GM and others shutting down production.
Just heard the GM part on tv news, looked HERE and found out it's hitting the others as well. Trucks seem to be getting the hardest knocks. Our little Chevy dealer here only has 4 new vehicles on ...
Forum Discussion
spoon059 wrote:monkey44 wrote:
No law against paying more than minimum wage for trained and skilled employees. If we had brought that work back to USA, we would not be in this dilemma. It's not just trucks either.
It's the untrained, unskilled workers that are not worth that pay.
Perhaps the guy actually making the part deserves more than $15 an hour... but what about when you have to pay the janitor $15 an hour to clean up, the parts guy $15 an hour to order parts, the warehouse guy $15 an hour to move parts, the parking attendant $15 an hour to help people park, the lady behind the lunch counter $15 an hour to warm up food, etc etc?
It quickly becomes unsustainable.
A $15 minimum wage only sounds expensive because minimum wage hasn't kept up with inflation... In 1980 I was earning $3.50/hour working at a gas station after school. In today's dollars, that's $12/hour. Paying a janitor $15/hour today doesn't sound crazy.
I don't know how much of a chip fab's cost goes to unskilled labor, but fast food is pretty labor intensive (around 30% of the cost of food is labor), and higher wages doesn't have a large effect on prices:
Burtless compared prices for two different types of burritos at San Francisco’s 710 Third St. Taco Bell (minimum wage: $16.07) to prices for the same burritos at a Taco Bell in Alexandria, Va., where the state’s minimum wage is currently $7.25 per hour, equal to the federal minimum.
In Alexandria, a Bean Burrito goes for $1.29, while a Burrito Supreme costs $4.19. At the San Francisco location, a Bean Burrito sells for $1.99, and a Burrito Supreme costs $4.19.
The most expensive burrito on the menu, the Crunchwrap Supreme, costs $4.19 in Alexandria and $4.49 in San Francisco, a difference of about 7%.
