[k-godwin]

> Should we be completely immune from minimum wage increases just because we can afford to pay for the finer things in life?

You aren't immune.

Minimum wage laws impact the supply chain that feeds Whole Foods and nice restaurants by increasing the cost of rural labor.

https://www.indeed.com/salaries/farm-worker-Salaries

A quick google will show you that farm workers are well below the $15/hour goal most progressives are touting.

The argument that "society should carry the cost" is based on your opinion that is in error. Society carries the cost of minimum wage increases because we all have to eat. We all have to patronize low margin businesses to some degree (even if it is indirect).

You can argue the EITC is a better "solution" than a minimum wage but if you are trying to ensure $15/hour for people paid $10/hour, you are really talking a negative income tax or UBI. At which point, you are probably better off supporting those proposals instead of pushing the EITC.

Personally, I'm not a fan of subsidizing low margin businesses that from a Capitalist perspective should probably be allowed to die if their workers can't afford to live on what they pay.

[scarface74]

So if you aren’t a fan of subsidizing low margin businesses - like the mom and pop shops - are you also not willing to allow public pensions to invest in VC funds that subsidize money losing tech companies?

I think it’s kind of rich that the same people who are probably working for money losing companies backed by VCs think that small low margin businesses owners don’t deserve to make a living.

[whack]

You're right that the "trickle down" effects of minimum wage laws will impact everyone in society to some extent. But it seems like a fairly obvious conclusion that people eating at McDonalds and shopping at Walmart, will be impacted more than someone who only buys premium organic food and spends the majority of his income on other luxuries.

> you are really talking a negative income tax or UBI. At which point, you are probably better off supporting those proposals instead of pushing the EITC.

I do support UBI too but it seems like an extreme stretch to say that is easier to sell than EITC. Especially when you consider that EITC already exists today as a federal law, and UBI does not.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earned_income_tax_credit

> Personally, I'm not a fan of subsidizing low margin businesses that from a Capitalist perspective should probably be allowed to die if their workers can't afford to live on what they pay.

Allowing McDonalds to hire workers at wages set by supply-and-demand, is the very opposite of a subsidy. Killing off profitable low-margin businesses, will by definition, lower the nation's GDP and tax base. Everyone, especially the workers like the one featured in the article, will be far better off in a world where profitable low-margin businesses aren't killed off by government regulation. It's far more effective to tax McDonalds, as well as every other profitable company, in order to fund the safety net that every citizen deserves.

[k-godwin]

> I do support UBI too but it seems like an extreme stretch to say that is easier to sell than EITC. Especially when you consider that EITC already exists today as a federal law, and UBI does not.

To do what the person I'm replying to wants, it would be on the scale of UBI/negative income tax. Otherwise, its not the equivalent to $15/hour when they are being paid $10/hour.