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by AnthonyMouse 4196 days ago
Unemployment is a feature of a regulated capitalist economy. The primary source of unemployment is the minimum wage. There are a nearly unlimited source of jobs available if you would accept $1/hour as payment, and if you have no other employment then at least it gets you experience/recommendations and enough to buy some food.

The minimum wage is a trade off. You create e.g. 10% unemployment so that the ~4.3% of people who make the minimum wage (and still have jobs) can make $7.25/hour instead of $5 or $3. There is a legitimate question as to whether this is the right trade off, but people seem to be in favor of it.
2 comments
Gracana 4196 days ago
> and enough to buy some food

A food, anyway, provided you aren't spending your $8 a day on rent.

How would social services work in this system without minimum wage? Would people making below a minimum wage deemed necessary to house and feed and care for oneself be eligible for benefits?

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AnthonyMouse 4196 days ago
> A food, anyway, provided you aren't spending your $8 a day on rent.

When you have the choice between a job that pays $10 and a job that pays $7.25, you generally pick the one that pays $10. When the choice is between $7.25 and $4 or $4 and $1 the choice is similarly obvious. But so is the choice between making $8/day and buying eight pounds of pasta/rice/beans/etc. or being unemployed and hungry.

> How would social services work in this system without minimum wage? Would people making below a minimum wage deemed necessary to house and feed and care for oneself be eligible for benefits?

That's how it works already. People making minimum wage qualify for government benefits that phase out at higher income levels.

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sbov 4196 days ago
Unemployment wasn't that low before the minimum wage was established. What was the primary source of unemployment then?
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AnthonyMouse 4196 days ago
> Unemployment wasn't that low before the minimum wage was established. What was the primary source of unemployment then?

The poor state of travel and communication at the time. You couldn't exactly hitchhike to the nearest city with a public library and find work via the internet in 1938.

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