Minimum Wage Raise (Blog Stage 5)

Federally imposed minimum wage now stands at $7.25 an hour. President Obama and Democratic legislators are calling for an increase in minimum wage to an astounding $10.10 an hour by 2016l that is if Texas doesn't pass the Texas Minimum Wage Increase Amendment first. Many people are fighting for this bill to be passed, but they don’t realize how many negative effects it can have on our economy.

Raising the minimum wage raises the cost of hiring at companies that employ low-wage workers and low-wage interns. Faced with higher labor costs, many businesses are going to have to raise prices, lay off workers or cut their profit margins. Competitive pressures will usually prevent business from boosting prices. That leaves business with the unpleasant choice of either letting go of hardworking employees or accepting much lower profits.

Democratic congressmen are trying to get the minimum wage raise passed which harms businesses even though big business helps many congressmen win re-election through campaign funding. Why should business donate money for congressional incumbents to win re-election if they are going to pass a bill that could harm the business industry as a whole? Congressmen may not be thinking about the support that businesses provides them, which is why it is critical that they be reminded.

The Editors of The Christian Century published “McWages” on February 16, 2014. The Christian Century is a progressive, ecumenical magazine based in Chicago. Committed to thinking critically and living faithfully, the Century explores what it means to believe and live out the Christian faith in our time and attracts many Christians throughout the United States as its audience.

            The Christian Century Editors argue that the government should step in to raise the minimum wage, especially for franchise owners, because $7.25 an hour is not enough to live off of. The Editors point out that fast food workers deserve $15 an hour which is more than twice the minimum wage of $7.25 an hour they currently receive. They believe that fast food chains are highly profitable and can afford to raise employee wages, but cannot do it independently because that would make the franchise raise the competitive wage for the franchise next door resulting in an industry-wide strike. The Christian Century Editors state that “people shouldn’t have to work multiple jobs to have their basic needs met.” They conclude with explaining that a wage increase would benefit everyone from working poor to high class and it would take the pressure off of welfare programs thus taxpayers wouldn’t pay to feed and house the poor.

            The Christian Century Editors give influential reasoning on why they think the minimum wage should be raised. However, if the minimum wage were to rise to an extremely high $15 dollars an hour what would that do to the middle class when it comes to the rise of consumer goods? The price of goods would have to increase in order to balance out the hefty pay raise of minimum wage employees. The minimum wage is set for a reason: it gives unskilled workers such as high school and college students a chance to earn money until they build their skill set to take on a more lucrative job.

Texas Money Race

On Monday, July 20, 2015, The Texas Tribune published an article titled First Disclosures Offer View of 2016 Texas Money Race. This article explains the flock of people already heading for electoral funding. The author of this article pretty much calls out people that need a lot of funding, and sheds a bad light on it. When looking at campaigns and elections it is clear that money plays a huge role in who wins and who loses. The person that spends less money on campaigning, usually the incumbent, actually wins most of the time because this person is clearly not threatened by the other candidate. Congressional incumbents have many advantages over their challengers which, in turn, leads to a very high percentage of re-election often called congressional stagnation. However, this doesn’t mean that whoever spends less will win. Challengers must spend more than the incumbents to even have a chance at winning congressional office, which is why it is wrong to call these people out for simply trying to put their name out there.