$15/hr minimum wage

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(08-07-2018, 08:21 PM)TheLeonardLeap Wrote: The thing that makes me laugh about the people who want the $15/hr is they either don't understand that it would then increase the cost of their goods, or they naively believe that the wage increase will come straight out of the profits of the business rather than a price increase.

Restaurants are a narrow profit margin business. Say you have 40 minimum wage employees working at a place making $10/hr right now, all working 40 hour weeks. That means the payroll for them would be $64,000 per month.

Now say those people get a raise to $15/hr. That payroll is now $96,000 per month.

That extra $32,000 per month needs to come from somewhere, and maybe McDonalds that are owned by the corporation itself could eat that kind of increase, but what about franchise owners in rural areas? If you own one franchise, there's no way you can eat that cost. So then you need to raise your prices. That $2 double cheeseburger now needs to be $3, your $1 menu now becomes the $1.50 menu.

And who are the people who are most reliant on the dollar menu? That's right, the people who make minimum wage. So suddenly they might be making 50% more, but they're paying 50% more too, so nothing has changed except maybe the small handful of restaurants that COULD afford to absorb the wage increase without increasing prices didn't have to raise their prices 50%, and are now much much more affordable than their competition, which would lead to them crushing the competition and just becoming that much more monolithic.

Raising the minimum is just the first effect. What do you do with the employee that has earned more than the minimum due to seniority ect...? 

You're starting out on fries and make $15/hour. What do you do with the cashier that has been there 1 year and has made a couple extra dollars more than the minimum?