L.A. raises minimum wage to $15/hr

It took me 10 years to get to $15 an hour (I don't live in L.A.), and I thought I was doing pretty well. Nice to see I'm as valued as a teenage zit-popper slinging fries.

 

Minimum wage isn't just for teenagers anymore. It's for working-class adults.

Also, how old are you? Adjusted for inflation, the $15/hr when you hit that mark is probably in the $25-30/hr range now. Minimum wage has fallen dramatically in inflation-adjusted dollars since the late '70s to early '80s.

 

With no marketable job skills.

 

Because this is phased in over several years, it won't make much of a difference the general public.

It will hit teens/younger workers and small businesses the hardest.

 

Sure ... but in 1970 those people with no marketable job skills went to work at the auto plant or any of a million other manufacturing places ... or they went to work in an office and learned the marketable job skills. Those things aren't happening anymore.

Anyway, I'm sure all the cries about the ruin of the L.A. economy will proceed forthwith, as the cries about California's economy as a whole took hold when we raised taxes on millionaires. I am still waiting for it to happen.

 

Does it apply to small businesses? The federal minumum wage is for companies that have a certain number of employees.

 

The LA law just gives small businesses an additional year to comply:

I'm a small-business owner. Will I have to increase wages for my employees?

Yes, though businesses with 25 or fewer employees will have an additional year to comply with the wage increase.

What you need to know about Los Angeles' $15 minimum wage - LA Times

 

Here is my take. I know insurance companies that family members work for.
The agents in the office don't need a college degree. They can make six figures easy and can afford houseboats and such.

Many don't really have to work that hard, especially after the first few years. Or they get walk-in business.

The women who work in the office may have been there grinding for 20 years. They have to know how to do everything. Yet they get paid maybe $10 an hour.

Would it really kill that company to pay those workers $15 ro $20 or more and maybe cut back on the trips to Hawaii for the agents?

 

Well, this isn't a new trend. If you can't or are unwilling to learn a marketable job skill, I'm not sure you deserve a raise, but...

See, I really don't think this will "ruin" the L.A. economy.

But, there will be fewer entry level jobs available. You're going to be ordering your Happy Meal from a kiosk, not a person.

Wallmart, with its other advantages vs. small business, will be in a better position when this law kicks in.

Small businesses will lower their labor, and customer service will suffer.

Chain restaurants, who have better systems in place, and are better at managing their labor, will do better than Mom & Pop.

More jobs will be part time.

For some, it will be great. For others, it will suck. Like most government programs.

And, the people currently earning somewhere between the current minimum wage and $15 are going to be bitter when they learn that they don't have the leverage necessary to earn a raise of their own. Instead, Pookie will be making the same salary the day he starts.

 

I live in an area with a pretty comparable cost of living as L.A. I used to hire people for much, much less than $15/hour, and it will haunt me until the day I die that I was partly responsible for the conditions in which they lived.

$15 an hour, assuming a standard work week, totals $31,200 a year. A cursory Googling shows the average rent for a one-bedroom apartment in Los Angeles County is around $1,800/month, or about 70 percent of the monthly income for a worker making the higher minimum wage. That's gross income, not after-taxes.

Pegging a minimum wage to the cost of living makes a lot of sense in most areas. But attempting to curb the cost of living might be a better way to fight poverty.

 

Late 30s. I work in newspapers, so I haven't had a raise in about six years. Luckily, I live in an area with one of the lowest costs of living in the country, so it's all relative. My $15 an hour is actually enough to not be high on the hog, but not desperate either.
Still, you're going to have a lot of people who were at $15 an hour who suddenly feel undervalued and think they should be making $20 or $25. Which means they'll want or need raises. Within a year or two, the ripple effect is that nothing is really accomplished except things getting more and more expensive because everyone suddenly has more money, even if they don't.

 

Did the women who work there understand this when they applied for their current jobs?

If so, why didn't they apply to be agents?