“The new overtime rules will affect millions of middle-class Americans” — Huh?
The new overtime rules will affect millions of middle-class Americans https://t.co/vjkBYVR6Fj
— Newsweek (@Newsweek) May 23, 2016
I’m confused! Millions of people work for the same company?
Oh, the federal government rules about overtime pay. Of course! How could I forget?! Well, let’s see what Congress has done this time. Newsweek:
Melissa Agnello earned her Ph.D in microbiology last year from the University of California at Los Angeles, an impressive achievement that unlocked her ability to wave goodbye to a decade of student poverty and… be a little less poor. She’s doing post-doctoral research now at the school, studying the microbiome, the bacteria that live on the human body. The job pays $42,800 a year, which would be a king’s ransom in rural Arkansas but in southern California it means a 45-minute commute to work from the place she and her husband can afford to live. It’s also a position that pays no overtime, even though Agnello doesn’t really have any duties that might be considered managerial, exempting her from overtime law. When she works 60 hours in a week, she makes the same amount of money as when she worked 40.
Plenty of American workers and plenty of international workers have it worse. But things are looking up for Agnello and an estimated 12.5 million workers across the country in the wake of an Obama administration change to the Fair Labor Standards Act announced last week, raising the salary threshold for overtime pay. By the first of the year, Agnello will either see her pay jump to $47,476, or she’ll be able to start clocking every hour she works above 40 to earn time and a half. By this time next year, she’s hoping, she’ll be able to ease a little farther away from a constant worry about money and start saving for a house, think about a family, and “stop being a starving student, which I’ve felt like for a long time.”
Isn’t that wonderful? She’ll make almost $5000 more per year! Hooray! And as we all know, that money magically comes out of nowhere. Employers having to pay more can’t possibly cause higher prices, or taxes, or unemployment.
That, of course, was sarcasm. This appears to be, essentially, a government-mandated rate hike for certain workers:
Eric Cook is associate director of human resources services at Mammoth HR, a Portland, Ore.-based consulting company that advises mostly small businesses that can’t afford their own separate human resources departments. . . . . What most of Cook’s clients are planning to do is give their employees raises, bumping them up somewhere above the new threshold of $47,476, which will allow them to continue having workers put in more than 40 hours a week without overtime.
Yup, Congress really screwed the pooch this time! But wait! What was that line? “[A]n Obama administration change to the Fair Labor Standards Act”??
The “Fair Labor Standards Act” sounds like a law. What is all this about the “Obama administration” changing a law?
Not being a labor lawyer, I don’t know whether this is another example of Obama overstepping his bounds and changing statutory language without Congressional authorization, or another example of Congress abandoning its lawmaking power and giving excessive power to the federal bureaucracy. What I do know is that no executive should be able to announce new rules about how much private employers must pay their workers. Even if we assume that the federal government has such a power, that power resides in Congress, not the executive.
Mike Lee talks about the overweening regulatory state in his books Our Lost Constitution and The Freedom Agenda (which I recently finished). We have lost all accountability, and are ruled by bureaucrats. They serve as lawmaker, judge, jury, and executioner.
We have to start fighting this.
P.S. Obama, of course, uses a Keynesian analysis to explain why this is great policy:
“This is a step in the right direction to strengthen and secure the middle class by raising Americans’ wages,” Obama wrote in an email to supporters. “When workers have more income, they spend it—often at businesses in their local community—and that helps grow the economy for everyone.”
I don’t know why we don’t just federally mandate that every worker in the nation receive a $50,000 per year salary increase. Why, just think of all the money that would be circulating in the economy!
If you’re interested in learning more about why such arguments are fallacious, you could do worse than to poke around Tom Woods’s Liberty Classroom. There is a whole course on Keynesianism and its fallacies. Poke around the free Liberty Classroom samples here.
Ding.
Patterico (328df5) — 5/23/2016 @ 9:47 amI work here is done??
http://www.twc.state.tx.us/news/efte/flsa_does_and_doesnt_do.html
narciso (732bc0) — 5/23/2016 @ 9:49 amfrom HR propaganda slut Eric Cook’s linkered in page
happyfeet (831175) — 5/23/2016 @ 9:59 amI don’t see where the leeway was,
http://www.kielichlawfirm.com/what-is-the-fair-labor-standards-act/
narciso (732bc0) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:00 amlast time the law was amended was in 2007, however you have commissar perez in that department,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:04 amThe new overtime rule is in keeping with the New Deal-era Fair Labor Standards Act, which mandates these protections but leaves the threshold for eligibility to be determined by the rule-making process. The threshold was last reset in 2004.
happyfeet (831175) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:21 amSo a UCLA PhD in microbiology commands about half the starting salary of an engineering BS. It’s too bad she didn’t think this thing through six or seven years ago when she had some career options. Hopefully her graduate work was covered with an RA or TA, but if not, if she’s doubled her indebtedness, then I’d say the school of hard knocks should have been allowed to continue operating unfettered.
A student loan is the worst sort of investment. It was only four months ago that a swat team of seven Federal Marshalls grab a fellow in Houston for an unpaid student loan of $1,500 dating back to 1987. The Feds are selling their delinquent loans to collection agencies, and as a sweetener, they’re loaning out the use of Federal Marshalls as the muscle behind the “collection”.
Is there any reason she has to live in California? Her degree might get her a real job in fly over country.
This is the real story of the post-graduate-degree cohort’s support of progressive policies. These snowflakes never have to grow up. And they will vote for Democrats forever.
BobStewartatHome (a52abe) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:22 amAnother “Screw you, America” from the SCOAMF.
nk (dbc370) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:34 amor
S*** like this is why we got Trump.
“Ween”
Heh
JP (bd5dd9) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:45 amI was not aware that the federal government, or any government for that matter, dictated how many hours constituted overtime, who was or was not eligible and at what income amount it kicked in. I don’t know how I missed this having over 1200 employees in my career but somehow I did. And obviously it didn’t make a damn bit of difference.
I particularly loved this sentence: “It’s also a position that pays no overtime, even though Agnello doesn’t really have any duties that might be considered managerial, exempting her from overtime law.”. “Considered managerial” by whom? If it’s my company I decide what is and is not managerial. But beside that, if “the government” told me something like this I would simply CUT everybody to 25 hours and make them part time. That is if I hadn’t already due to Obamacare.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/23/2016 @ 11:06 amOh, come on, Patterico. That notion of “restrictions on The Executive” is SO old-school. It’s from a LEAST a century ago. Our Beltway Betters have “Progress”ed far beyond such limitations.
You want to HINDER the power of This Nation’s Best-and-Brightest to establish Utopia-for-The-Masses by a handwave and “so let it be recorded, so let it be done”? How backward! How selfish!
You’re on the “wrong side of history”, as our Beneficent New Overlords would surely say.
A_Nonny_Mouse (02f1f2) — 5/23/2016 @ 11:22 amBob,
She’s a PostDoc, she’s still in the University system, not working real job that commands a good salary. She’s working on a research project that will bolster her name and eventually lead to a good paying job or a professorship.
I’m not sure how this will work out for her though. I’m thinking that most PostDoc positions are funded by Federal (NSF) research grants, where all of the costs come from the same cash pool: lab equipment, experiment materials, salaries, office space. I’m also thinking that the next batch of PostDocs will simply be offered a much lower salary, with the expectation that they’ll work up to 60 hours (or more) per week.
Xmas (3c8969) — 5/23/2016 @ 11:23 amA_Nonny_Mouse is right. We now have a living, breathing constitution so any ideas about any “restrictions on the Executive” are strictly delusional. I learned years ago it doesn’t matter what’s written on the paper, it’s what the lawyers say what’s written on the paper means.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/23/2016 @ 11:48 amCan’t anyone here do arithmetic? The obvious thing for the university to do is to raise her pay 11% to the new minimum, and raise her workload by the same amount, to 66.5 hours/week instead of 60 – assuming she’s not exaggerating that. That way they can get just as much work for the same amount of money. Of course, that also means laying off 9.1% of the people in her position. (I’m assuming, for simplicity’s sake, that there are a bunch of them, all paid the same. Even if the situation is more complicated, the same principles apply.) So 9.1% are far worse off, and the other 90.9% are better off in some ways (more money), worse off in others (less free time – particularly bad if you’re thinking of starting a family). Of course, an 11% pay raise comes to quite a bit less than 11% after taxes, so her actual per-hour compensation will go down a bit, even as her take-home pay goes up, and so she’s arguably worse off even if she keeps her job. Typical consequence of government interference in the job market.
Of course, the university could just raise her pay without raising her hours or laying anyone off, but that means higher tuition, or more tax money from the state, or a bit of each, doesn’t it? Someone will pay, and it won’t be any of the bureaucrats in D.C., unless they send their kids to California state schools.
Tradeoffs: has everyone forgotten how they work? Apparently Obama’s bureaucrats have, at least in part because they rarely have to face them themselves.
Dr. Weevil (ee6365) — 5/23/2016 @ 12:26 pmSome comparisons grabbed in a quick Google search; these agencies selected since they are routinely seeking employees;
The median annual Police Patrol Officer salary in Oakland, CA is $59,633, as of April 26, 2016, with a range usually between $49,661-$70,363 not including bonus and benefit information and other factors that impact base pay.
The median annual Police Patrol Officer salary in Stockton, CA is $57,006, as of April 26, 2016, with a range usually between $47,474-$67,263 not including bonus and benefit information
I did not dig into the qualifications, but I believe a HS diploma in the hands of a relatively bright person will get them a seat at the exam and probably eventually a job. Those commenters suggesting maybe a bit more research, before the fact, into employment prospects might be on the right track.
I don’t know if this is a true reflection of the true relative value of security vs. learning about micro-organisms.
Gramps (39f97a) — 5/23/2016 @ 1:28 pmWhat Bob said in #7!
Colonel Haiku (6f2264) — 5/23/2016 @ 1:38 pmI am waiting for Obama to issue a new regulation entitled, the “Anti-Dog-Eat-Dog” Act.
When the economic collapse of Venezuela, due to the same idiotic government mandates on prices and wages, isn’t enough to bring people to the understanding of the inevitable failure of a command economy, it should be no surprise that an economic illiterate like Sanders (and all Keynesian zealots) are taken seriously rather than being ridiculed as the deserve.
Pete (f15acc) — 5/23/2016 @ 2:15 pmThis is weird. I was Googling the name of the young scientist to see if I could find out what sort of research she was working on, and I found the name Melissa Agnello in two different programs at two different Los Angeles universities:
The USC School of Pharmacy where she supposedly received her degree in 2015, and
The UCLA School of Dentistry where she is doing her post-doc.
Do you suppose this is just crappy reporting by Newsweek (I know, knock me over with a feather), who misidentified the school from which Dr. Agnello received her PhD as UCLA instead of USC? I don’t find her name in the program for last year’s PhD conferral ceremonies at UCLA. And according to the link to the USC Pharmacy School, her degree was not in “microbiology,” it was in Clinical and Experimental Therapeutics. Does Newsweek not understand the difference between the two, or did they take her info straight from the talking points provided by the United Auto Workers, who are trying to organize graduate students and post-docs? Finally, it seems to me if you carry the title of “Managing Director” of an academic lab but only make $42,800 then you either are not supposed to be working 60 hours per week or you are the worst salary negotiator of all-time.
If Newsweek can’t even get the basic facts right about her educational attainment, why should we believe them with respect to her financial compensation or her reporting of her work load?
JVW (05e1e2) — 5/23/2016 @ 3:38 pmHow does Obama have the right to do this? It’s quite stunning, really.
I eagerly await the repeal by Congress.
Hello? Bueller? Anyone?
Patricia (5fc097) — 5/23/2016 @ 3:40 pmI particularly loved this sentence: “It’s also a position that pays no overtime, even though Agnello doesn’t really have any duties that might be considered managerial, exempting her from overtime law.”. “Considered managerial” by whom? If it’s my company I decide what is and is not managerial
Her goddam title is “Managing Director!” If she got saddled with that title without commensurate responsibility or pay, then whose fault is that really?
JVW (05e1e2) — 5/23/2016 @ 3:44 pmwell she’s now at ucla, that’s the important thing, or something.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/melissa-agnello-6a829483
narciso (732bc0) — 5/23/2016 @ 3:45 pmwell she’s now at ucla, that’s the important thing, or something.
Seriously. Ol’ JVW sitting here at his laptop took about three minutes to find that Dr. Agnello’s PhD came from USC, not UCLA, and that it was in Clinical and Experimental Therapeutics with the School of Pharmacy, not in Microbiology from the School of Arts and Sciences. Is Newsweek so dilapidated these days that they can’t even expend that much effort to fact-check their own story? And if they are wrong about those basic details, why would I care to believe them with respect to Dr. Agnell0’s salary or working hours?
JVW (05e1e2) — 5/23/2016 @ 3:50 pmOl’JVW put the final nail in the coffin of belief in anything written by the MSM for Ol’Hoagie, I’ll tell ya that.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/23/2016 @ 4:14 pmAll Newsweek wanted was a spin to make the SCOAMF look good. If the Shrub’s Department of Labor had done this, it either would not have been reported at all or spun into people being fired or moved into part-time positions.
nk (dbc370) — 5/23/2016 @ 4:24 pmAnd that lady in the picture is way too fat for one so young. She is eating too good and not working hard enough.
nk (dbc370) — 5/23/2016 @ 4:29 pmEconomics taught by stooges.
mg (31009b) — 5/23/2016 @ 4:48 pmGramps: police officer salaries are an object lesson in the value of unionization. Nothing more, nothing less.
Leviticus (f876fd) — 5/23/2016 @ 5:03 pmplus the lil pig pigs get to retire at like 35, 36 something like that
happyfeet (831175) — 5/23/2016 @ 5:06 pmMore importantly, police face an everpresent risk not faced by those who work in microbiology labs
kishnevi (b8538f) — 5/23/2016 @ 5:11 pmhttps://www.boston.com/news/crime/2016/05/22/auburn-police-officer-fatally-shot-during-traffic-stop
Remember this is an Oregon company, so it’s undoubtedly full of commies.
I don’t know what the average is for most salaried workers, but let’s start by giving them 10 days of vacation per year plus New Years Day, Memorial Day, Independence Day, Thanksgiving Day, and Christmas Day off. That’s an additional 5 day work week.
These used to be paid, but they won’t be now because she is about to become an hourly worker.
So, say they work 49 weeks per year at 40 hours per week. Basically Ms. Agnello’s salary would be
converted to an hourly wage allowing no overtime. Which I calculate would be
$21.84 per hour.
Why wouldn’t she be allowed to work overtime? This:
This is in fact how most companies have dealt with this kind of tyrannical overreach when liberal states have done the exact same thing. Ms. Agnello’s job skills aren’t all of a sudden worth an extra $4700 or so. But she can pop the cork of the cheap bottle of Cold Duck and celebrate the fact that I rounded up slightly and she will be getting an extra six dollars and change per year.
I haven’t priced cheap Cold Duck or Champagne lately but I believe if she shops around she might have a buck or so left over from her Obama raise.
Labor is a commodity like any other commodity. Things go badly when gub’mints decide they can set commodity prices. See Venezuela for a lesson in this:
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-05-23/coca-cola-to-stop-production-of-sweetened-beverages-in-venezuela
A couple of points. It’s actually past the point were Venezuelans wait in long lines for medicine as it is simply unavailable. Hospitals can’t even get them; they can’t even get surgical gloves or cleaning supplies. That’s not amusing but this is; the Coca Cola company is talking to government officials to work on a solution? The government officials created this problem! And
there will be nothing temporary about this shortage, just like there is nothing temporary about any of the other shortages, as long as Venezuela is forced by Maduro and his cronies to stick to this stupid Bolivarian revolution/Chavismo economic model.
I forget what British politician it was who said this, but back when Britain was experiencing electricity outages and a lack of fish for sale at markets he noted, “Britain is an island of coal surrounded by an ocean full of fish. Only a socialist could produce shortages of both.”
So, why has Venezuela with it’s ideal soil and climactic conditions for growing sugar cane run out of sugar? For the same reason they’ve run out of everything else. The government regulates the price, the same way King Putt in Caracas-on-the-Potomac thinks he can regulate the price of labor.
I read it somewhere but the government set price for sugar is ridiculously low, a fraction of the world market price for sugar. You couldn’t grow it in the US (where you can grow sugar cane, naturally) as to sell it for the government set price is well below the cost of what it takes to grow it. Imagine trying to do it in Venezuela where you have to pay black market prices for everything from tractor parts to fuel because what you need simply isn’t available on the government regulated markets.
So Venezuelan farmers have done the only sane thing they could; they stopped growing it. And, believe it or not, the Venezuelan government has put price controls on everything. So, again as any sane person could have predicted, Venezuelan farmers have switched to those crops they can produce and sell at an unregulated price above the cost of what it takes to grow them.
The idiots in DC who came up with this plan think exactly like Maduro and Chavez. This is no exaggeration. These are the first baby steps toward Venezuela.
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/23/2016 @ 6:47 pmYou can be sure this is some sort of payoff to big labor. This happens in liberal states where the labor unions own the pols. I haven’t examine this for all the angles, but in Kali it’s even worse. And the unions design the labor regs.
Get this; Kali calculates overtime by the day. So if an employee works more than eight hours then you must pay that employee overtime. Even if it’s only Monday and there are still four days left in the work week. You don’t have the flexibility to let the employee decide how they’ll manage their time during the week. Which is how it use to be for many fast food chains that had salaried managers at each store. Corporate would encourage managers to manage their stores as if they owned them. They had the flexibility to control their own schedules and if they were successful they received bonuses accordingly.
In Kali this PO’d the unions as these employees didn’t want to unionize, so the labor laws seem to be a form of punishment. I’m sure there’s something along the same lines going on nationally. There always is when Dems are in charge.
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/23/2016 @ 6:58 pmThese overtime rules have been in place for like a 100 years. Or 80. When was the NLRA passed? How long has the present cap (over $42,800) been in place? Keep calm and don’t do anything rash in the voting booth.
nk (dbc370) — 5/23/2016 @ 6:58 pmSteve@30
kishnevi (9c9b54) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:16 pmAneurin Bevan, of all people.
I’m sure @27 and @28 can supply some kind of substantiation for their wrong opinions…
Gramps (39f97a) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:32 pmOh, wait. I do know a cop (little piggy to HF) who retired before 35… he even used his “powerful police union” to force his former employer to provide his chair and put a ramp at his house. He could not walk due to his lower-body paralysis from that pesky bullet that got into his spinal cord… He died last year at the age of 72.
Overpaid my a$$!
yes christian slater, often shows himself to be a jackalope,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:34 pmNow I’m sure there is a union pay-off in this latest Obama/NLRB power grab. I was searching on the web for more information and I came across this glowing article (published last August when this was just a wet dream of the Labor Secretary’s eye) from a “think tank” named the Economic Policy Institute really cheerleading for this increase in the salary limit for overtime pay. Going beyond, in fact, the DoL’s own estimates about the wonderfulness of it all.
http://www.epi.org/publication/overtime-threshold-would-benefit-13-5-million/
Check out the board of directors (accessible on the “About” drop down menu and at the bottom of the page) starting with the Chairman of the board of this “think tank.” There are (or were) 32 members on this board when the article was published. I won’t list them all as the majority of them are your standard leftist academic. But I found these names interesting:
Richard L. Trumka, Chairman
AFL-CIO
R. Thomas Buffenbarger
International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers
Larry Cohen
Communications Workers of America
Ernesto J. Cortés, Jr.
Industrial Areas Foundation
“Cortés is the national co-director of the Industrial Areas Foundation (IAF), a nonprofit organization founded in Chicago by the late Saul Alinsky. Cortés’ affiliation with the IAF officially began in 1972 when he attended the organization’s organizer training institute in Chicago…”
Rep. Keith Ellison (D-Minn.)
[Our first Muslim member of Congress and current co-chair of the Congressional Progressive Caucus should need no introduction.]
Leo W. Gerard
United Steelworkers
Mary Kay Henry
Service Employees International Union
Debra Ness
National Partnership for Women and Families
“…Previously, Ness worked in numerous capacities at the Service Employees International Union and the National Abortion Rights Action League.”
Robert B. Reich (board member emeritus)
University of California, Berkeley
[Yes, that Robert Reich.]
Lee Saunders
AFSCME
Randi Weingarten
American Federation of Teachers
Lily Eskelsen García
National Education Association
Anthony “Marc” Perrone
United Food and Commercial Workers International Union
Dennis Williams
United Auto Workers
So, out of 32 board members 10 are currently union presidents. Many more on this board were clearly ranking members of the labor unions such as Debra Ness (NARAL; you can’t get more leftist than that). Are my instincts right or what?
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:45 pmA very moving story Gramps, but it could just have well been a caterer shot in a robbery and still have been as unfortunate. It also does not indicate either way if the cop, or the caterer is overpaid.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:49 pmyes, the function of soldiers and law enforcement, is to rush into danger, that’s not typical of caterers,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:51 pmSo basically Steve57, the whole thing is a union push to further control the cost of labor and increase union power. Wonderful.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:53 pmAnd soldiers and cops work for the government and are paid by taxpayers, and that’s not typical of caterers.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:56 pmAgain, as a voice in the wilderness, I direct your attention to INS v. Chadha (Wikipedia) 462 U.S. 919 (text) (1983) where the Supreme Court removed Congress’ statutory power to veto regulations, which were written into the enabling acts of all the Nixon-era agencies.
Wikipedia’s summary of the dissent:
Kevin M (25bbee) — 5/23/2016 @ 8:29 pmJust in case you were wondering when the fan got all brown.
Kevin M (25bbee) — 5/23/2016 @ 8:32 pm@37. Salary/compensation is the amount that is paid to purchase the commodity (labor) by an organization. The cost of that commodity is based on the qualifications required to do the particular job and knowing what level it should be at to attract people to take the job. As jobs become more distasteful, by work condition, location and hazard, it is often necessary to offer higher compensation to fill them.
People tend to notice a shortage of police and fire people, and soldiers, long before they notice the shortage of microbiologists and DMV counter clerks, That’s why when budgets are fought over, those in the safety business are given priority. It may not be perfect, but that’s what people want.
And, yes, they do work for the government. I would be interested in seeing your model of a privatized police or fire department.
Gramps (39f97a) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:30 pmI favor public employee unions. Their members are less likely to follow illegal orders from their government bosses.
nk (dbc370) — 5/23/2016 @ 10:45 pmIf you are referring to my comment @40 Gramps, I never mentioned a “model of a privatized police or fire department”, in fact I made no mention at all about firemen. I simply pointed out who was paid by whom.
According to your observation that ” As jobs become more distasteful, by work condition, location and hazard, it is often necessary to offer higher compensation to fill them”, at $20 million a movie Matthew McConaughey must have one of the most distasteful, hazardous and dangerous jobs on the planet.
When folks try and overthink why and how much someone is paid we end up with the NLRB and stupid laws like the one(s) mentioned. The simple economic truth is people are paid what they’re paid because the people paying them believe they’re worth it. Regardless of what the government or some lawyer “thinks” they should. And frequently it has nothing to do with hazard, danger of shoveling sh!t, it has to do with talent and the ability to do the job.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 4:46 amNo. People are paid what they’re paid because bosses try to maximize profit while workers organize to withhold their labor as a group to get bargaining power. Bosses would pay Einstein a $1 a day if they could get away with it, and McDonald’s workers would demand Einstein’s salary if they could get away with it. Both sides use their political power to get the government to carry some of their water for them. The bosses with money and cronyism; the workers primarily with their votes.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:01 amNo. People are paid what the person paying them think they’re worth. Not a penny more or less. When you make a statement like ” Bosses would pay Einstein a $1 a day if they could get away with it,” it shows that you are a lousy businessman and a lousy employer and that you have spent too much time listening to, and believing socialist lies. You’re a very good left winger.
Then proving your leftist creds you state “Both sides use their political power to get the government to carry some of their water for them. The bosses with money and cronyism; the workers primarily with their votes”. You actually believe the owner of Tonys Pizza has the government “carrying it’s water”? Or the cashier at the Hallmark store dictates labor rates?
So neither the market, the training, experience, education or any other qualification counts because “the government” and “workers organized” (labor unions) have all superseded supply and demand in labor? You do realize you’re defining big business not the everyday business the law being discussed would affect? Yeah, you’re a lawyer. An expert at everything.
So I must ask, why do you get paid whatever you do? Are you the crony capitalist or the unionist? And would you work for less?
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 6:22 amYou actually believe the owner of Tonys Pizza has the government “carrying it’s water”?
Absolutely, in a great many ways. We can start with the Chamber of Commerce and go on to the checks businesses write to politicians and soft-money PACs and from there to putting their own in elected offices.
Or the cashier at the Hallmark store dictates labor rates?
Double absolutely. We can start with the minimum wage and overtime rules at the federal and local level obtained through political power, and collective bargaining obtained through unionizing.
As for me, I charge what the market will bear. I would love to get $1,000/hr and my clients would love to have me work for free. Somewhere we meet.
I know all the songs the bloodsuckers play on their fascist banjos, Hoagie. The unvarnished fact is that America is built with the sweat and blood of workers.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 6:38 amAnd workers would like to be bosses, nk. Milton Friedman rules.
Simon Jester (2002f6) — 5/24/2016 @ 6:49 amAnd why shouldn’t they, Simon? It’s good to be rich, and few people get rich solely from their own labor. The rich-rich get rich from the labor of many others.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 6:54 amOh, nk, surely you know Milton Friedman is my homie.
Simon Jester (2002f6) — 5/24/2016 @ 6:57 am46… is it any wonder Greece is in the state it’s in?
Colonel Haiku (6f2264) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:05 amGreece is nowhere near as bad as America was in 1933. Was it the workers who caused the Great Depression?
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:13 amMilton Friedman is God.
Colonel Haiku (6f2264) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:17 amOf course it was comrade. Fact is workers expend their sweat and blood in Somalia too, how’s that workin’ out? Without the ingenuity, industry and fortitude of the free market capitalist America would be just another country of sweaty, bloody workers producing very little.
An although your snarky use of the C of C, unions etc. to prove your point you have pointed out the corruption of the system, not the system itself. You yourself are paid “what the market will bear”. And that “market”, the PEOPLE PAYING YOU decide how much you’re worth, right? Or they don’t hire you.
Was that a money Quote from Sanders, comrade nk?
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:18 amBTW, when were you in Greece? I, myself, have not been there since 2002.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:19 amLike the treasury union minions that did the bidding against the tea party.
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:20 amIs there a treasury union?
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:23 amNo comrade nk, it was the government. The economy went into a cyclical downturn called a recession, which weeds out the outdated and weak in the economy from time to time. The government turned it into a Great Depression by screwing with the natural order of economics.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:23 amFree market theory is all well and good but we don’t live in a theoretical world, Hoagie. Free market economists are apologists for an economic system they like as much as Marx was an apologist for an economic system he liked and Keynes an apologist for an economic system he liked.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:26 amThe economy went into a cyclical downturn called a recession, which weeds out the outdated and weak in the economy from time to time. The government turned it into a Great Depression by screwing with the natural order of economics.
I think the first time I heard that song was from Milton Friedman in one of his round-table discussions from U of C.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:29 amExcept the last two downturns were largely do to govt interference in the private economy, through pressures on housing and exaggerated interest rates spikes.
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:34 amIsn’t there another option as well? Instead of raising her salary or paying her overtime, couldn’t they cut her hours and thus, decrease her take home pay?
RS (8243d6) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:53 amBTW, when were you in Greece? I, myself, have not been there since 2002.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:19 am
====================================
and they still tell the stories of teh randy goatherd from America…
Colonel Haiku (6f2264) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:54 amhas everybody drunk from the water of lethe,
http://nation.foxnews.com/irs/2013/05/20/obama-and-irs-smoking-gun
re my latter point, gretchen morgenstern, re the last downturn, and greenspan’s sniffles that turned into pneumonia in argentina’s case
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:54 amIt seems to me that some of this discussion is either/or when it could be both/and.
Doesn’t an employer hire and pay somebody on the basis of what they think the employee is worth and in relation to maximizing profit/accomplishment? Doesn’t an employee want to be paid not less than they are worth and also as much as they reasonably can? A higher paying job may be one that requires rare expertise, is dangerous, especially profitable for the employer, is especially distasteful, or some combination of the above.
The post doc doesn’t get paid a lot because while the position requires rare expertise, it is also a desired position, a safe position, a position hopefully leading to something better, so their are factors that would push the salary higher, and others that keep it down. And all of those things get mixed together to determine “what the market will bear”, “what a person is worth”.
Is that not true, both Rev. H. and nk, others?
MD in Philly (d70645) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:55 amAt the moment I am trying to decide how much to pay for wills and POA documents, whether expertise makes higher fees worth the charge, and how am I to know whether I think the cost is worth it or not…
MD in Philly (d70645) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:58 amAsk around, MD. Many probate and estate lawyers will quote a flat fee, particularly for document preparation.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 8:05 amFurther to my comment @30 (thanks, kishnevi, for reminding me of the British pol who made the remark I quoted). If you followed my link you’ll have noticed that in addition to Coca Cola shutting down production of conventional Coke due to lack of local or imported sugar, Empresas Polar SA (Venezuela’s biggest) also had to shut down production because it was having similar difficulties acquiring malted barley. As noted in the article I quoted:
Good news! Those government authorities have hit on a brilliant solution, at least when it comes to solving Empresas Polar’s difficulties.
https://www.thedrinksbusiness.com/2016/05/venezuela-brew-beer-or-face-jail/
Always trust your Marxist central planners, kids. They’re smarter than us; just ask Obama and Tom Perez. Of course; it’s obvious. It’s the brewers and the soft drink manufacturers who are sabotaging the country. Not the central planners who come up with super-smart ideas like price controls, rent controls, ever-higher minimum wages, and now doubling the salary threshold for overtime pay. Over and over and over again. And these time tested bolshevik ideas work each time. Except for those economic saboteurs the hoarders, the wreckers, the capitalist lackey running dogs, the Kulaks, and various other enemies of the people’s revolution.
I’m reminded of Iowahawk’s comment after the Greek election when the people rebelled against EU “austerity” and voted in that young punk socialist. The next day the Greeks went the their ATMs and they still could only withdraw 60 Euros a week. “Hey,” the angry Greeks said, “I voted for this machine to give me as many Euros as I wanted.”
Socialist/communist revolutionaries only think they are rebelling against capitalism. What they’re actually rebelling against is reality.
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/24/2016 @ 9:38 amJVW (05e1e2) — 5/23/2016 @ 3:38 pm
Even according to Newsweek (read carefully)) she’s not regularly working 60 hours a week – it’s just that maybe it could conceivably reach that level in certain circumstances, like deadlines or some kinds of emergencies.
When she works 60 hours in a week, she makes the same amount of money as when she worked 40.
This is clearly intended only as an illustration.
Sammy Finkelman (0730f4) — 5/24/2016 @ 9:49 amOf course not, komerade.
It was Hoover and FDR who made the depression GREAT!
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/24/2016 @ 9:49 amBy the way, nk, as far as saying Greece is nowhere near as bad as America was in 1933 that’s a matter of one’s perspective.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/world/young-greek-women-selling-sex-for-the-price-of-a-sandwich-new-study-shows/2015/11/27/c469695e-94d9-11e5-b5e4-279b4501e8a6_story.html
You’ll have ask these young ladies how bad it got in Greece. Or those older women who couldn’t compete with the teenaged and twenty somethings in the sex trade so they made their living by dumpster diving. Where they had to compete with the men who also had no other way to make a living.
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/24/2016 @ 9:58 am39. Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/23/2016 @ 7:53 pm
It’s not just that. It’s to standardize pay and working conditions.
Sammy Finkelman (0730f4) — 5/24/2016 @ 10:00 amHoover, yes. He did his best to destroy the labor movement; wipe out small businesses and the savings of small depositors; and keep the working poor poor. While his rich cronies were sitting pretty. So it would be like the 19th century again and the poor people would tug their forelock and say “Yowza” and “Yesum” and be content to merely survive on the crumbs that fell off the bosses’ tables.
FDR could have been a Lenin or a Hitler. The climate was ripe for one. The ricos got lucky. He kept the lid on and there were no Rockefellers, Vanderbilts or Smiths hanging from lamp-posts. In a way, WWII was the lucky thing for ordinary Americans. With 20 million trained veterans coming back from the war, the plutocrats did not dare to reprise Hoover. They built up the economy and integrated the working class into the middle class
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 10:13 amThat Washington Post story is horses***. Those “young Greek women” are either Gypsies or Albanians and their fathers, brothers and husbands are peddling them. Since this Laxos guy is a sociology professor, I’d venture that some are African and Middle-Eastern too.
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 10:19 amRight comrade Sammy and as soon as ability and commitment are standardized so should pay. There is a “standard” Sammy: I’ll pay you what you’re worth and if Joe is better, I’ll pay him more. And as far as working conditions go I thought the NLRB, OSHA and who knows how many other bureaucracies took care of that a long time ago. If not they should be fired and replaced with people who can do the job.
I’ve been here long enough comrade to develop a system where I’ll do the “go around” once or twice but after that I simply agree. I’ve found going in circles with lawyers who are incapable of admitting even the slightest error is futile. Lawyers have always been belligerent “experts” on everything but give them Google and Wiki and they think they own the world. So I’ve learned that all my decades of experience, my education in the field, my observations of the matter cannot compete with a lawyer with Google. I surrender.
Besides, now I have to leave for my therapy.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 10:26 amnk @75, that’s just wishful thinking on your part. They were Greek girls. Even Greek girls have to eat and when girls have no other way, they do what they have to do.
It isn’t like my only source is the WaPo. Eletho, kurizaikimou. Apopse sethelo poli.
No, I’ve never been to Greece. But Sixth Fleet ships still pull into Piraeus. Of course it’s illegal for sailors to engage in the sex trade. And even before it was illegal not every sailor would, including me. But I’ve pulled into ports or have been TAD/TDY where desperate times called for desperate measures. Like a port visit to Vladivostok where a small bag of oranges would get any woman in town including girls who looked like Victoria Secret runway models.
When I was down in Panama I lived at Rodman Naval Station and worked out of Howard AFB. We had a duty driver running a shuttle between the two. I was waiting for the shuttle when I heard a “Psst, psst, hey Joe” coming out of the bushes behind me. It scared the h3ll out of me. There was a Panamanian girl hiding from the SPs there who could be mine for a three piece dinner from KFC.
None of them liked having to do it, either. But I learned earlier in life that it just doesn’t pay to do something you can’t live with. I would pay them for their time, though, like in Thailand, just for hanging out and singing Karaoke, and I would by them food. After all they were working and time is money. Those Panamanian girls weren’t hiding in the bushes outside of Rodman for the fun of it.
You’re kidding yourself if you think Greek girls won’t survive any way they can as well.
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:28 pmfuture red queen advisor who vouched for fannie and freddie,
http://venezuelanalysis.com/news/2719
the difference is none of the western democracies, not blum or baldwin chose to go toward nationalization or expropriations like hitler, mussolini, et al,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:35 pmthey will only be promoted under red queen,
https://pjmedia.com/jchristianadams/2016/05/22/every-single-one-meet-the-doj-lawyers-suing-north-carolina-over-trans-rights/
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:42 pmI’ll pay you what you’re worth and if Joe is better, I’ll pay him more
No you won’t. You will pay Sammy the least you can pay him under current market conditions while retaining his loyalty so he doesn’t go looking for a better paying job. If he is a good worker you may pay him more to keep him loyal. But”what he is worth” is so subjective that it is useless as a criteria.
kishnevi (15d500) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:46 pmprobably, but the government is a poor arbiter of what the market will bear,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:53 pmSteve57, when my best friend once asked why I liked Vietnam so much I told him I love Vietnamese food and I love Vietnamese women. Well, not all of them but I sure tried. Plus, Uncle Sam was paying me to kill communists. It was a hat trick.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:57 pmThere’s a vital federal government central planning function, Sammy. I believe it’s specifically mentioned in the Preamble to the Constitution.
Bye the bye, Sammy, care to expand on why pay and working conditions need to be standardized across the fifty states? I look forward to your thoughts on the subject. When do you think the central planners should get around to standardizing cost-of-living and living conditions across the fifty states? I mean, if the central planners standardize pay it just isn’t fair that you get so much more for the government mandated wage in Georgia than you do in NYC. And after leveling society in that regard, what in the name of egalite should President Robespierre turn to next as he standardizes society?
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:59 pmI do recall an american heritage piece, about laski a professor at the lse, who taught jfk for a time, musing how fdr didn’t take the example of stalin, but that’s sheer madness, much of this intervention is why it took till 1945 to recover,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:04 pm@82, I’m jealous, Rev. Although I have to admit Vietnamese food is just OK as far as I’m concerned. I really love Thai food. I even like Korean food better. Of course my first love among Asian cuisines is Japanese. I wouldn’t have spent seven years there if I didn’t love the food. And the girls. No commie killing though. Dammit!
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:07 pmWhat’s this? Another lawyer who is going to tell me after 40 years in business how and why I’ll hire and pay my employees? As soon as you started off with “No you won’t” you tipped your hat to total ignorance of running a business. I’ll type it once again so the arrogant among us can let it sink in: I’ll pay Sammy what I think Sammy is worth. No one has to work for me, not even Sammy. And if Sammy thinks he’s worth more then I think Sammy’s worth then Sammy can work somewhere else. So, yes I will!
Are you really that self-centered and an arrogant know-it-all to presume to tell me what I’ll pay an employee? You should join the democrat party. Like you they believe they know how much everybody should be paid. Welcome aboard comrade kishnevi.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:09 pmIf this works, this is a pic of my wife taken Sunday the 15Th. It was her 64th birthday. She is Korean. I’m not good at pictures so if this is screwed up I’m sorry.
file:///C:/Users/John/Pictures/2015-09-30/015.jpg
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:19 pmI don’t think it worked. Someday I’ll figure this stuff out. That’s alright though, I clicked on the wrong picture. This is an older one. She’s dressed better on her birthday. Funny, I’m looking at it on my screen, the right one that is, and I can’t get it to work. Oh well.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:23 pmnk, do you own a pair of shoes? They’re made for walking if you don’t like the salary offered. The beauty of non-unionized companies, large or small, is that the work can be assigned to those who can perform it best. If you are doing something valuable for the company that is distinctive and you have a pair of shoes, there’s no reason to think that you must allow yourself to be exploited. You really don’t have to turn off your brain as you enter the work place. Unless, that is, you work in thoroughly unionized environment. And these union jerks are just setting themselves up for replacement by a robot. The more constrained and well-defined their duties, the easier it is to automate it.
This principle of leaving to find a better opportunity also goes for those presently living in places like Chicago or Seattle. Fish where the fishing is good.
The guys and gals who founded this country were certainly a breed apart from what passes as citizens these days. They travelled a third of the way around the world using sailing ships and covered wagons hauled by oxen because they knew they could do better. Today, nk’s snowflakes can’t be bothered to spend a few days relocating in their hybrid SUV to a place where opportunity still exists.
BobStewartatHome (404986) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:36 pmRev H. I have worked in the real world for 30 plus years—40plus if you want to include part time jobs as a teen and college student.
What I described is how every business with which I have dealt does it. So either you are a rather unique businessman–and hats off to you–or you take refuge in a vapid phrase.
If you paid your employees what “they were worth” you would sit down, figure out what each one contibutes to your bottom line, and pay them that. Did you? Or did you act the way every employer I know of does it?
Capitalism is as rife with slogans and cant as socialism, and it is not leftist to point out the cant.
kishnevi (15d500) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:37 pmBtw, upload the picture to Flickr or another service, then link the uploaded picture in your post here. You can’t copy and paste a picture the same way as text.
kishnevi (15d500) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:41 pmhoagie, if your link worked for us, your computer would be wide open for invasion by anyone who could get the url of your link to your internet provider. That C:/ is probably the root directory of your hard drive. If you had an account with an internet server, you could post the photo there and then give us the url to your server with the accompanying directory names and the file name.
BobStewartatHome (404986) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:42 pmkishnevi, it’s painfully obvious that you never worked for the right kind of employer. My oldest boy worked his butt off for his boss, and at age 18.5 he had a company truck and a couple of 30 year olds working on his crew. This was right out high school, and he made more than the UCLA snowflake with her PhD and Post Doc. And he found this job in the want ads of the Seattle Times.
You might speculate that the 30 year olds who worked for him were not happy with their lot in life. Perhaps they pissed and moaned about life and how unfair it was, or maybe they were happy doing what they were doing. It doesn’t matter. That’s what those shoes are for.
BobStewartatHome (404986) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:50 pmif it’s a digital camera, you can upload it to the computer and send it as an attachment,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:57 pmThanks guys. You can see computers are not my strong point. I think I lost the entire file that one picture was in. I can’t see it now. I’ll get my niece to come over and straighten all this out. I think I clicked something wrong when I realized I was on the wrong picture and tried to go back.
Kishnevi, I probably acted the way every employer you know does it. I put a price on the job to be done then basically look for the right person to fit it. But if you’ve been in business that long, you realize the main job of an owner is training. You know kishnevi, I put a few kids through culinary school and through business school. I also invested my own money in two restaurants started by my own ex employees. I had a lot of luck with a lot of employees. Most were hard workers and many were good learners. The very first kid I put through culinary school now owns and chefs his own place in Miami. The guy’s doing well, nice wife, cute kids.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 2:02 pmTo answer the original question, when Congress passes laws like this, with thresholds that are supposed to be based on conditions in the real world, it hardly ever puts an amount on the threshold, it delegates that job to the appropriate government department. After all, how should it know where to set these things? It just says “an amount to be determined by the Secretary of Labor” or something like that. Some wonk in the Department calculates the appropriate amount, and the Secretary publishes it. As the market changes, from time to time the number is recalculated and republished.
So yes, the administration does have the legal authority to do this, and there is no room for outrage.
Milhouse (87c499) — 5/24/2016 @ 3:15 pmWell, my hat off to you, Rev H., for all that. I would ask the name of the restaurant in Miami, but my Crohn’s means I only eat outside the house when I have to.
Now get your son to show he is really worth that money and teach you how to upload pictures to the ‘Net.
kishnevi (7940ff) — 5/24/2016 @ 3:25 pmEvery single comment that discusses what wages or overtime ought to be misses the point. Obama’s administration has changed a law by decree. Again. And the only way for Congress to put a stop to it is to pass a new law, override the veto. There is no balance of power any more. All Congess can do is shut the government down, and if they lose the power of the purse, not even that will work.
Kevin M (25bbee) — 5/24/2016 @ 3:45 pmEverytime folks talk economics, I come back to this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GTQnarzmTOc
Incidentally, I am a scientist. Postdocs are interesting. When I was in grad school and postdocing, you can rest assured I worked the hours I needed to work to reach the goals my PI wanted. As my family would tell you, I continue to work much more than 40 hours a week, even after forcing the yahoos to give me tenure.
Because I love the work, folks. It’s not a job. It’s a calling. And I don’t care who rolls their eyes; it’s how I feel.
There has been a lot of discussion about how many hours a week a postdoc should work. I guess I am still childish in my old age; the pursuit of science is a wonderful thing. I *like* to work the extra hours, to find out things no one knew before. Sure, they aren’t world shattering.
But *I* uncovered that piece of the Great Puzzle.
So all the SJW got involved. It started out with women who wanted to have childen while in grad school or postdocing. Now, there are PIs who insist people work ungodly hours. There are many other PIs who are reasonable. No two situations are the same.
The part my so-smart colleagues don’t get is simple: a one size fits all approach forces all things into one size, if you see what I mean.
SJWs love the government they like to tell them what to do.
Simon Jester (f0f6ef) — 5/24/2016 @ 4:06 pmkishnevi,
I’ve been a lawyer for 34 years. My clients have included a regional oil company, a spot-market oil tanker owner, AND restaurant owners some of who own from two to a dozen restaurants and banquet halls the size of of one or two city blocks (including the parking lots). Names you would recognize. I have defended them and advised them on copyright and trademark infringement, employment issues including wages and sexual harassment, products liability, as third parties in bankruptcy, collections, their corporate structure, and a host of other things, even some minor criminal matters like guns this being the Chicago area.
Moreover, I am a Greek. Half the trustees at my church are restaurant owners, and a lot of them are a lot like Hoagie sounds. They have unearthed all the secrets of existence and all the sweet mysteries of life because they have managed to build up a successful, by their measure, restaurant business, and some lawyer who wasted half his behind a desk cannot tell them anything.
Those last are not my clients. 😉
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 4:41 pmSimon….
I’m a bit speechless after that link.
Very imaginative.
I’m just not sure which has the biggest audience:
mathematician jokes
rapping economists
or
chemistry jokes based on the benzene ring…
(I’ve been guilty of 1 and 3)
MD in Philly (2b30b4) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:03 pmthat is impressive,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:10 pmwasted half his *life* behind a desk
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:15 pmWell, if the chair is hard enough, you might in fact waste half your behind….
kishnevi (77bff0) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:25 pmThe first video they made I like even better.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=d0nERTFo-Sk
Simon Jester (f0f6ef) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:27 pmnarciso,
MD in Philly (2b30b4) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:28 pmI assume you mean nk’s career,
not my benzene ring jokes…
yes yes i love the hayek thinger
happyfeet (831175) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:30 pmMD, don’t make me get out my Alpha Chi Sigma joke book.
http://pubs.acs.org/subscribe/archive/tcaw/11/i03/html/03light.html
Simon Jester (f0f6ef) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:30 pmWell Simon,
MD in Philly (2b30b4) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:37 pmWith Alexander Hamilton a thing on Broadway,
Who knows…
Dammit, nk, you got me. The guy who first hire me to work in his restaurant was a Greek. As a kid I lived near the Greek area of Philly and my best friend then was a Greek named Alex. When we were 13 we wanted to go live an work in Wildwood, NJ for the summer but we were too young to get a room or working papers. So Alex’s mom who was a big shot in the Greek community arraigned for us to rent a cheap room over a Greek’s restaurant named the Apollo and get a job at the Hot Spot on the boardwalk. The owner was Harry and over the next five summers I went from a porter/bus boy to the GM and that Greek SOB taught me everything about the restaurant business from sanitation to menu to hiring and firing. For the first year I thought my name in Greek was Malaka. Harry was the best. So going into the restaurant business was an obvious choice for me. The only way I could ever repay that Greek SOB was to be successful and to help other young people get a start like he did for me. So yeah, I probably have that “Greek” attitude, thank you very much.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:38 pma little of both,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 5:42 pmRev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 10:26 am
I didn’t say standardizing pay was good – I said that’s what unions wanted to do.
They didn’t just want to raise the cost of labor.
I think this actually is terrible, especially in things like the field of education. But that’s what unions want to do. They also don’t want people to switch jobs very much.
Steve57 (fa6407) — 5/24/2016 @ 12:59 pm
To increase union power, like Hoagie said. They want that so there wouldn’t be a temptation to move or open factories in other states, or in other parts of the same state (they don’t like a different minimum wage in different places)
They’re against foreign competition, too.
Sammy Finkelman (0730f4) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:25 pmRev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 1:19 pm
That points to your own hard disk. It’s not very useful online.
(and I’m not even sure that is 100% correct. I’ve seen things like that, but I am not sure File: and 3 slashes works. Try maybe just C:/Users/John/Pictures/2015-09-30/015.jpg But we can’t view that, any more than we can view your e-mail.)
Sammy Finkelman (0730f4) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:34 pmthis was the passage from a 1966 Allan Nevins piece, which is as toxically adulatory as David Remnick,
For example, readers of that brilliant but extraordinarily half-informed and error-streaked book, Harold Laski’s The American Democracy , will find an almost incredible analysis of what the author regards as Mr. Roosevelt’s fundamental failure. This was his failure to smash the old America completely, and build a quite new America on the theories that pleased Mr. Laski. The author draws an illuminating comparison between Lenin and Roosevelt. Lenin, it appears, made a marvelously precise and correct analysis of the maladies of modern society and economics; and he applied it with revolutionary courage. Roosevelt, on the other hand, was never converted—he never learned that “the foundations of the Americanism he inherited were really inadequate to the demands made upon its institutional expression.” In particular, writes Laski, he failed to see that he should destroy “private ownership of the means of production”; that is, that the state should take over all mines, factories, transport, workshops, and farms. Roosevelt, as a result of his faulty analysis, unhappily failed to carry through a real revolution. What was the upshot? In Russia, admits Laski, life became nearly intolerable. The price of revolution proved “almost overwhelming”—starvation of millions, wholesale executions, vast concentration camps, the extinction of freedom. In America, Laski admits, life was immensely improved. Industrial production became enormous; farm output grew tremendous; the standard of living steadily rose. But theory (says Mr. Laski) is everything. Lenin with his ideology was right; Roosevelt with his practical experimentalism was a failure!
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:39 pmI thank you Sammy Finkelman but computers are so beyond me it’s sad. I will try and get my niece to help me and hopefully teach me.
Rev. Hoagie ™ (734193) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:43 pmProgressivism was intended, by Wilson anyway, to be an inoculant against Bolshevism and Fascism which Wilson saw replacing the Russian Empire and rising in the wake of the Hohenzollerns and Hapsburgs. Although Wilson included do-gooder language in explaining his motives, he was explicit enough, and other actions such as Jim Crow in the federal civil service and armed forces show, that his policies were all about control of the masses. Not necessarily a bad thing. ~_^
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:54 pmtrue, but bolshevism and fascism were preceded by progressivism,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 7:56 pmRevolutionary anarchism and socialism, the precursors to both Bolshevism and Fascism, had been around for decades. The October Revolution and Mussolini only confirmed Wilson’s fears. This is from 1923(?)*. http://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks03/0300991.txt (The Road Away From Revolution).
*Not published until 1923?
nk (dbc370) — 5/24/2016 @ 8:09 pmyes, although anarchism was a dead end from the wobblies to the social revolutionaries, held no enduring platform, the last did serve in the kerensky coalition, tr as turtledove reminds us he was a real adversary of socialism,
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 8:13 pminteresting,
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-3606226/Criminal-trials-2032-NO-divorces-able-claim-inheritance-Greece-lawyers-strike-tax-hikes.html
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 8:48 pmSJWs love the government they like to tell them what to do.
Right up to the point when it tells them to do something they don’t like.
Kevin M (25bbee) — 5/24/2016 @ 8:59 pmBTW, Keynes would be horrified at continuous deficit spending. All he suggested was that government spending should be counter-cyclical, never mind that spending is addictive to politicians.
Kevin M (25bbee) — 5/24/2016 @ 9:03 pmyes, like mcluhan, he would say to krugman and co ‘you know nothing of my work, you teach a class in this’
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 9:07 pmhttp://www.forbes.com/sites/ryanmac/2016/05/24/this-silicon-valley-billionaire-has-been-secretly-funding-hulk-hogans-lawsuits-against-gawker/#1e5f66f67805
narciso (732bc0) — 5/24/2016 @ 9:53 pmTBF, a 45 minute commute to UCLA could be less than 10 miles.
NickM (63e1a7) — 5/28/2016 @ 10:12 am