Fast food workers staged a one-day strike for “living wages.” More specifically, they want the federal minimum wage to be raised from $7.25 an hour to $15.
You want to make a living wage? I’ll tell you how to make a living wage. I’ve had a lot of jobs and this method has never failed me.
Here it is: Before accepting a job offer, you always ask yourself, “Does this job pay enough for me to live on?” And if the answer is no, then you don’t take that job.
If you want to earn $15 an hour, do what I do: get a job that pays $15 an hour. Who’s stopping you?
If no one’s willing to pay you $15 an hour, it’s because the skills, intelligence and motivation that you bring to the table don’t allow you to do anything that’s worth $15 an hour. You need to do something about that. You need to be able to deliver $15 of value to an employer. Figure that out.
Setting the minimum wage at $15 is not going to help you. If you set the price of something at more than it’s worth, people are not going to buy it.
Imagine this: My friend Paul Epps is a programmer. Let’s say we passed a Minimum Wage for Programmers law that says that programmers must be paid at least $200,000 a year. Is that good news for Epps?
No, it isn’t.
His boss calls all the programmers into a meeting and says, “Well, according to the new Minimum Wage for Programmers law, I can’t hire any of you for less than $200,000 per year. You know what that means?”
“We all get a big raise?” Epps suggests hopefully.
“No, it means you’re all fired. Get out of here.”
Or imagine this: We pass a Minimum Price for Restaurants law that says you can’t get a meal in restaurant unless you pay at least $15 for it. What will that do to sales of Quarter Pounders and Jumbo Jacks?
People will stop buying those things. Many restaurants serve meals for which customers are willing to pay $15, but a fast food burger isn’t worth $15, even with fries and a drink, so people will stop buying those things.
Related links
- Some Minimum-Wage Links (cafehayek.com)
- Obama and the Evidence on Minimum-Wage Legislation (cafehayek.com)
- Minimum Insight (thebigquestions.com)
- Maximum Insight on Minimum Wages (cafehayek.com)
- Good Thoughts on the Bad Policy of Pricing People Out of Jobs (cafehayek.com)
- More Questions for Proponents of Pricing Low-Skilled Workers Out of Jobs (cafehayek.com)
- Scott Sumner Has Some Empirical Data on Minimum-Wage Legislation (cafehayek.com)
- Krugman Concludes That the Evidence for Minimum-Wage Legislation Is Strong If the Evidence Against Minimum-Wage Legislalation Is Ignored (cafehayek.com)
