Economic peak oil explained....

[slowmover]

If the US is really interested in keeping menial jobs, then we need to get rid of the utterly worthless minimum wage law.

Too bad, isn't it, that the minimum wage -- properly set (one-half of the average wage) -- adds to the overall economy. Lifts people from poverty. And no jobs are ever lost as a result. But, since wages lost their connection to productivity, the minimum wage isn't enough to live on, much less start or start over in life.



As the former societal arrangement created the middle class, it looks as though everyone in America in the bottom 90% is owed a 65% raise. Or a 15-hr workweek. Take your pick. Repeal Taft-Hartley and start putting the tables aright. The 1956 Tax Code would be another. The equal of 5% of GNP as Federal tax revenue as the rate for corporations and the wealthy. We had no wars then. Today we have about six.

.

[Duffman]

But rising wages without rising economic output is just inflationary. From a pure economic perspective min wages are actually bad, one good thing they do that people do not recognise is that they provide a reference point for every other wage to reflect off of.

[Thymeclock]

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

Two things: they better stop *****ing about the consequences of congestion, and nothing is going to change until nature says "enough!".

Frank, I might even be able to agree with parts of your comment, but I can't because it's unclear in every point.

Who is the "they"?

Who is *****ing about the "consequences of congestion" other than you?

And lastly, what makes you think that "nature" will say "enough"?

Example: NY City (where I was born) has always been crowded and congested and even filthy and crime ridden (beyond all belief compared to today), not just during my life span but for many generations before me. Yet people flock to it, not just from all over America, but from all over the world, and want to live here. In fact overall it is much better now than it was than I was a kid during the '60's and '70's, although it is hardly a Utopia. (Ironically, there is a neighborhood within part of NY city that is actually named Utopia, FWIW. ) I prefer to live in the suburbs, but many, both rich, poor and everything in-between don't mind living in a densely populated place.

So please tell us what part of "nature" is going to have an eruption because of this?

[Duffman]

People flock to the big cities have job opportunities that rural areas can not match outside of the universal professions like teaching and medicine.

[Frank Lee]

How big is big enough? Is 500000 too small to have fun in? How about 1000000? How many 1000000 areas are needed to have lots and lots of fun?

[redpoint5]

Originally Posted by slowmover

Too bad, isn't it, that the minimum wage -- properly set (one-half of the average wage) -- adds to the overall economy. Lifts people from poverty. And no jobs are ever lost as a result. But, since wages lost their connection to productivity, the minimum wage isn't enough to live on, much less start or start over in life.

A vague chart that suggests a corelation / causation relationship is hardly evidence against well established economic literature on the subject.

It is, in fact, impossible to count how many of anything is lost due to having made one decision over another. However, it follows that if someone is willing to work for a certain wage, but is unable to legally due so, they have been denied the right to work, and the job can be considered lost.

The fact that the US has an enormous undocumented work force that labors illegally for less than minium wage is testament to the demand for low wage work. Should these jobs instead be made available only to well-paid, college educated individuals?

I find it arrogant of anyone to tell me what minimal amount I am able to live on; just as I object to anyone that told me the maximum I'm allowed to earn. I'm entitled to earn whatever the market price is for the service I provide, absent any artifical manipulation.

To rationalize minimum wage, one must also rationalize maximum wage. Once this is reconciled to the mind, one realizes their utopia is socializm.

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

How big is big enough? Is 500000 too small to have fun in? How about 1000000? How many 1000000 areas are needed to have lots and lots of fun?

Have you visited Manhattan Frank? I certainly prefer living in the country where the burden of rules, laws and deadlines is light, but I have to say, NY offers something spectacular that a smaller city can't. Mostly though, it offers economic possibilities.

[Frank Lee]

Never been to Manhattan. Don't think going there would increase my chances for wealth either.

What I've noticed about large urban areas is more duplication of things throughout said areas more than anything else. What that accomplishes besides sprawl and congestion, I don't know.

[Thymeclock]

Redpoint wrote:

Have you visited Manhattan Frank? I certainly prefer living in the country where the burden of rules, laws and deadlines is light, but I have to say, NY offers something spectacular that a smaller city can't. Mostly though, it offers economic possibilities.

You are correct in that there is a law or regulation against doing virtually everything in NY city. Bloomberg's village is the epitome of the Nanny state. That's one of the worst aspects of life here.

Wages are much higher here, but so are taxes and rents, which are astronomical. What the right hand giveth, the left hand taketh away...

Originally Posted by Frank Lee

Never been to Manhattan. Don't think going there would increase my chances for wealth either.

I doubt that you would like it, but you'd get to see that not everyone who lives in a large city is miserable or bothered by congestion.

[slowmover]

A vague chart that suggests a corelation / causation relationship is hardly evidence against well established economic literature on the subject.


If the chart is vague, you should point out where. The same exists for taxation rates. The higher on the rich, the greater is societal prosperity. A middle class isn't constructed from nothing. "Well-established"? You are kidding aren't you? One may choose to believe in the equivalent of religious training -- a madrassa; nothing else explains the non-real world of economics -- but easily scaled walls are not "well-established".

The fact that the US has an enormous undocumented work force that labors illegally for less than minium wage is testament to the demand for low wage work.

No, it's testament to profit being a greater perceived good than human welfare, dignity and the rest. The cost to the average citizen to raise prices commensurate are negligible. It might -- just might -- offset the tax and other unfunded burdens created as a result. If you live in ciy of 400k persons or fewer and Wal-Mart comes in, your costs as city have just risen. Individually and collectively.

Are we a society based on property, or on people? You should read more deeply into this. The poor society -- in all it's aspects -- is the one you describe. It misses the purpose of government altogether. Ayn Rand junk. It's a very long way off from what built this country.

There are two novels that can change a bookish fourteen-year old's life: The Lord of the Rings and Atlas Shrugged. One is a childish fantasy that often engenders a lifelong obsession with its unbelievable heroes, leading to an emotionally stunted, socially-crippled adulthood, unable to deal with the real world. The other, of course, involves orcs.

Rationalize wages? Of course. An economy is nothing but a set of rules, it is neither natural nor foreordained. It looks as though a complete reading of, say, Adam Smith, even J.M. Keynes is in order. Misconceptions, here. Do you set the rules to benefit a minority, or is your idea of a just society based on maximizing opportunity for all? Taxes are both incentive and disincentive, as should be. How and where applied is another.

The Peak Oil connection to any of this is: At a time when the economy is in the toilet (in no small part due to speculators and the capture of government by giant private forces), Americans (among others) will have to make changes in their lives where -- for the first time in about 300-years -- there is not cheaply-acquired energy as a sop, a backstop to expensive changes. Individually or societally. Whether the economy stumbles along (reset, reset, reset) the costs will continue to rise (not just inflation). There will come a point where what people are able to pay for energy -- and what is available at a price they can afford -- will diverge.

And at that point, all bets are off. Just due to oil.

.

[jamesqf]

Originally Posted by redpoint5

Most of the U.S. is wide open space, but the people want the entertainment and salaries afforded by the city.

Salaries, yes. This has been a recurring pattern throughout history: people go to the city in hopes of making a fortune, suffering the greatly degraded quality of life as part of the price. Those fortunate few who do make fortunes, great or small, almost always return to the country and buy estates.

Technology is breaking this pattern, though. There are a lot of people who, like me, can live in the country and telecommute to well-paying jobs.

As to your art comment, that is entirely subjective. If I had to choose between music and not having to hunt and gather my food, I would forgo the music.

But we have already foregone art and music. Little if any has been created in the last century, and we can nowadays put most of what there is on a good hard drive.