Questions for Libertarians and Ultra Conservatives

[IndieVisible]

Ultra conservatives want less government, Libertarians want even lesser government. So I have some questions for you. Not to put down, but for dialog and discussion and really outline our differences for those who may find some aspects of both these parties appealing can get a deeper understanding of what really is at play here. I thank you in advanced for your input.

I believe that there must be some regulations in place to assure safety, and better health, and fairness which in turn saves lives and expenses down the road and protects our basic rights better. I wonder how many of these guidelines and agencies you oppose and why?

Osha (http://www.osha.gov/) - meeting safty standards for employers to assure safety in the work force. Osha saves lives! Otherwise chemical companies would be free to take short cuts!

United States Postal Service, why do we need it? Why not privatize it?

The FCC
FBI, really needed?
Social Security
Unemployment Insurance?
Public Defenders?
Dept of Motor Vehicles?
Death Penalty (after birth abortion?)
Federal Reserve
CIA
Small Business Administration SBA
Executive Agencies (Dept of Labor, etc)
Endangered Species Committee
Pollution Control? Abuse of power?
Library of Congress?

Of course we already know you oppose Medicaid and Medicare.

So where do we draw the line and who decides? Our founding fathers only laid down the ground work it was left up to us to build on that and we did. I don't think what they put in place was meant as absolute otherwise there would be no amendments. While I agree some agencies and laws are not needed. I believe we all benefit from a lot of them. So bottom line, should be case by case.

Now lets get started ok?

[brien]

Without getting into a big discussion here, the LP advocates privatization of many government agencies and programs, not abolishment. Here is the link for the LP:

http://www.lp.org/

http://libertarian.com/

As for the security of the US, we are ok with the FBI, CIA, and Homeland Security. We are not ok with with these agencies exceeding their constitutional powers. For example, we are not ok with the IRS, and its unconstitutional powers where the accused must prove their innocence in a court of law. We are not ok with the forced income tax, whereby private enterprise is used as the defacto tax collector for the government. If the government wants to enforce an income tax, let them force each indidvidual taxpayer to file 1/4ly income statements and make their estimated 1/4ly tax payments just like every independent business person must do. Then we would see how long that income tax scheme would last.

We basically believe in the Constitution as the compass for the ship of state.

I also must add that to call the LP "ultra conservative", or even compare us to that term, is a bit off base and incorrect. We are very socially liberal in some areas as in our stance for the legalization of illegal drugs, or any so called crime that harms no other person but perhaps themselves. We don't believe the state should protect someone from themself. So there is no broad conservative paint brush one can use to whitewash us along with "ultra conservative" labels. THe LP is very unique in its philosophy and I invite anyone whith enough interest to explore the LP through its website and not take my explanations as "gospel."

[IndieVisible]

What about Osha?

[IndieVisible]

As I see it LP only talks about popular issues and tends to hide other stands that may not be popular. Like abolishing the minimum wage?!

I agree on some social policies LP does lean more left then conservatives, BUT on every other issue they go further right then most conservatives.

I understand the "why's, I just want the average Joe to see the differences as they are striking! I don't believe the majority of Americans would support abolishing the minimum wage, and remove all restrictions on free trade or abolish social security or welfare just so they can get legal pot.

[Osborn F. Enready]

Indie said:
I believe that there must be some regulations in place to assure safety, and better health, and fairness which in turn saves lives and expenses down the road and protects our basic rights better.

I agree, and support regulation which is in complete conformity and respect to individual rights.

Indie said:
I wonder how many of these guidelines and agencies you oppose and why?

I would gladly debate each and every program, but to do all of them in one thread would be impossible for me with the post limits as they are.

In general I will say this.... there is a difference between taxation as discussed in the Constitution, and "income tax". My priority is removing income tax as practiced, regardless of what it is being used for, as its use as practiced without conscent is unconstitutional and illegal in my and many more educated than I, opinions.

The Constitution specifies forms of taxation that are acceptable, and specificly has a process for checks and balances it must meet....the income tax according to many, with supporting evidence, fails that test. Also, the Income Tax as practiced currently is far different than its original intent upon proposal and passage to law, these changes are relevant to the argument and in fact critical steps to assigning what has changed and why it is arguably unconstitutional as currently practiced.

Indie said:
So where do we draw the line and who decides?

The line is already drawn, and that line is defined by individual rights that citizens hold against government from intrusion. Individual rights are clearly enumerated in a language of the times, those words have clear meanings in the context written, and they are objectively sound observations which allow little room for error in interpretation if context is taken into account. There is room for error though, as there have also been several laws created that directly infringe them....though we the people are not obliged to abide any law that directly contradicts our individual rights as enumerated, it is our duty if we wish to remain self-governed to "audit" laws based on both content and application when judicial review fails to do so.... This is why the jury reserves the right to jury nullification of standing law in a trial by our peers.... our peers CAN override and nullify the law if they deem the law a violation of rights on its face, or the application in the case beyond reasonable application. Jury nullification can be abused as can any right if not understood, and understanding is part of the duty of remaining self-governed.

http://www.fija.org/

Indie said:
Our founding fathers only laid down the ground work it was left up to us to build on that and we did.

They also, on demand of the people, included specific UNALIENABLE RIGHTS which were deemed off-limits to encroachment by government, law or any other entity, and one of those included the right to use up to, and including lethal force, in protection of those unalienable rights.

They did this because they knew as time passed, the value of these rights may not be as evident as to those who were just forced to use force, to shrug off assaults on those very self-evident claims. Time, peace and prosperity has a way of weathering our attention, our skepticism of power, and our tolerance of intrusion by an entity we believe to be working in our intrests.... often time, to the point of being so far gone before noticed that force is required to again shrug it off.....

The forefathers empowered the people to prevent this abuse of power from happening again, by creating a "bill of rights of the people", rights recognized by the very law of the people, that were sacred to all citizens under such government and beyond reproach of government itself, with legal recognition to defend the self, family and loved ones from such with force if necessary. They felt the "objective" and "positive" rights as defined would be sufficient for allowing the people to determine when government was working in their intrests, and when they were not.

George Washington, the first President under the New Constitution and Bill of Rights recognized some inherant weaknesses of the system after serving his final term as President, and clearly enumerated them in his own words of his farewell address speech.

Most important to note, his clear warning of the general evil of the "spirit of party"....
http://www.yale.edu/lawweb/avalon/washing.htm

I argue that it is indeed this spirit of party that has allowed the corruption to the Constitution and Bill of Rights as it exists today, which some would argue since 1913, and some would argue since 1933 have eroded in part, a portion of each and every right enumerated with the BOR. It is hard to contest the fact that spirit of party exists, nor of its evil nature as you can bear witness to the death-grip stranglehold the two-party monopoly has had for the last 155 years..... since Millard Fillmore.
http://www.whitehouse.gov/history/presidents/

Indie said:
I don't think what they put in place was meant as absolute otherwise there would be no amendments.

They intended and expected amendments, which is why they specificly created a process by which amendments could be passed....many of the issues I am arguing of here, as you know, have no amendments, except the income tax specificly, which is the 16th. As I stated above, the income tax as specified in the 16th was in application to a corporation or worker that obtained money from out of the country, not a worker or corporation WITHIN the country, which was later changed without amendment, because the 16th set precedent that was bad to begin with by not excluding individuals earning income in the U.S. solely.

Indie said:
While I agree some agencies and laws are not needed. I believe we all benefit from a lot of them. So bottom line, should be case by case.

I couldn't agree more, it should be evaluated case by case, clearly and objectively debated once performance and funding of the agencies are fully known and understood,
all that meet up to respecting individual rights should be left alone, those that do not should be put to vote of the people, and if the people find the programs valuable, they would HAVE to find another constitutionally sound method of funding them.

What my base argument is here however, is the base argument made by our forefathers themselves.....taxation without representation is immoral and clearly unconstitutional, and the vast majority of people have been lacking representation in THIS REGARD since at least 1913-1933.

“To say that any people are not fit for freedom, is to make poverty their choice, and to say they had rather be loaded with taxes than not.”
-Thomas Paine, 1792

“If taxes are laid upon us without our having a legal representation where they are laid, we are reduced from the character of free subjects to the state of tributary slaves.”
-Sam Adams

“[With the decline of society] begins, indeed, the bellum omnium in omnia [war of all against all], which some philosophers observing to be so general in this world, have mistaken it for the natural, instead of the abusive state of man. And the fore horse of this frightful team is public debt. Taxation follows that, and in its train wretchedness and oppression.”
-Thomas Jefferson to Samuel Kercheval, 1816. ME 15:40

(concerning the DANGER of a standing army to its own people, through the power to tax)
"A standing army we shall have, also, to execute the execrable commands of tyranny; and how are you to punish them? Will you order them to be punished? Who shall obey these orders? Will your mace-bearer be a match for a disciplined regiment? In what situation are we to be? The clause before you gives a power of direct taxation, unbounded and unlimited—an exclusive power of legislation, in all cases whatsoever, for ten miles square, and over all places purchased for the erection of forts, magazines, arsenals, dockyards, etc. What resistance could be made? The attempt would be madness. You will find all the strength of this country in the hands of your enemies; their garrisons will naturally be the strongest places in the country. Your militia is given up to Congress, also, in another part of this plan; they will therefore act as they think proper; all power will be in their own possession. You can not force them to receive their punishment: of what service would militia be to you, when, most probably, you will not have a single musket in the State? For, us arms are to be provided by Congress, they may or may not furnish them." Patrick Henry, Shall Liberty or Empire be Sought?, from a June 5, 1788 speech in the Virginia Convention, called to ratify the Constitution of the United States.

"These are the times that try men's souls. The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of their country; but he that stands it now, deserves the love and thanks of man and woman. Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered; yet we have this consolation with us, that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph. What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly: it is dearness only that gives every thing its value. Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods; and it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated. Britain, with an army to enforce her tyranny, has declared that she has a right (not only to tax) but "to bind us in all cases whatsoever," and if being bound in that manner, is not slavery, then is there not such a thing as slavery upon earth." Thomas Paine, The American Crisis, Chapter 1 (1776). Whole Book.

[GhostintheMachine]

I think maybe the question you are trying to ask is, with the elimination of certain government services such as welfare, will charity be able to replace it? When will people become motivated to help each other? Or does the security blanket need to stay in place due to individuals' self-interested motivations? When do government services transcend necessity(in the protection of an individual's well-being) and become unnecessary for the public?

[IndieVisible]

I think maybe the question you are trying to ask is, with the elimination of certain government services such as welfare, will charity be able to replace it? When will people become motivated to help each other? Or does the security blanket need to stay in place due to individuals' self-interested motivations? When do government services transcend necessity(in the protection of an individual's well-being) and become unnecessary for the public?

I'm saying left unchecked the majority of Americans would be living near poverty while the fortunate one's would be living in a lap of luxury. With out regulations to keep big corporations more people friendly, and with out a safety net millions more will simply fall in to poverty. And all some will say is hey they had an opportunity to succeed, not every one can so it's not my problem. I believe it is our problem! But it doesn't stop at charity. Job training, extended education, and job placement is also critical. Who should that be left to? The States? Charity organizations? Who is in a better position to make sure it is fairly done and accessable to all? It should be at a government level.

I realize we can not address every single issue here. But I hoped we can touch on a few. I am still waiting for the answers to why we should abolish

minimum wage
osha

I think it's crucial for all of us not familiar with the LP to get familiar with it a little better as this is a election year. It's not as liberal as some may like to believe. IMHO it's much closer to ultra conservative with few exceptions.

[Osborn F. Enready]

Minimum wage is an OBVIOUS infringement of individual business owners rights.

[IndieVisible]

Minimum wage is an OBVIOUS infringement of individual business owners rights.

So you would be ok with companies paying American workers $1/hr?

What about age restrictions? Would it be ok to hire child labor for 50 cents an hour?

[GhostintheMachine]

I'm saying left unchecked the majority of Americans would be living near poverty while the fortunate one's would be living in a lap of luxury. With out regulations to keep big corporations more people friendly, and with out a safety net millions more will simply fall in to poverty. And all some will say is hey they had an opportunity to succeed, not every one can so it's not my problem. I believe it is our problem! But it doesn't stop at charity. Job training, extended education, and job placement is also critical. Who should that be left to? The States? Charity organizations? Who is in a better position to make sure it is fairly done and accessable to all? It should be at a government level.

Yes, I think these are honest concerns. There must be checks and balances to make sure that governmental organizations are successful in doing this.



I think it's crucial for all of us not familiar with the LP to get familiar with it a little better as this is a election year. It's not as liberal as some may like to believe. IMHO it's much closer to ultra conservative with few exceptions.

Well in a classic liberal sense, they are very liberal.

Let's look at wikipedia's definition of liberal: Broadly speaking, liberalism emphasizes individual rights and equality of opportunity. Different forms of liberalism may propose very different policies, but they are generally united by their support for a number of principles, including extensive freedom of thought and speech, limitations on the power of governments, the rule of law, the free exchange of ideas, a market or mixed economy, and a transparent system of government.[2] All liberals — as well as some adherents of other political ideologies — support some variant of the form of government known as liberal democracy, with open and fair elections, where all citizens have equal rights by law.[3]

I would say, most reasonable participant of a democracy would agree upon these beliefs. Recklessly abandoning governmental programs that protect individual rights and equality of opportunity is not in the public's interest. Whether or not individual libertarian candidates have done this is not a question I can answer, perhaps somebody more knowledgeable could answer this. The key value is "where all citizens have equal rights by law" and are able to seek a voice and influence in their government.

[Osborn F. Enready]

Indie said:
So you would be ok with companies paying American workers $1/hr?

Is that what I said? No.

I said the government MANDATING a minimum wage with PENALTY OF FORCE for not complying, is ABUSE OF INDIVIDUAL RIGHTS OF THE BUSINESS OWNER.

If you don't understand the concept of what an individual right is, I am not even going to try to explain to you how the free-market in the nation, or the global market works.

Indie said:
What about age restrictions? Would it be ok to hire child labor for 50 cents an hour?

People hire child labor all the time, but it requires parental conscent.
I have seen kids as young as 6 years old working home-made lemonade stands.
When I was 10, I cut grass for money using the family lawn-mower.....

Yes, I support reasonable child labor.

Wage is determined between the person looking for work, and the person offering it, and THAT IS A RIGHT OF ALL AMERICANS.

[brien]

What about Osha?


The private sector seems to do fine with Underwriters Laboratories and Consumers Union so I see no problem with privatizing OSHA.

[brien]

As I see it LP only talks about popular issues and tends to hide other stands that may not be popular. Like abolishing the minimum wage?!

I agree on some social policies LP does lean more left then conservatives, BUT on every other issue they go further right then most conservatives.

I understand the "why's, I just want the average Joe to see the differences as they are striking! I don't believe the majority of Americans would support abolishing the minimum wage, and remove all restrictions on free trade or abolish social security or welfare just so they can get legal pot.


The majority of Americans haven't the first clue in Economics 101 and how the minimum wage hurts the very people it intends to help. They just don't know any better because they are ignorant of the facts surrounding the minimum wage. Secondary education in the US is a sham and the Education Unions only benefit from perpetuating the minimum wage hoax in the government schools.

The minium wage is the government's way of perpetuating a giant hoax upon workers and denying business full and equal access to a free and open labor market. It also prevents the very people who need employment from gaining access to the jobs they need because business can't afford to increase jobs when they are forced to pay government mandated wages. The minimum wage prevents business from expanding and hiring more workers to aid in that expansion. Professor Tom Sowell, PHD in Economics, has written extensively on this subject.

http://www.capmag.com/article.asp?ID=4757


A survey has shown that 85 percent of the economists in Canada and 90 percent of the economists in the United States say that minimum wage laws reduce employment. But you don't need a Ph.D. in economics to know that jacking up prices leads fewer people to buy. Those people include employers, who hire less labor when labor is made artificially more expensive

**********************

The proponents who want minimum wage are often connected to Unions:

http://books.google.com/books?id=gbfTLG_HmGEC&pg=PA213&lpg=PA213&dq=Sowell+on+the+minimum+wage&source=web&ots=WdR6DBRgzc&sig=d3jgKlGO74HYM8hGYXM7dRnM1-E&hl=en&sa=X&oi=book_result&resnum=7&ct=result


************************************************** ******************

Minumum wage laws have been shown to hurt minorites:

http://www.fireandknowledge.org/archives/2008/05/27/black-unemployment-and-minimum-wage-sowell/

Unemployment among 16 and 17-year-old black males was no higher than among white males of the same age in 1948. It was only after a series of minimum wage escalations began that black male teenage unemployment not only skyrocketed itself but became more than double the unemployment rates among white male teenagers. In the early twenty-first century, the unemployment rate for black teenagers exceeded 30 percent.

**********************************


http://www.amatecon.com/etext/mwe/mwe.html


Conclusions

The minimum wage law addresses a serious social problem, but creates no new options for dealing with it. In fact, it simply reduces the set of existing options available to the parties—employers and employees—who must voluntarily agree if there is to be a job. Trying to make people better off by reducing their options seems questionable even as a theory. In practice, what has happened is that fewer transactions (less employment) have taken place when there were fewer options open to the parties. It would be very surprising if it were otherwise.
The great unsolved problem remains of what to do about the poor in general, or the low-wage workers in particular. Low-wage workers are not changed by calling them higher-wage workers, any more than students are improved by calling them B students instead of C students. The tragic educational results of the process of upgrading by fiat is hardly a recommendation for extending this practice into the economic sphere. In both cases, it is of course much harder, much slower—and more heartbreaking—to try to create real skills and real achievements. And yet nothing else will really do the job.
Automatic escalation compounds the problems of the minimum wage law by making it possible to close our eyes to its effects hereafter. This seems unconscionable when those affected are poor, vulnerable, powerless, and inarticulate. If the Congress does not monitor what happens to them, there is no other powerful institution to do so. The set of incentives confronting the U. S. Department of Labor makes it unrealistic to expect it to critically evaluate minimum wage effects, and nearly forty years of history make it painfully apparent that it has no intention of doing so. Labor unions have their own imperatives and constraints. For them, the minimum wage law presents the same kind of opportunity that a tariff presents to a business firm. It is a way to price competitors out of the market. That this is accompanied by humanitarian statements may be a matter of rhetorical, or perhaps political, interest but it changes no economic fact. In the Union of South Africa, minimum wage laws were applied to native black Africans for the explicit purpose of stopping their competition with European workers.20 In the days of the British Empire, British unions and manufacturers attempted to get minimum wages applied to India for similar reasons, though with different rhetoric.21 American unions and businesses have been doing something very similar in Puerto Rico and other affiliated territories where minimum wages are set by tripartite boards of mainland Americans, often from competing firms.
The point here is not to depict anyone as particularly evil. The point is that powerful institutional incentives exist to use the minimum wage laws for purposes very different from those announced in the Fair Labor Standards Act, and that these institutional incentives are likely to persist through turnovers of personnel in the future as in the past.
Special interests, recognized as such, may be kept within bounds. For the special interests revolving around the minimum wage laws, Congressional oversight seems especially needed, and therefore automatic escalation seems especially dangerous.
Finally, my hope would be that some way might be considered to have the statistical analysis of minimum wage effects performed by some organization other than the agency whose own fate is intertwined with that of the Fair Labor Standards Act.

***********************

It is the LP position, and I agree with it, along with many of economists in the US and abroad, that minimum wage laws hurt the very people they pretend to help and therefore should be abolished immediately.

[IndieVisible]

So your ok with employers paying $1 per hour for jobs? How about child labor at 50 cents per hour?

[brien]

I think maybe the question you are trying to ask is, with the elimination of certain government services such as welfare, will charity be able to replace it? When will people become motivated to help each other? Or does the security blanket need to stay in place due to individuals' self-interested motivations? When do government services transcend necessity(in the protection of an individual's well-being) and become unnecessary for the public?

Faith based charitable organizations already handle much of the care for the poor and indigent in our society. If more people thought there was no "government safety net" perhaps they would act more responsibly in their lives.

For example, if a woman thought when she became pregnant, she would have no welfare "safety net" for her and her child, wouldn't she do more to protect herself from becomming pregnant in the first instance? Perhaps the government would be more serious and responsible for tracking down and forcing irresponsible deadbeat fathers to support the children their sexual indescretions have foisted unwillingly upon the taxpaying public. The first line of responsiblity here is individual. The first line of prophylaxis is education.

Welfare entitlements are a very small part of the government budget but welfare reform has been shown to have a positive effect in society since the Great Society entrenched it into the American culture during the LBJ Administration. The unintended consequences were the destruction of the Black family in America. In 1960 70% of the black families in the US were two parent families, today, it is 28%. Welfare, as designed by the Democratic Administration of LBJ, has destroyed the Black family in the US today. So just how successful is government charity been in this case?

http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1450339/posts


http://shroudedindoubt.typepad.com/bodyparts/2008/06/fathers-father.html

[brien]

So your ok with employers paying $1 per hour for jobs? How about child labor at 50 cents per hour?

Please don't be absurd. If an economy somehwere on the planet paid $1 per hour and 50 cents per hour, all things being equal, that would be ok. I am not in favor of Child labor and neither is the LP.

Most businesses who hire entry level job seekers in the US are small businesses in America and small businesses make up the bulk of business in America. When the pizza parlor down on your corner street starts to catch on and needs to hire another worker to make more pizzas, he can't do it because it will cost him too much money, and it will reduce his profits so he ends up earning less than if he doesn't expand his business at all.

So if the MW is $8 per hour, and he has to hire another person at $8 per hr, and pay the government all of the taxes that go with that $8 per hr, the Pizza store owner merely works his other employees even harder. But, if he can hire 2 students at $4 per hour, he gets twice the production and can expand his business based upon twice that production.

It only makes sense to have two people working than having one person working at one an one half times the rate. Two people could work at twice the rate and make the business 50% more profitable than making one person work time and 1/2. Therefore, you end up needing 2 people to do the work of three people. France tried limiting the number of employees in the labor market and it has failed and they are eliminating it.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121209889109030725.html

http://blogs.wsj.com/juggle/2008/05/30/the-french-example-how-many-hours-a-week-do-you-work/



But I don't want to get into Econ 101 here. You asked, and I answered, so you may disagree, and that is your perogative.


Why do you think the US has such an intense illegal immigration problem? Do you think they are being paid minimum wage?

[IndieVisible]

Please don't be absurd. If an economy somehwere on the planet paid $1 per hour and 50 cents per hour, all things being equal, that would be ok. I am not in favor of Child labor and neither is the LP.

Most businesses who hire entry level job seekers in the US are small business in America and small businesses make up the bulk of business in America. When the pizza parlor down on your corner street starts to catch on and needs to hire another worker to make more pizzas, he can't do it because it will cost him too much money, and it will reduce his profits so he ends up earning less than if he doesn't expand his business at all.

So if the MW is $8 per hour, and he has to hire another person at $8 per hr, and pay the government all of the taxes that go with that $8 per hr, the Pizza store owner merely works his other employees even harder. But, if he can hire 2 students at $4 per hour, he gets twice the production and can expand his business based upon twice that production.

It only makes sense to have two people working than having one person working at one an one half times the rate. Two people could work at twice the rate and make the business 50% more profitable than making one person work time and 1/2. Therefore, you end up needing 2 people to do the work of three people. France tried limiting the number of employees in the labor market and it has failed and they are eliminating it.

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB121209889109030725.html

http://blogs.wsj.com/juggle/2008/05/30/the-french-example-how-many-hours-a-week-do-you-work/



But I don't want to get into Econ 101 here. You asked, and I answered, so you may disagree, and that is your perogative.


Why do you think the US has such an intense illegal immigration problem? Do you think they are being paid minimum wage?

LOL, well with out any minimum wage employers could pay pwhat ever they wanted! MW should be kept up with the cost of living. If employer can not afford to pay MW may be they are in the wrong business then.

[brien]

"I'm saying left unchecked the majority of Americans would be living near poverty while the fortunate one's would be living in a lap of luxury. With out regulations to keep big corporations more people friendly, and with out a safety net millions more will simply fall in to poverty"

*************************

This is not really true because the labor pool is not stagnant and entry level jobs / lowpaying jobs are not permanent to the worker. Most workers labor at the entry level job, gain the skills need to command more money in wages out in the market, and move on to better jobs. Minimum wages merely prevent business from job expansion, and thus shut out more workers from gaining the experience they need in the job market to move on to better paying jobs.

For example, a 16 year old inner city kid gets a job at MC Donalds. He learns the basic skills of cooking on a grill, french fryer and kitchen skills. He then takes them and gets a better job in a better restaurant paying more money. He takes it and learns even more in that kitchen. By the time he is 26 he could be a fully trained sous chef and working towards running a kitchen of his own earning $80,000 per year. He could even save enough money as the sous chef to open his own restaurant.

For every kid who has to be paid $8 per hour minimum wage, two could be learning the same trade and moving toward a better lifestyle.

[brien]

LOL, well with out any minimum wage employers could pay pwhat ever they wanted! MW should be kept up with the cost of living. If employer can not afford to pay MW may be they are in the wrong business then.

If that were true, the businesses that did pay the living wage would hire those in the labor pool were ready and available to work and other would not get the workers. Furthermore, low paying jobs are usually entry level jobs and aren't meant for the same person to work all of their lives. I don't know one person who earned a low wage in 1960 earning the same $1.75 cent per hour today. So please don't be absurd and show an abject ignorance in Economics and labor.

There is a finite labor pool. Business must compete for those laborers. Business will pay whatever the market rate is for the job being offered to the public. Once again, why do you think the US has such a problem with illegal immigrant labor in the market today?

[IndieVisible]

If that were true, the businesses that did pay the living wage would hire those in the labor pool were ready and available to work and other would not get the workers. Furthermore, low paying jobs are usually entry level jobs and aren't meant for the same person to work all of their lives. I don't know one person who earned a low wage in 1960 earning the same $1.75 cent per hour today. So please don't be absurd and show an abject ignorance in Economics and labor.

There is a finite labor pool. Business must compete for those laborers. Business will pay whatever the market rate is for the job being offered to the public. Once again, why do you think the US has such a problem with illegal immigrant labor in the market today?

I THINK WE HAVE A IMMIGRATION PROBLEM BECAUSE WE HAVE MORE JOBS THAT PAY BETTER COMPARED TO MEXICO WHERE THE EMPLOYERS CAN PAY THEM AS LITTLE AS THEY WANT.

I support the MW and I think it should keep up with the cost of living. So do the majority of Americans. So I'm not worried about your personal interpretation or views on it. May be that's why the LP only has 900 members in NYS :lmao:

[NortheastCynic]

So your ok with employers paying $1 per hour for jobs? How about child labor at 50 cents per hour?Oversimplification. "Ok"? What exactly does that mean? Would I like to work for $1/hr. Of course not. Do I believe that, should two individuals come to a free and peaceful agreement wherein one agrees to work for the other at a $1/hr salary, that they should be disallowed to do so? Of course not. I'm all for peaceful, voluntary interaction. If one person agrees to work for another for any fee, I, you and the gov't have no right to stop them.

That is what a libertarian believes. Oversimplifying the question into being, 'ok' or not 'ok' with a certain action does a disservice to this debate.

-NC

[Milton Bradley]

That is what a libertarian believes. Oversimplifying the question into being, 'ok' or not 'ok' with a certain action does a disservice to this debate.


That's what it's all about for many of our opposition. They seek only to marginalize your position, not understand it.

[penmyst]

Other than the military, law-making, and the judicial system, I am at a loss to name one single circumstance where government can do anything better than the private sector can.

Genuine freedom and free-market capitalism fit like hand in glove. They did alright making the U.S. the greatest nation to ever be (or ever will be). But that time is past.

[william the wierd]

The elephant in the room is natural selection it can be:
Differential reproductive success: a free market within a free society.
Ethnic cleansing by means of illegal immigration and/or invasion.

Other choices are simply class warfare conducted by the Bureaucratic/New class.

[brien]

I THINK WE HAVE A IMMIGRATION PROBLEM BECAUSE WE HAVE MORE JOBS THAT PAY BETTER COMPARED TO MEXICO WHERE THE EMPLOYERS CAN PAY THEM AS LITTLE AS THEY WANT.

I support the MW and I think it should keep up with the cost of living. So do the majority of Americans. So I'm not worried about your personal interpretation or views on it. May be that's why the LP only has 900 members in NYS :lmao:


The illegal immigrants wouldn't come here if there were no jobs. And in many cases, those jobs are paid at less than minimum wage. If there were no illegals to take those jobs, the wages would rise to reflect the true value of the labor pool, and in many cases, probably higher than your minimum wage. This is exactly why many politicians will do nothing about illegal immigration because they want to control the wages and the labor pool. So much for your minimum wage in terms of illegal immigration. The minimum wage is a failure and I have shown you links to prove it. I can't do any more than that here.

And the reason there are only 900 members in the LP in NY is probably because you and they are happy with the status quo in government. That makes you, and them, squarely part of the problem and not the solution. Join the solution and make it 901 there fella.