Fate of $15 per hour lies in the hands of the Senate Parliamentary

[squatz1]

Not sure if anyone has seen this news, though in the coming days the Senate parliamentary will make a decision on if $15 an hour federal minimum wage can be included in COVID 19 stimulus bill.

The only reason the parliamentary must make a decision is b/c Dems are trying to pass through budget reconciliation which only requires 51 votes instead of the normal 60 votes (w cloture) in the Senate. The caveat to using this method is that the parts included in these budget reconciliation bills must have substantial budgetary impact.

Here’s a bit from the MarketWatch article about the process:

Senate rules require that items in such a bill must have a substantial budget impact that is not “merely incidental” to the language’s main intended purpose.

MacDonough has been meeting with Democrats who have tried convincing her that their minimum wage provision meets that test and with Republicans who have told her it doesn’t. Democrats want to raise the federal floor, fixed at $7.25 hourly since 2009, to $15 over five years.

What do ya folks think about the fate of this portion of the bill being left to a non partisan appointed member of the Senate

https://www.marketwatch.com/story/fate-of-federal-15-minimum-wage-rests-in-hands-of-senate-parliamentarian-elizabeth-macdonough-01614276142

[1714827256]

1714827256

[1714827256]

1714827256

[1714827256]

1714827256

[1714827256]

1714827256

[1714827256]

1714827256

[suchmoon]

This is becoming a bit ridiculous for Democrats. The $15 is mostly symbolic, with many large employers already paying that much or close to it, so it's just going to squeeze smaller employers in some low cost-of-living areas and won't do shit for their constituents in large blue cities. OTOH, it should be a no-brainer instead of a fixed amount to make it indexed on inflation like it's done in... you know... sane countries.

[squatz1]

This is becoming a bit ridiculous for Democrats. The $15 is mostly symbolic, with many large employers already paying that much or close to it, so it's just going to squeeze smaller employers in some low cost-of-living areas and won't do shit for their constituents in large blue cities. OTOH, it should be a no-brainer instead of a fixed amount to make it indexed on inflation like it's done in... you know... sane countries.

Yup, exactly. I think you may agree with parts of Hawleys plan for minimum wage increases.

The bill: Hawley is proposing a three-year program that would increase worker wages in 2021, paid by taxpayers rather than employers.

Hawley told Axios he also would support a $15 minimum wage for workers of large corporations that generate at least $1 billion in annual revenue.

Those making below $16.50 per hour would receive a refundable tax credit worth 50% of the difference, paid out in quarterly installments. The $16.50 could increase over time, as it would be tied to the Consumer Price Index.
The credit would only apply to 40 hours or less of weekly work.
Only American workers with valid Social Security numbers would be eligible, meaning non-U.S. citizens and undocumented immigrants would be excluded.
Between the lines: Hawley's plan would immediately be implemented in the 2021 tax year, expiring in 2024.

The real best case situation is to tie this entire thing to local cost of living and have that done without some massive overarching federal piece of legislation that wont pass if its included.

Pretty such Dem leadership declares that it cant be included so they have a reason to not put it into this Covid stimulus bill. Because if it is I think this bill may be dead by a vote or two. Even if this is a gradual increase, it just doesn’t make sense everywhere in the US.

[franky1]

$16.50 where fed subsidies 50% of difference

so someone on $10 would get $3.25 from the government UBI....
... so still on $13.25 overall once the cheque clears. still not $15 and still not $16.50

i can also see some people already on $15 not getting a pay rise for a few years because government gives them a $0.75(5%) pay rise instead.
i can see some companies already paying people $15 laying those people off or demoting them down to $13.50 so that government fill in the missing $1.50 to bring them up to 'value' of other workers in the sector, thus
saving companies 10% in labour costs.

though im for taxes being used for people in need. doing it to subsidise businesses is the same as letting businesses get away with not paying taxes.

[PrimeNumber7]

The free market is already effectively making the minimum wage at something around $15/hour. Many major companies that require little/no experience have starting wages at or about $15/hour. If you are an employer and try to pay your employees something less than $15/hour, you will have difficulty finding and retaining employees.

Raising the statutory minimum wage is not possible via budget reconciliation. Senate rules are clear on this. If Democrats want to raise the minimum wage, they will need to negotiate with Republicans. With that being said, Republicans agreeing to raise the minimum wage after receiving some concessions is not entirely unrealistic due to my statement above.

[BADecker]

Fate of $15 per hour lies in the hands of the Senate Parliamentary


Actually, it lies in your hands. If you don't like the measly $15 per hour, start a business.

[suchmoon]

Yup, exactly. I think you may agree with parts of Hawleys plan for minimum wage increases.

Aside from being tied to the CPI, sounds unnecessarily complicated. And I don't know if it's shoddy reporting or Hawley being incompetent, but SSN doesn't imply citizenship. A person legally working in the US gets an SSN so this just sounds like red meat for the base and is either a possibly unconstitutional requirement or a lie.

The article does correctly note that this would basically shovel federal tax money into states that didn't raise the minimum wage.

[squatz1]

Yup, exactly. I think you may agree with parts of Hawleys plan for minimum wage increases.

Aside from being tied to the CPI, sounds unnecessarily complicated. And I don't know if it's shoddy reporting or Hawley being incompetent, but SSN doesn't imply citizenship. A person legally working in the US gets an SSN so this just sounds like red meat for the base and is either a possibly unconstitutional requirement or a lie.

The article does correctly note that this would basically shovel federal tax money into states that didn't raise the minimum wage.

Might be shoddy reporting, as I highly doubt there would be an issue with giving people this tax credit if they have a work visa to be here.

I like the plan in broad strokes. - Like forcing big businesses to pay $15 an hour and allowing more leeway for small businesses who may not survive paying that wage all across America.

Makes more sense to tie it to cost of living in the locality, but that makes too much sense so Congress wont do that.

The free market is already effectively making the minimum wage at something around $15/hour. Many major companies that require little/no experience have starting wages at or about $15/hour. If you are an employer and try to pay your employees something less than $15/hour, you will have difficulty finding and retaining employees.

Raising the statutory minimum wage is not possible via budget reconciliation. Senate rules are clear on this. If Democrats want to raise the minimum wage, they will need to negotiate with Republicans. With that being said, Republicans agreeing to raise the minimum wage after receiving some concessions is not entirely unrealistic due to my statement above.

Yup, the parliamentary has decided that budget reconciliation can not be used to do this which means that this bill will not include any sort of minimum wage increase. Saves moderate dems and dem leadership from a tough vote as well as moderate Republicans who may have a tough reelection.

[theymos]

The rule disallows inclusion if any of the following are true:

1. If it does not produce a change in outlays or revenues;
2. If it produces an outlay increase or revenue decrease when the instructed committee is not in compliance with its instructions;
3. If it is outside the jurisdiction of the committee that submitted the title or provision for inclusion in the reconciliation measure;
4. If it produces a change in outlays or revenues which is merely incidental to the non-budgetary components of the provision;
5. If it would increase the deficit for a fiscal year beyond those covered by the reconciliation measure (usually a period of ten years); or
6. If it recommends changes in Social Security.

A minimum wage increase clearly fails #4. The point of the $15 minimum wage is not to save/collect/spend money, but to add a regulation. That the CBO says it'll have knock-on effects which will increase the deficit is clearly incidental.

The majority can always overrule the parlimentarian, so it's not ultimately up to her, though overruling her would be seen as a sort of "nuclear option", so it'd be difficult to get centrist Democrats to go along with it.


Minimum wage laws are completely nonsensical. It's banning employers from paying people below a certain rate, but you can equally look at it as banning employees from voluntarily selling their services "too cheaply". You'd also generally expect it to increase unemployment; if your work only produces $10/hr for the company, then there's no way in hell they're going to pay you $15/hr: they're just going to fire you. Only people who are already being paid an amount slightly above or below the new minimum wage have a chance of seeing a small actual raise.

If you want to guarantee that people actually receive a "living wage" and don't just get fired, the proper solution would be to increase/expand the earned income tax credit (EITC). The EITC more-or-less says, "If you make less than $x/hr, then the government will pay the difference between this wage and $x/hr." So instead of increasing the minimum wage to $15/hr, structure the EITC such that everyone is guaranteed to actually make $15/hr from work, no matter what their employer actually pays them. The EITC already exists in the tax code, but it's small and the "EITC minimum wage" weirdly depends heavily on the number of dependents you have:

# of dependents	Current "EITC minimum wage" (rough idea - it's complex)
0	$3.64/hr
1	$6.79/hr
2	$9.96/hr
3	$10.81/hr

I don't actually actively support any sort of welfare like this, but I don't understand why almost all leftists cling to the counterproductive and contentious minimum wage idea instead of the much more reasonable EITC idea. (Changing the EITC involves just changing some numbers in the tax code, so it'd clearly be allowed by reconciliation, as well.)

[tvbcof]

Great news for the promoters of 'agorism' in combination with crypto-currency.

Basically, it makes sense to give the statist and social justice idiots all the rope they need to hang themselves.  I'm dearly looking forward to the 'new green deal' where energy use is to be brought down to horse-and-buggy levels.

The Agorist solution (to the VERY limited degree that I understand it):  Just do cottage-industry level stuff and stay off Big Brother's radar as much as possible.  Specialists can make the translation between crypto/fiat at the neighborhood level for now, but they will take a big chunk.  That chunk is likely to decrease as more people see a living to be made and become involved, and as more necessary commodities are traded straight across with crypto as the medium when one is needed.

[Obito]

They need to pass that bill, in my opinion, a $15 per hour wage is not enough to be completely honest, the prices of commodities are steadily going up with the inflation and salaries should go up together with it and it is almost a decade since there has been an increase in the wages and the commodities price increase every year. For me, there shouldn't be any hearing about this kind of thing because this is a necessity for workers and a delay will only anger the masses.

[gredinger]

This is becoming a bit ridiculous for Democrats. The $15 is mostly symbolic, with many large employers already paying that much or close to it, so it's just going to squeeze smaller employers in some low cost-of-living areas and won't do shit for their constituents in large blue cities. OTOH, it should be a no-brainer instead of a fixed amount to make it indexed on inflation like it's done in... you know... sane countries.

The bill is indexed to inflation, but due to inflation going up without a min wage increase in the last decade, that's why it starts at $15.

After it hits $15 (over a 4 year period), it's tied to inflation/cost of living.

[BADecker]

The shouldn't pass the bill. We should get rid of minimum wage. Why?

If there isn't any minimum wage, the prices of everything will come down. Nobody is going to work for $1 an hour. Why not? Because he can't buy anything that way. So, big business will not get any workers. Ir they want workers, they will have to reduce the price of products and services, or increase wages.

What will happen when they increase wages? They will get people who are willing to work to make it worth getting the wages. After the sluggards get hungry enough, they will discipline themselves just to be able to do quality work so they can get a job.

The whole idea of a minimum wage is something that tears down the whole nation by turning everybody into "who cares?"

[PrimeNumber7]

earned income tax credit (EITC). The EITC more-or-less says, "If you make less than $x/hr, then the government will pay the difference between this wage and $x/hr."

This would not be a good idea. It would effectively put anyone making less than $x/hr at a 100% marginal tax bracket until they make more than $x/hr. The EITC also does not discriminate based on how much a person works, so it would also mean that after a person earns $1 from their employer, they are in a 100% tax bracket, until they make more than the threshold so that they are no longer eligible for the EITC. This would result in people choosing to not look for work if they are fired or laid off early in the year until late in the year or the following year if their earned income is below the EITC limits.

As I noted above, it is far superior to let the free market decide what the "minimum wage" should be -- in other words, if a company were to pay too little, they would be unable to find and retain employees.

If the government were to take action on the minimum wage, IMO the best solution would be that anyone making less than $x/hr is eligible for free/low-cost skills training that will help them become qualified for higher-paying jobs that tend to pay above $x/hr. (teach them to fish).

[theymos]

This would not be a good idea. It would effectively put anyone making less than $x/hr at a 100% marginal tax bracket until they make more than $x/hr. The EITC also does not discriminate based on how much a person works, so it would also mean that after a person earns $1 from their employer, they are in a 100% tax bracket, until they make more than the threshold so that they are no longer eligible for the EITC. This would result in people choosing to not look for work if they are fired or laid off early in the year until late in the year or the following year if their earned income is below the EITC limits.

My explanation was massively simplifying how it works. There's a phase-in and phase-out curve to avoid exactly those incentive problems, it's actually implemented as a refundable credit based on annual income, not as an hourly payment boost, and there are other rules such as disallowing EITC if your unearned income is too high.

If the government were to take action on the minimum wage, IMO the best solution would be that anyone making less than $x/hr is eligible for free/low-cost skills training that will help them become qualified for higher-paying jobs that tend to pay above $x/hr. (teach them to fish).

I'm much more wary about stuff like that compared to just giving people money, since it increases the size/scope of government bureaucracy, and the #1 objective of bureaucracy always ends up being growing/perpetuating itself. How many times have you heard someone in a government agency saying, "My agency is doing just just fine: no need for more resources or employees or powers. In fact, we could handle a budget cut just fine." ? If welfare programs have to exist, then it's best to do them with the absolute minimum number of government employees possible, even if it might make the overall program somewhat less targeted.

[mindrust]

There shouldn't be any minimum wage. It should be $0.

$15/h minimum will not improve the situation. On the contrary, it will make everything worse.

Most small-mid size businesses are not even operating and the US gov. is raising the minimum wage in this chaos... brilliant.

The employers will just stop hiring people they don't know. This is what this $15/h min-wage will do. They will employ their relatives, their neighbors instead. Nobody will care if you are really proficient at doing your job. Your college diploma? Now it is worthless.

None of these really matter of course when most of the small to mid size businesses are closed.

[PrimeNumber7]

This would not be a good idea. It would effectively put anyone making less than $x/hr at a 100% marginal tax bracket until they make more than $x/hr. The EITC also does not discriminate based on how much a person works, so it would also mean that after a person earns $1 from their employer, they are in a 100% tax bracket, until they make more than the threshold so that they are no longer eligible for the EITC. This would result in people choosing to not look for work if they are fired or laid off early in the year until late in the year or the following year if their earned income is below the EITC limits.

My explanation was massively simplifying how it works. There's a phase-in and phase-out curve to avoid exactly those incentive problems, it's actually implemented as a refundable credit based on annual income, not as an hourly payment boost, and there are other rules such as disallowing EITC if your unearned income is too high.

So for example, the EITC was revised such that if someone has earned income of less than $31,200 ($15 * 2080 {if someone works 40 hours a week 52 weeks a year, they will work 2080 hours}), they will receive $y as a refundable credit, with y being ($31,200 - [earned income * 1.0]) * 0.88 (the lowest tax bracket is 12%).

If someone making $20/hour during the first six months of the year, gets laid off, and cannot find work in the next two months, will have a 100% tax rate if they find work making $20/hour for their work for the rest of the year because every dollar they earn will reduce their earnings by $0.88, and the federal income tax will take the remaining $0.12. (Someone making $20/hour for 6 months will make $20,800, and if they work an additional 13 weeks @$20/hour, they will earn $31,200).

If someone is making $12/hour at their job, if they were to receive a promotion involving them earning $14/hour but with more responsibilities, their additional income would be taxed at 100% in my above example because they would receive $0.88 less via the EITC for every additional dollar they earn, and the federal income tax would take the remaining $0.12. This is especially troubling because it gives incentives for employees to not take promotions involving earning more money, which may lead to longer-term reductions in earnings when they would not be in contention for subsequent promotions involving even higher wages.

In the above example, the earned income multiplier could be reduced to below 1.0, but this would still result in high effective marginal tax rates for low earners. It would also result in more people receiving the welfare benefit who doesn't need it.

If you want to have transfer payment welfare, it is best for the cutoff to be well into the middle class, where it is less trivial to turn down an additional dollar of income, and who will not be as harmed as much by not receiving the welfare.

If the government were to take action on the minimum wage, IMO the best solution would be that anyone making less than $x/hr is eligible for free/low-cost skills training that will help them become qualified for higher-paying jobs that tend to pay above $x/hr. (teach them to fish).

I'm much more wary about stuff like that compared to just giving people money, since it increases the size/scope of government bureaucracy, and the #1 objective of bureaucracy always ends up being growing/perpetuating itself. How many times have you heard someone in a government agency saying, "My agency is doing just just fine: no need for more resources or employees or powers. In fact, we could handle a budget cut just fine." ? If welfare programs have to exist, then it's best to do them with the absolute minimum number of government employees possible, even if it might make the overall program somewhat less targeted.

What I described doesnt need to be run by a government bureaucracy. I was thinking that non-profits (or potentially for-profit entities) could receive grants from the government in order to administer the skills training and could be paid based on outcomes.

I agree that government bureaucracy is generally bad, however, I also believe it is superior to teach low-income (skill) workers the necessary skills necessary to earn higher incomes. This reduces reliance on government and should in the long run benefit everyone.  

[tvbcof]

There shouldn't be any minimum wage. It should be $0.

$15/h minimum will not improve the situation. On the contrary, it will make everything worse.

Most small-mid size businesses are not even operating and the US gov. is raising the minimum wage in this chaos... brilliant.

The employers will just stop hiring people they don't know. This is what this $15/h min-wage will do. They will employ their relatives, their neighbors instead. Nobody will care if you are really proficient at doing your job. Your college diploma? Now it is worthless.

None of these really matter of course when most of the small to mid size businesses are closed.

Controlled demolition.  Just as I expected when I got the hell out of Dodge a few years ago, and pretty much right on schedule.

Trump mostly just tee'd up a bunch of fascist balls for the next guy to drive down the fairway.  I didn't in my wildest dreams imagine that they next guy they would have the chutzbah to put in would be Joe the Kiddie-Groper Biden so I didn't make that prediction, but I will say that it was brilliant.

They are going to get their 'people's revolt' (to crush) some way some how even if they have to totally stage it since Joe Sixpack is so vaxxed up that he cannot tie his own shoes.

[BADecker]

^^^ I pretty much agree with this.

Some of the things that Biden is doing actually help the world, and stabilizes situations more than what Trump does. Other things that Biden does are a disaster.

All that Trump is, is a different form of disaster... one that may not be as bad as the Biden disaster, even though it might happen faster. Trump might bring the world to its knees faster than Biden, but when Biden's work is finished, there won't be any knees left... and maybe no world.

Minimum wage, no matter how great or small, gives businesses and workers a focus. The focus subtly says that we should all get the minimum. This takes away competition. Business people know that if we lose competition, we also lose the goal to better ourselves. This makes us apathetic. Minimum wage is simply another move government is using to drive us into socialism and failure. It's up to us to resist it.

What resistance? Government people are using government as a business for themselves. They are attempting to work their business against the business of our individual lives. They are trying to make slaves of us all. Minimum wage is simply one way that they are doing it.

[Toplistico.com]

Clearly, minimum wages make a business worse, especially for MSMEs. The government should be able to act more rationally towards things like this, for example by providing support to these businesses so that they can survive in a pandemic like this. They only demand that businesses provide good wages to workers, but at the same time businesses are struggling to rise from this crisis. It's like killing them.