Op-Ed By Guido H. Stempel III
Athens Ohio Today, March 8, 2013
President Obama set off a dialogue about the minimum wage when he suggested in his State of the Union message that it should be raised to $9 an hour.
We immediately began hearing from those who said this would increase unemployment and those who said analysis of what happened in the past when the minimum wage was raised showed that unemployment did not increase. Then a group of liberals suggested it would be $10 an hour.
The best word, but undoubtedly not the last word came this past week from Craig Jelinek, CEO and president of Costco, one of the five largest retailers in the country. He said that Costco starts employees at $11.50 an hour.
Costco obviously is profitable so Jelinek’s disclosure should answer the concern that any increase in the minimum wage would put some companies out of business.
At the heart of this issue is what you believe should determine pay of employees. Some say it should be the market. If you can get someone to work for you for $2 an hour, that’s OK.
Others say that if a person is performing useful work, he or she should get a living wage. Two dollars an hour isn’t a living wage. What about the current national minimum wage of $7.25?
One way to test that is look at the federal standards for poverty. A single persons making $7.25 an hour for a 40-hour week gets $15,080 a year. That is above the federal figure ...
Beyond this, the poverty level figures are not considered to be completely adequate. For example, the HEAP program which provides subsidy for the cost of heating the home, considers twice the poverty level as the cutoff.
Another consideration is that with or present pay scales, half the people that get food stamps are employed. ...
Finally, bear in mind that it is the members of Congress who will decide whether to leave the minimum wage at $7.25 or raise it to $9 or $10. Last year they were in session 107 days. That figures out to a little more than $400 an hour. Is it possible for them to understand the problem?
Guido H. Stempel III is a distinguished professor emeritus in the E.W. Scripps School of Journalism at Ohio University.
Copyright 2013 Athens Messenger