Obama____never______had____to_____meet_____a____
Payroll____in____his____entire____life.

What do you expect?

Cars and busses are supposed to run on unicorn farts. Why the heck can't McDonalds and Subway do it?

If they would just forget about staying in business, they could easily pay their employees fifteen bucks an hour.

Parents got me bacon of the month from Zingerman's for Christmas present. Three months cost $99. Come to find out it's $10/pound bacon (I looked up the individual bacon vendors online) with $20/pound of hype and shipping. So you can always hide the costs of doing business somewhere else, ya know?

So you can always hide the costs of doing business somewhere else, ya know? -- Juliana at April 19, 2014 5:19 AM

Zingermans may be able to pull that off, and other select retailers based off of reputation. The problem is that your typical fast food franchisee like Subway, Burger King, etc. don't have that option. They live and die off the day-to-day foot traffic that comes through. If the cost of a Whopper alone goes to $6 then more people are going to be packing that tuna sandwich from home on a daily basis.

So raising the minimum wage will cause the franchisees to find a way to cut down on employees. That will include changing to kiosks so that you punch in your own order. (I hear that is done already in many European countries.)

The other thing that will be advanced is further development of the robo-burger and similar equipment to automate and further replace employees. As it is, if you walk into a McDonalds and watch how they do the fried foods already. The person opens the bag of frozen french fries, dumps them in the basket, then presses a button to drop the basket into the grease. After a certain amount of time the basket comes up and the worker dumps it into pile to be boxed. How much work would it take to automate that process completely? Maybe not that much.

This will cut down on the number employees because the store owner will be able to buy a machine that lasts three or more years for $50K. Two employees for two shifts will cost about $50K per year. Which way would you go as the owner? Not to mention the direct owned stores that Burger King owns. They have the deep pockets to it.

Well for example, the ceo 0f mcdonalds males about 28 million a year. Mcdonalds employs about 1.5 million people. How about the ceo and board members take home about 2 million less a year together and raise the hourly wage 2 dollars for all restaurant employees? That would make happier employees that might care more about the quality of service and and maybe even clean the mccafe machines properly evry once and awhile. The ceo would still make over 26 million a year. Is that too much to sacrifice?

You suck at math Anthony. Taking $2 million away from the CEO's yearly salary is not going to afford an hourly raise to 1.5 million people. Sure, for the whole year they can make a little over $1 more, but certainly not hourly.

Minimum wage jobs -- raising the pay -- is a way for government to make up for the fact that kids in 11th grade are reading at a 1st, 2nd, or 3rd-grade level. Those kids will never work at Google, except maybe as janitors, until they have robots to do that.

The kids reading this way, I found, come from single mother homes. (I used to speak at an inner-city school.) Being poor is not the problem. One of my former assistants is a first-generation American, from an Asian family, and not only lived with her parents but her grandma (who would hang up on anyone who called who didn't speak Korean). She didn't grow up in Beverly Hills, let's just say, but is a hard-working, good person, who got a scholarship to college.

From Slate, W. Bradford Wilcox writes:

http://www.slate.com/articles/double_x/doublex/2012/07/single_motherhood_worse_for_children_.html

Research by Sara McLanahan at Princeton University suggests that boys are significantly more likely to end up in jail or prison by the time they turn 30 if they are raised by a single mother. Specifically, McLanahan and a colleague found that boys raised in a single-parent household were more than twice as likely to be incarcerated, compared with boys raised in an intact, married home, even after controlling for differences in parental income, education, race, and ethnicity. Research on young men suggests they are less likely to engage in delinquent or illegal behavior when they have the affection, attention, and monitoring of their own mother and father.

But daughters depend on dads as well. One study by Bruce Ellis of the University of Arizona found that about one-third of girls whose fathers left the home before they turned 6 ended up pregnant as teenagers, compared with just 5 percent of girls whose fathers were there throughout their childhood. This dramatic divide was narrowed a bit when Ellis controlled for parents’ socioeconomic background—but only by a few percentage points. The research on this topic suggests that girls raised by single mothers are less likely to be supervised, more likely to engage in early sex, and to end up pregnant compared with girls raised by their own married parents.

Black women are the most likely to have children out of wedlock. Nobody wants to stigmatize this. Somebody should. (Moynihan did, a while back.)

I personally don't believe in marriage for myself, but I do believe that if you have children, you owe it to those children to stay together until they go to college, and I don't care whether sex is ho-hum and you'd rather be somewhere else.

Well for example, the ceo 0f mcdonalds males about 28 million a year. Mcdonalds employs about 1.5 million people. How about the ceo and board members take home about 2 million less a year together and raise the hourly wage 2 dollars for all restaurant employees? -- Anthony Cacioppo at April 19, 2014 7:41 AM

That is a fantastic idea but you need to have a clue of how franchise businesses work. Let's use McDonald's as an example. There are a large amount of the individual stores that are owned by the McDonald's Corporation itself. With their headquarters in Oak Brook, IL I'm sure all of the ones in the Chicago area are directly owned. Then there are the franchise stores.

Basically a franchise store is one that pays money to the McDonald's Corporation to use the name, logos, menu, etc. to get the joint use, but they are owned by a separate person or company. Usually they have the rights to a city or other regions. The McDonald's Corporation then restricts their stores and other franchisees from opening in that area.

So cutting the $2M from the corporate CEO and disbursing it to employees in the form of a raise would only get a portion of them a raise.

Try reading up on how franchising works. Then maybe you'll realize how far off you are.

"Well for example, the ceo 0f mcdonalds males about 28 million a year. Mcdonalds employs about 1.5 million people."

Not that I can resist piling on -- let's take all the CEO's money, all $28 million, and distribute it among the remaining 1.5 million employees. $28 million divided by 1.5 million equals: a whopping $18.67 annually per person. Assuming these workers are part-timers averaging 1,000 hours per year, this money comes out to a raise of $0.02 per hour. Over the year, that should buy you three or four extra packs of smokes, depending on brand and location.

"I believe in paying and treating employees well, but I don't believe the government should be setting wages."

I agree, it is, nowadays anyway, an old-fashioned idea - the government keep the fuck out and let the market forces work.

Don't like that the CEO makes "too much" money? Don't buy there.

Don't like that the workers don't get paid "enough"? Don't shop there.

You want others to get paid more, then pay up yourself - there is nothing stopping you from "tipping" the fast food workers, if you so desire. And, I'm sure, that they will love you for it. Hell, maybe they'll even put an extra pickle on your burger as a thank you. Tipping might even make them wash their hands before they handle your salad.

Off-topic, but, something else that really gets me - since when has fast food been considered economical?

As a kid growing up, we never ate at fast food places. I didn't have my first fast food burger until high school when our sports team won and the coach treated us to Burger King (a place I, and most of my teammates, had never been to before). Mom (and Dad, at summer barbeques) cooked great home-made burgers at a much lower cost that the fast food places.

Okay, we did have treats once in a while such as Dairy Queen or Stewart's root-beer floats. But, eating out at a fast food place? for the whole family? That, in my opinion, is not and never has been "cheap."

The government demanding that fast food workers (really much of what they do is truly "unskilled") be paid more will make fast food even more expensive. Amy, I'm sure that Zingerman's is great, and maybe even worth the $14 dollars for a sandwich. But at that price it certainly cannot be considered "fast" food; at least not in considering how long it will take a worker to earn the money to pay for the sandwich.

And with such food now too expensive for most just where does that leave the workers who are laid off because of diminishing demand? Does he expect them to grow their own food in their back yards, just like the first lady does? (minus, of course, the tax-payer paid garden staff to help grow that arugula)

So, thanks Obama! more job-killing ideas!

The piece also points out that Costco pays employees pretty well because people pay for the Costco membership. Minimum wage jobs in CA aren't filled by teens or even by inner-city adults. And there's guys standing in front of Home Depot who will work for less than minimum wage.

Does he expect them to grow their own food in their back yards, just like the first lady does?

I doubt it. Most Dems support restrictive policies which make it illegal to grow your own food in residential neighborhods

Charles hit close to this point...
Z's pays more and CHARGES more for a sammich. If subway was forced to pay higher wages, they too would charge more. All business with minimum wage workers would charge more.

Making the general cost of living go up... and making that raise worth less than nothing, cuz you'll be likely paying higher taxes, too.

That is until business owners looking for an edge, automate everything they can... in droves.

It isn't really hard to understand these processes... but it's hard to demonize people if their process makes sense. [See, mickyD's ceo above] so people ignore what they don't wish to see.

The "Commenter James Hishmeh" left out that some minimum-wage jobs are for on-the-job training and experience, with raises after a while. Nor all, or most, perhaps less than 10% - but they exist.

For an 18-year-old fresh out of high school who wants to be a car mechanic, which would be the best option?

1. Go to a trade school that charges $4,500 a year for a 30 hour per week two year program.

2. Work 40 hours a week for two years for a professional car mechanic who would be willing to pay $5 an hour (much lower than the current minimum wage)

With option 1, the student would pay $9,000.

With option 2, the trainee would be paid $21,800. Of course the government would steal a good size chunk of that to support and subsidize the student who chose option 1.

Just to be clear, I don't believe in a minimum wage, or any other form of gov't interference in private business.

Setting that aside, comparing a Zingerman's Reuben, made with thick homemade bread, stacked 3" high with premium cornbeef, Swiss, and kraut to a Subway sandwhich made with Wonderbread and scant amounts of industrial processed ingredients is apples to oranges.

The last time we ate ate at Zingerman's, my wife and I struggled to eat one sandwhich between us. Zingerman's is still the better deal even at $14.

comparing a Zingerman's Reuben, made with thick homemade bread, stacked 3" high with premium corn beef, Swiss, and kraut to a Subway sandwich made with Wonder bread and scant amounts of industrial processed ingredients is apples to oranges. -- AllenS at April 19, 2014 7:57 PM

And no one is really trying to do that. The thing is that if you raise the minimum wage Subway stores will have to raise the price of the sandwiches. The days of the $5 foot long are pretty much gone. The new deal for $5 is a 6 inch combo with a 25¢ cup of soda water and a 50¢ bag of chips.

To keep a standard Subway franchise open they have to average at least five sandwiches an hour as a WAG. (Wild Assed Guess.) Going from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour is going to add about 40% to employee costs at minimum. Not to mention the employee that has worked at a place and it already making $8 per hour. Do you think they'll accept going to just $10.10 an hour? They are going to want $10.85 at minimum.

So what is the franchise owner going to do. He's going to raise the price of the sandwiches to cover his costs.

Then add in the fact that those of us who are making much more than minimum wage in skilled jobs are probably not going to see a significant change in our income. So our choice is to pack a can of soup or a bologna sandwich and skip going out for lunch most of the time. Or in other words less patronage of the already struggling franchisee.

Then the other one that goes along with it is a place like Zingerman's will also have to raise wages to keep their employees. Take a guess how much that Reuben will cost.

Then there is the cost of product in the supply chain. That processing plants that supplies Zingerman's with corned beef and the bread (ingredients) will also have to charge more.

So it isn't a straight line comparison of the two, but an evaluation of all the effects.

Anthony, assuming the 1.5m workers are doing 40 hours a $2 pay raise over a year comes to $6.24billion.

$2 x 1.5million X 40 hours x 52 weeks = $6,240,000,000
6.24 billion - CEO pay cut (2 million) = $6.238 shortfall ... oops, that does not work

How about we pay the CEO nothing :
6.24 billion - CEO pay (28 million) = $6.212 shortfall ... oops, that does not work either

I know it is fun to look at the high paid and complain they make so much more than their workers but cutting thier pay and distributing it does not add up to your fantasy world.

Charles:

"there is nothing stopping you from "tipping" the fast food workers"

Actually in quite a few places there is a ban on taking tips, you see it more in places with mixed income (mix of hourly and tipped workers) . In some cases it is thanks to the dual unions in the same workplace or a union that supports both like hotels (front desk hourly and bell services/valet tipped)

The owners of Zingerman's are what are know as "rent seekers". They seek to drive the costs of their competitors up, so that they can't compete on price - compare a $10 or $12 subway to a $14 Zingerman's, it won't take the average consumer long to figure out the differential is a trivial amount and worth it.

It also increases barriers to entry in that market, so that the next generation of sandwich shops don't even get started let alone get to a point where they may compete against the established regime.

The same can be said of any large corporate entity that backed the ObamaCare legislation. For them, it would be a manageable cost, but it would not be as easily managed for smaller competitors and would force more than a few out of business.

Look – I know some of you want to believe that the government is your friend, and that your hero is punishing that big bad Business Owner who is screwing you.

Sorry. That's not what is happening.

Those of you who "suck at math" are being taken for a ride. You're being sold nothing more than more wealth envy, to get your vote.

Remember getting a big cheer from everyone in your high school algebra class, when you asked the teacher, "When are we ever going to use this?"

Now is the time. Why don't you take a look at what happens when everyone gets the same pay raise?

Why don't you take a look at the unit, "one hour of work", for which you are paid a minimum wage in dollars? Note that one is equal to the other?

There is your hint. Raising the minimum wage devalues the dollar. That's all there is to it. You'll be paid more for 10 minutes or so, and then the rest of the marketplaces' prices will climb by exactly that fraction, to take that new pay from you in an illustration of a basic truth:

You do not have a minimum-wage job because you are valuable.