Let's Rally Around the $100 Minimum Wage

Let's Rally Around the $100 Minimum Wage

by Jerry Collette, Guest Contributor

Liberals are rallying for an increase in the minimum wage. Their media cheerleaders are already lined up to promote this and to portray those who oppose it as coldhearted.

Denying the laws of supply and demand, as they apply to labor, by artificially raising the price, while appearing to some as compassionate, is not so at all. It's terribly coldhearted, because doing so reduces demand for the labor of the least productive members of society, those who are having the most trouble finding work. However, many low information voters don't understand this.

So, how to we get our message across? Let's rally around the hundred dollar minimum wage. Yes, it's been mentioned before, but it hasn't gotten the traction it needs. Let's give it a big push and really get it out there.

How far can we go with this idea? Let's get it widely publicized. Let's even get it introduced as a bill. Ted Cruz could explain this in a way that people could get it. It might even pass in the House; the current House is willing to pass bills that make important statements, even when they know that the Senate won't even consider them. Properly promoted, a bill like this would make such a statement.

How will liberals respond? They can't support such a bill. They'll have to admit that it would cost jobs or hurt the economy.

The logical conclusion is that any artificial increase in the price of labor will cost jobs and hurt the economy. The only difference is the degree of the impact. The hundred dollar minimum wage makes the point very clearly, in a way that a lower minimum wage doesn't.

This is a wonderful opportunity to get some basic understanding of the laws of supply and demand out to the population, with a very simple, clear example. Neither big media nor big education is going to do it. Let's bypass them and raise the issue prominently. We have the Internet now. We can do this!

Will everybody get it? Unfortunately, there will still be some low information voters who won't understand even this simple example. However, the message that many of those same voters will get is that conservatives wanted to raise the minimum wage to a hundred dollars, while those coldhearted liberals opposed us and only wanted to raise it to ten or fifteen bucks.

Pass the word. Let's get a rally going on this. When would now be a good time?

 

1. This article is released under the Creative Commons Attribution License.

2. The laws of supply and demand, themselves, like the law of gravity, are undeniably coldhearted. However, a compassionate society teaches its people to understand such basic laws rather than deny their existence.

3. Some examples are here, here, here, here, here, and here.

4. That's already happened, for example, here.

Will everybody get it? Unfortunately, there will still be some low information voters who won't understand even this simple example. However, the message that many of those same voters will get is that conservatives wanted to raise the minimum wage to a hundred dollars, while those coldhearted liberals opposed us and only wanted to raise it to ten or fifteen bucks.

Pass the word. Let's get a rally going on this. When would now be a good time?

Psychology 101 Applied to Progressive Economics

by Jerry Collette, Guest Contributor

Progressives tend to be heart centered, but not so math savvy. Low information voters tend to tune out when math is discussed. Here's a way to approach the subject of progressive economics using only psychology, but no math.

Let's take Marx's famous motto of economic liberalism:

From each according to his ability, to each according to his needs.

For most people, the heart's first response is to like it; it sounds so nice. There's no denying that.

Now, let's apply something from Psychology 101 to it:

What you reinforce (reward), you tend get more of. What you punish, you tend get less of. 

Under progressivism, being needy is reinforced and being more able is punished. Society ends up with more needy people (e.g., record numbers of people on disability and food stamps) and fewer able people (e.g., fewer new business startups and more employers moving operations overseas).

Marx's theories have worked in small groups, like families and monasteries. One key thing about such small groups is that, typically, they aren't democracies. Wherever progressivism has been most intensely applied in large societies, brutal totalitarian governments were needed to enforce it.

The free market, the laws of supply and demand, and the basic laws of human psychology, just like the law of gravity, can sometimes be heartless. That doesn't mean that we can just wish them away.

 

1. This article is released under the Creative Commons Attribution License.

2. This is called “Operant Conditioning.”