and troublesome human employees/adversaries with compliant machines.

Economic history indicates that a demand for human labor will only exist in those untrained labor jobs where humans can offer a cost or performance advantage over machines. The most reliable way to guarantee an investment in automation has always been to raise the costs and restrictions of using human labor.

By definition the minimum wage only applies to new unskilled workers and those who have failed to learn any skills valued by employers, and so raising the minimum wage only artificially raises the cost of employing entry level workers or those workers who refuse to make any effort in improve their own situation. Around here, even the burger flipper jobs offer higher than minimum wage starting salaries because even the minimum skills of getting your order wrong, tossing your burger and spilling your fries into a bag, and giving you the wrong change are higher level functions than are expected of those applying for jobs paying only the minimum wage.

Contrary to the emotionally manipulative claims of how difficult it is to support a family on the minimum wage, the majority of people working in jobs subject to the minimum wage are single individuals in their late teens or early twenties. A low starting wage is necessary to allow businesses to offer entry level positions to these new workers with very limited skills. Contrary to their desire to see themselves as the center of the universe and vastly important, these new workers in reality have very little to offer the working world when they first attempt to transition from the total denial of reality of the public school system into the real world of business. Those who are capable and willing to learn tend to quickly work themselves into higher paying jobs. Only those unable or unwilling to provide real value to their employers in return for their wages stay in minimum wage positions over the long term.

I've lived in places with very limited employment opportunities, or only offered jobs for which I found myself unsuitable. But we have something called freedom of movement here. If someone doesn't find the kind of job they desire in the location where they are currently located, they should move to where the prospects are better! If they don't qualify for a quality job they should learn new skills. I currently live thousands of miles from where I was born, and see nothing wrong with that. All of the skills I currently use in my business I had to teach myself. Even if the schools were able to actually teach, all of the critical skills I currently use to earn a living flat didn't exist back when I was in school. It is not the obligation of society to provide a quality life to the individual - in a free society the success or failure of an individual is the right and responsibility of that individual.

I have also in the past made the conscious decision for my own reasons to live in locations where employment opportunities were limited, and paid the price for my decisions by accepting low grade local jobs or having to commute over an hour each way to a better job in another city. I've done both when it suited my purposes. Actually, in commuting long distances I was carrying on a family tradition since my father and grandfather also decided they wanted to live and raise their families out a very rural area, but wanted to pursue technology based careers that weren't available in the farm country where they chose to live. After commuting long distances for a number of years, I decided to change my form of employment in order to reclaim the hours I was spending in the car.

Over a decade ago I gave up small town living and moved to the big city for the benefit of my business. I currently live in a fairly urban area where the infrastructure needed by my corporation is available. The key is that I have both the freedom and responsibility to adjust my location and life-style to accommodate my life decisions. The decisions are all mine - I can chose to live where the good jobs are, or live where employment is sparse but some aspects of life are better. I can chose to learn skills that will be valued by employers, or shut down my cognitive functions altogether and live as a semiconscious vegetable. Society - and especially private enterprise - have no obligation to accommodate my life choices.

I have at times enjoyed substantial prosperity. On the other hand, through mischances, mistakes, or my own outright ignorance and stupidity, I have also occasionally fallen on hard times. I've more than once been down to my last dollar, and had to dig myself out of very deep holes. At times when I needed a job - any job - I've accepted employment for even less than the minimum wage doing tasks I found repugnant. But I needed the job and was grateful for the opportunity when I needed it.

While I had no intention of keeping these low wage jobs over the long term, they suited my purposes at the time, and I fulfilled my obligations as employee to the best of my abilities. Over the years I've pumped gas for $1.75/hour, harvested Christmas trees in the cold and wet for $3.00/hour, ran a wave soldering machine for $3.50/hour, performed simple brute labor as a warehouseman for $2.50/hour, hired on as a utility worker in a box shop for $3.00/hour, remanufactured aircraft engines for $2.50/hour + training, ran a mass production punch press for $4.50/hour (and still have all my fingers!), and more.

Most of these jobs paid less than the minimum wage of the time. If the minimum wage had been applied these jobs flat wouldn't have been available, and my life would have been substantially more difficult. I used these low paying jobs - along with very careful management of the limited financial returns - to get through the hard times and prepare myself for better jobs. In order to use my limited money for improving my overall state, I've intentionally lived for years without a TV, stereo, car, new clothes, etc. I've also taught myself how to keep a $50 car running for 200,000 miles when the need arose.

In every case where I worked in low wage situations, there were other workers who loudly complained about their situation, but refused to do anything meaningful to change their condition. I worked my way out of those situations while my fellow workers spent their money on short term pleasures, couldn't be bothered to learn new skills or move to a better area, and not surprisingly stayed behind continuing to complain about the unfairness of life.

The key is that at every stage, for better or worse I was the one primarily responsible for my own well-being. I've proven my worth both to myself and to society as being far more than the minimum wage, but I've also found it useful at times to agree to work for "starvation wages". Nowadays, the ever expanding tentacles of federal regulations intrude into more and more aspects of local businesses.

Nearly all businesses around here consider themselves subject to either the Federal or State minimum wage with predictable impacts on traditional entry level positions. For example, picking berries used to be a traditional seasonal job for kids, but since the farmer - or the distributor he sells his produce to - ships across the state line, berry picking has become subject to the minimum wage. And as the wage for berry pickers was raised beyond the work value of most kids, the jobs disappeared. The farmers are now obliged to change their operations to "U-Pick" (customer picks his own berries), invest in automated machine picking where appropriate, or hire migrant workers who follow the season.

Those who advocate a government mandated minimum wage seem to believe that someone has the obligation to deliver generous employment to what ever location an individual happens to occupy. They don't seem to believe that the individual has any obligation to look after his/her own well-being - that all obligations to provide a quality life to the individual are projected onto business owners, the government, or society as a whole.

While the professed intention for raising the minimum wage is always to help those at the bottom of the economic ladder, the net result is always to cripple the free market's ability to provide entry level employment opportunities to those with minimal skills. Far from aiding entry into workforce for the marginally employable, the hard reality is that such interventions raise the barriers to participation as productive citizens.

Young people just getting started now have far more difficulties finding that first entry level job, and are denied what many consider a very necessary part of learning how the economy really works. Small wonder so few seem to understand how business works in the real world any more, and totally absurd concepts of social engineering through regulating business get so much undeserved attention.