@alexa @freemo

Let's take a closer look at what just happen in Spain...

3 months ago, the minimum wage was somewhere around 810€ if I recall correctly.

Then the gobernment rised the minimum wage to 900€. When this happen, the Bank of Spain started warning that companies would not be able to pay their employees and many companies would have to close, being unable to be solvent.

What happen was quite the opposite of what the Bank of Spain predicted... while it's true that we're on summer and the employement rate increases during summer, the unemployement rate did still drop even lower than it usually does rather than increase.

In fact, most companies are employing people above that wage, like common salaries for low class jobs usually range from 1000€ to 1200€.

So, I can conclude that this comic is a complete lie. Period.

@enigmatico
See you actually just proved my point.

I agree that everything you just said probably happened. It also does NOT accurately describe WHY minimum wage is bad. Since you didnt bother to ask me what opinion I held, and instead you made a few assumptions, you got it all wrong.

In short you totally missed both why minimum wage is bad as well as the intent I had by posting the meme. Which is why you should try to engage people and listen to them first, then draw your conclusions second. Otherwise youll be so lost in your own confirmation bias you wont make a useful argument. I mean hell you just thought you debunked an argument of mine which wasnt the argument I was making in the first place. So case and point there.

@alexa@fedi.absturztau.be

@freemo @alexa The problem is, I never said the minimum wage is bad... I just wanted to point out that what the comic says is a lie, the fact that just because you have a minimum wage, companies won't be able to stay competitive and will have to fire people. That is completely not true.

A free market works because of competitivity. You want to hire the best people in order to be the best company, so you have to offer better salaries than the other company. In theory, this works. But in the practice, this doesn't completely work as many small companies will exploit the fact that they can hire for whatever money by offering low salaries, completely breaking the economy by making a lot of the population not being able to spend enough money to consume.

What a minimum wage does, when done correctly, is to ensure that every company pays a salary that ensures every person can afford to spend a little bit of money, even if it's just a little. In practise this also has it's flaws since a lot of companies perform tricks to avoid these wages but the reality is most companies are still able to hire over the minimum wage while still giving some marging for competition if they so desire.

@enigmatico @freemo @alexa minimum wage is just an expense, like property tax or whatever, it goes against PL like everything else.

The argument that some must live in poverty to keep prices low has some value however it is heartless and cruel. A modern society should not force people into poverty to keep lower prices.