Yes but the company's heavily influence what the state ends up doing, the people didn't vote for it!

BUBBLEGUM GUN like anyone voted for the tax code.

@@bubblegumgun3292 the masses are ignorant, that doesnt mean they wanted this. just because people dont know that they are being manipulated and scammed doesnt mean its directly their fault. the large cooperations influence politics almost completely, the us is hardly less corrupt than russia for instance, you just need more money to play.

Capitalism inevitably ends in a small group of the most profitable corporations dominating the market. Corporatism is the logical end of any capitalist system, not some corruption of capitalism.

@Eric Zeng capitalism only works when there has recently been a large event causing the economy to 'reset', after a while companies start getting more power than they should and inequality grows, the us is in that fase right now.

@Volkstribun Common good for who?

silkhead44 Unless that sexual activity is an adult male paying an agreed upon sum in exchange for sex from a consenting adult female. Then it’s government to the ‘rescue’.

Theft, torture, and forced labor. It's all good bro. It's to serve the "common good".

firstandforemost87 Prostitution is an extremely risky business.It is saturated with brothels employing minors and migrants,abuses and sexual crimes,scammers..

Autistic Legion I am sure that is universally true the world over and is in no way related to its status as a black market trade most places.

Yeah, exactly lol. Like.....that's the point.

The duty of the small press, maybe. But the MSM only exist to uphold the government and the powers that be. Manufacturing Consent.

"Due to the Karlovy Vary resolutions, the entire press system was subject to censorship, which was particularly strict with regard to the Rheinische Zeitung. The Prussian authorities first sent a special censor from Berlin. When this did not lead to the desired adjustment, each issue had to be submitted to the Cologne district president in the second instance. Because Marx's editorial staff regularly circumvented this double censorship, the newspaper was finally banned from publication on April 1, 1843. Marx resigned as a staff member and editor on March 17 because the owners hoped to avoid a ban by changing the newspaper's line with the censorship authorities." The context of such quotes is important. Marx had to flee to other countries since the German states (Germany wasn't a nation yet, but dominated by Prussia and Austria) were really repressive at this time. Americans tend to forget that we weren't so fortunate to live in a democracy back then.

“This crippling of individuals I consider the worst evil of capitalism. Our whole educational system suffers from this evil. An exaggerated competitive attitude is inculcated into the student, who is trained to worship acquisitive success as a preparation for his future career.” ― Albert Einstein

@@GrantWitherspoon exactly. The duty of the mainstream press is to uphold the status quo

@@bubblegumgun3292 Even in a free market, the corporations' incentive to smother out competition by force exists. There must be larger incentives from customers not to.

@@Birkarl_ In a free market, there are fewer controls that large corporations have to smother out competition. Only government authority allows them to impose their barriers on new entrants.

@@squee116 Corporations in government is a failure of government and predictable of corporations.That's how I put it.

@@JudahDavis I generally agree.

Crony Capitalism...

Nah, because walmart gives low hours... If you have a specific amount you need to make to rent and eat, which in california is like 2600 a month. You take the job with more hours

No, it would mean all the jobs are shit and Walmart just happens to be the least shitty.

We Smoke Bitcoins If someone was going to cut off both your legs and the other guy only wanted to cut off one of your arms, then wouldn’t it be a good thing that the other guy only wants to cut off an arm?? So shouldn’t we agree that he’s being generous to only do that and shouldn’t we let him??

@@LouisVictor767 yup, I would be pretty glad if I were in that shitty fucking situation.

@@tadhgmcgrath1409 Explains why people are coming to my state of Texas from there. Besides the relatively high taxes of course.

I’m as lefty as they come and I cannot argue with this We’ve established monopolization of entire industries, which keeps capitalism from functioning as advertised.

@Juden Arier As if those corporations have just always existed. Like giants like Blockbuster and K-mart didn't just fade away. Thanks for the dumbest comment ever to be posted on KZfaq.

@Juden Arier we need a twentieth century teddy rosevelt to break up Amazon, Google and Disney with extreme prejudice

@@patoren3gou653 Microsoft too

Exactly!

There are plenty of people who want work for a good wage but if you're not going to give it then why the hell should I give 110%?

Just hire immigrants, they usually work harder

thank you for telling the truth.

And even worse than those that don't want to work attack those that do and about half of those that do either quit or play the same game as the deadbeats. In one annual review session I told the assistant manager that by not getting after the deadbeats you are putting workers in a position to chose between being a chump or playing the game. That game being I can do 120% of the work I signed on to doing or I can do 10 to 20% of that work and still get the same 40 cent a year annual raise you give to the deadbeats. He just sat there looking dumbfounded.

@@zackhamilton8444 That is something you realise over time. It will be the same in most other companies where you are an employee. However if you are a contractor working 120% it is good because you get more money for working that hard.

Bingo. Welfare given to workers is absolutely dwarfed by welfare given to corporations (including the world'smost profitable corporations, like Exxon). Until corporate welfare ends, the John Stossels of the world need to shut the fuck up about ending welfare for workers.

AbbeyRoadkill1 John Stossel has been critical of “corporate welfare.” He has criticized tax payer funded stadiums and if you watch the video to the end, you see him criticizing “corporate welfare.”

Dave Davis, you're absolutely right! AbbeyRoadkill1 is blind and foulmouthed to boot.

Let's cut all welfare!!

READ "No They Cant" by Stossel...It will tell you a lot...

Cruz gave a good speech on crony capitalist hurting everybody during Obama years

Hi, I tend to lean left but I do think we as a society should be more civil to those we disagree with so I'd like to respectfully voice my opinion and hear your thoughts; Aren't crony capitalists always going to be inevitable if we deregulate, and cut taxes for corporations? I mean if we remove all roadblocks for giant corporations to accumulate massive amounts of wealth, then aren't there always going to be giant corporations who want to save more money by lobbying the government and having policy crafted in their interest by buying politicians, democrat and republican? It makes their business more profitable, so other companies can't compete unless they do the same thing

@@aidanalberts6010 We don't have to eradicate all crony capitalists, but we could reduce them. One way is to make sure that they're competing in the market just like all of the other companies, and to make sure that they don't get any special privilages from the government. No monopoly exists without government favoritism. That's why we have Big Tech giants lobbying the s* out of government for their wants. I also think that lobbying should be overhauled so it won't work against us as much as it currently does. Also lobbyists need to be registered, and the money needs to be transparent to the public because if we allow secret money with secret lobbyists to thrive, we are not only vulnerable to crony capitalists, but also to foreign ones too. Same goes to politicians too. They need to have transparent money from registered lobbyists. Also it should be illegal for all political leaders to break their own rules. For politicians, I should look into more. Thanks for opening up.

@@caster863 I completely agree with your point about government favouritism. I don't think the state is ultimately a friend of the people. But how are we going to make sure companies like Amazon aren't exploiting government policy, when in order to have a successful career as a politician, you have to take funding from companies like Amazon (unless you're an AOC/Bernie type) We've never really had a truly "free market". What we've had has always been state capitalism in which the state picks its favourites, and protects the property of the "oppulent minority" to quote James Madison.

@@aidanalberts6010 First there has to be transparency, then the politician should do more for his or her cause more than they benifit the business. If that politician benefits the business that grants it special permissions to become monopolistic or oligargical, then that politician and Amazon should be investigated with no lobbying stopping it. If that cause is admittedly intended to help Amazon, then that the politician should only change what is unfair for Amazon, and any business. I'm not an expert in crony capitalism, and corruption in general because solving it is like trying to avoid stepping on broken glass, but these are my suggestions of what I think should happen. Maybe not all special government privilages are for fulfilling the wants for a company to become a monopoly or an oligopoly, which I got from the last part of your reply.

Luxury Bosses make bigger profits because luxury is a fetish that can be sold like trinkets the Dutch bought Manhattan with. Bosses naturally don't want to pay for education because it would cut into profits. If they are faced with having to pay a higher wage they can raise prices and lose customers or cut other expenses like advertising, boss bonuses or profits themselves. They make their decisions based upon maximizing profits for themselves come hell or high water. A higher minimum wage means those workers will be able to spend more on things they need. This results in a shift in production away from luxury goods to workers necessities. As far as hiring and training goes capitalism always works to replace higher skilled labor with unskilled labor and machines. Capitalist supervisors are paid to get the longest hours at the fastest pace at the lowest wage in a pay period from those they watch for a living. The fact that they system itself enter into crisis and can't match all the labor available with the capital equipment is due to the natural tendency of long term profit rates to decline.

@@kimobrien. No, the reason companies do not want to pay for education, is because people routinely screw them over when they do this. I worked at a Cadillac dealership. The dealership used to have a huge training program. 3 mechanic internships, and 2 body repair internships. Back in the 1960s, if you trained someone, they would stay with you for decades. Today, you train someone, and then they quit and work for your competitor, or they quit and open their own repair shop competing against you, with the training you gave them. No one is going to pay for education directly, knowing there is a good chance you'll quit and work for someone else with the knowledge you gave them. You wouldn't do that either. If you paid for it out of your pocket from a business you were running, you'd be pissed. Second, CEO pay will not pay for wages. If you confiscated all the salary of the CEO of walmart, and gave it to the employees, it would be less than half a penny per hour. If CEO earned zero, it would not even raise your pay by a penny. Third, higher minimum wage means those workers earn nothing. They are unemployed. Go read about what happened to the car wash workers in NYC. They jacked up the minimum wage of car wash workers with Unions. The result was that many car washes closed, and others converted to full automation. In both cases all the employees lost their jobs.

@@amostake All your doing is making excuses for the bosses. They can't afford this and they can't afford that but they can afford CEO pay and who knows what else they are hiding in their budget. Bonus for bosses, stock buybacks, advertising, and diversity training, WalMart has money to buy new computer systems to replace people and they can cut the pay of other bosses and plans to buy or invest. They can cut their trips to Las Vegas and donations to their foundations. We aren't interested in subsidising bosses who can't make a profit with low wages. They run everything based upon profits, Their profit system is coming to an end because of the declining rate of industrial profit. That's why we say the workers can't accept this close everything down because we can't make a profit. They wasted 5 trillion dollars destroying Iraq and Afghanistan. You want to die and sacrifice for them and their profit system that's your decision but don't expect me to follow.

@@amostake Why do you want a bunch of slaves washing cars to begin with? Seems to me that's a luxury service and if it gets replaced by automatic car washing that's a good thing. We don't want jobs that are just those of digging a hole and filling it up again. Same with the neoliberal argument that John Lewis made coal expensive compared to oil. Does it not make more sense to burn oil and gas than coal? Is not oil drilling and extraction safer than coal mining. Coal will probably always be needed to make raw steel. We want a system where people can change jobs without economic hardship. We don't want this business where people are thrown out of work, ignored, and treated like dirt on a shoe.

@@amostake Does the boss guarantee a life time JOB either? From a sensible point of view and not one based upon a boss making a profit than on the job training fulls two functions it creates value as the worker trains and he isn't put in the position of being told he didn't get the right training or some other reasoning after he spent both time and money on outside of work education. The bosses want all the choke points in the economy so they can extract profits. The want the all the gains and make us take all the losses.

The only thing increasing market competition brings is layoffs, consolidation, bailouts and the next war for bigger profits. The profit drive of the bosses runs up against the tendency of the long term profit rates to decline. While the bosses may be making record aggregate profits they can't escape the long term tendency of the rate of profit by which they judge success to decline. They are in a world crisis of their own making.

@@wayneyoung9061 No such thing. A market is a place of conflict. It always requires a eith a second pr third pasty to act as a regulator or controller. A market requires a policeman to contain conflict.

@@wayneyoung9061 Some things don't belong in markets. By abolishing private property you cloes down the stock and bond markets.

@@wayneyoung9061No you don't because the production workers will decide to abolish it in the class struggle by creating a labor party. The capitalist are the ones who need an oppressive government to defend their crisis ridden profit system which can only lead to war and depression.

You have to look at where minimum wage laws come from. It's unions who want them (same when it comes to needing a license to do a job, when all most people need is some basic on the job training), as a way of raising barriers to entry level workers. Originally it was used to discriminate against blacks who were previously slaves. In Apartheid South Africa the mining unions advocated for a minimum wage specifically for black people to make them less employable. Nowadays, it's about big corporations trying to shut down or keep smaller competitors out of business.

the whine about the money supply .. minimum wage is a factor in employment, but the major factor in employment is labor supply .. we spend billions in educating (schools) our labor supply and then short circuit that effort importing legal and illegal labor .. Trump/Coulter/Hansen are right and Trump's marginal efforts are showing results to make the need for minimum wage less important as an economic factor .. for the most part, the purpose of a job (job creators) is to make a living wage .. job creators who create jobs that don't meet that standard need to go back to the drawing board about their product and work structure.

@@gregcoste5332 It's about currency stability. The federal reserve's inflation policy destroys the poorest among us. There'd be no need for a minimum wage at all if it weren't for the Fed constantly destroying the value of the dollar. Just look at how much you've seen your purchasing power decline within your own lifetime, the results speak for themselves. If we want to stop immigration, we should stop destroying countries around us by launching coups and end foolish policies such as our drug war that not only allowed, but encouraged the creation of gangs of criminals (MS 13), widespread corruption, and drug cartels in our neighbor's countries. A large part of the migration crisis' we've seen spring up around the world can be tied directly to the violent criminality U.S. foreign and domestic policy has fostered.

dlllester- Best comment in the entire discussion about this video !

Crypto currency is the best for future

You either got the wrong degree, need more experience, or a different job. You have choices in the free market... you have no choices under socialism.

What degree? Art?

@@treasureplanet9082 The US is a mixed market... so do we or do we not have a choice?

@@John-jg2km Depends if the government made choices

Well crony capitalism/ corporatism is the only form capitalism can take you have to blind not to see that.

All systems are driven in one direction because of the conditions in which they exist. In capitalism, corporatism is the way to a super company that controls everything. And in communism it leads to authoritarian dictatorship. That is why pure capitalism or communism is bad.

Yep!

Niklas Molén I’d argue that it’s not necessarily the case with communism most of the times Leftist governments come into power which the majority of them where democratically elected and the US decided to squash them either using the CIA or direct military intervention, a small exemption is a state in India called Kerala in which they have the lowest amount of people in poverty as well as the improvements brought by leftists which was indicated in a 1984 study using World bank data.

@@Iandar1 There is a difference between a left-wing government and a communist / socialist government.

The minimum wage is not decided by the politicians, instead the unions and the employers' association make agreements for different sectors of the labour market which include wage levels. www.sverigesingenjorer.se/om-forbundet/om-oss/the_swedish_model/

@@mrertam excellent

No minimum wage is required. There are welfare programs that mean that if the salary is too low, it is better to live on welfare. Therefore, companies must keep a certain salary if they want to be able to hire someone. And what Erik wrote.

sweden GDP is a lie like all socialist/communist countries lie about GDP as Rome told people economy was good up until day Rome was destroyed

@@darrelljohnson1319 The only problem is that Sweden is not a socialist / communist state, so the whole reasoning falls. In fact, the market in Sweden is more free than in the USA.

No he doesn't because he fails to say that a higher minimum wage means a shift in production away from luxury goods towards things workers need as a social class. People like him will pay higher prices for Lincoln Continentals and advertising budgets will get cut as waste as will talking heads like Strossel himself. His investments will yield lower rates as capitalism is unable to halt declining profit rates in industrial production. .

Okay... so increase your prices?

@@John-jg2km And then when people stop eating at his restaraunt because it's too expensive, how will the employees be paid?

@@armoredplacoderm If the business cannot afford to pay employees a living wage then its best to let capitalism do its thing. It will go bankrupt and a better restraunt will replace it.

@@John-jg2km And now instead of those employees having a non-living wage, they simply have no wage. Brilliant. There is no guarantee a restaraunt will replace the out-of-business restaraunt and employ those people. You're also failing to account for people who are willing to work for lower wages for a variety of reasons. The video addresses them. Now they just don't get to have jobs because you know better I guess. Not to mention if you raise the cost of goods and services by raising minimum wage you will have a number of other effects: 1) Jobs will be outsourced to other countries where labor is cheaper. 2) Cost of living will increase for everyone so the dollar will have less buying power. Your "living wage" is now no longer a living wage because everything is more expensive. 3) It's going to insentivize automation and the elimination of jobs. Increase the cost of unskilled labor and watch those jobs vanish. But sure, just pay people more money. The final consideration is this: Why $15 an hour? Why not $30? Or $100? If we can just legislate our way to prosperity, the sky is the limit right? Some entrepreneur will make it work no matter the labor cost right? That's the implication you made right? How about $1,000 an hour? How about $1,000,000? How much is to much? Who determines that and how?

@@armoredplacoderm your right, the place will go out of business and if there is no demand for the business then that buisness won't work. Look at blockbuster, no demand = no buisness. Why not $20? Because that would create inflation. The idea is to pay people enough to survive and afford private Healthcare, house utility's, and children = the bare minimum to take care of yourself. We want automation, the world is already moving to that and the service industry is exploding, times are changing and the market will follow. Nothing you just listed is against raising the minimum wage.

@ALJustice0 but in Texas you cannot get a job to afford it lol

The problem is, the Left ignores reality. Leftists dominate the big cities where less than $15/hour really is very hard to live on because cost of living in general, and especially rent, is so high. So they think that applies everywhere. Meanwhile, conservatives tend to live in rural areas and many suburbs where the cost of living is much lower, so they are well aware that even on less $15/hour you can live quite well... in those areas. Conclusion? What needs addressed is not the federal minimum wage, but the LOCAL one (if there is one). Conservatives consistently put in the hard work to address issues they care about at the local and state level... why don't Leftists do the same?

@@grantjohnson5785 15 an hour isn't enough in san Jose CA

And you do earn 160$ a month more (if you work 40h/week) so that is something.

@@inbredjesus9188 I imagine 15 dollars wouldn't be enough in California anywhere. What does rent normally run in your state/city?

@@_gamepoint_ 1100. 900 for roaches and crackhead if you are lucky. Ceres California. 13 is minimum wage here at odd jobs with usually no overtime

It really depends on where you live

isn't that around a 33% difference. huge difference

@@jonathantiernan2148 25% actually

@@serbanandreimarin5988 you must be a mathmatician

@@daviepageviews4521 Not really 15 and 20 are both multiples of 5 (and 3 and 4) respectively 3 is 75% of 4 and as such any correlating multiples will follow the same rule It's quite common knowledge really

Like one big HOA.

@Ryan Alex "Still better than not getting the job" you mean?

Except food stamps and government assistance aren't limited to employees of corporations, so by definition they'd be better classified as "poor people" welfare. And their targeted income levels may be way too high or too low depending on the state in which they are implemented. Meanwhile, the corporation likely didn't lobby for those things to be in place, as they come out of taxes, which are collected twice against corporations, at an entity and individual level. Further, none of this takes into account an individual's ability to budget and plan for their career ahead of time. The whole "late 20's with a family" schtick in regards to entry level job means that person made some poor economic choices.

I make only $12/h and I dont qualify for food stamps nor do I need them. No Amazon employee qualified due to their pay. They qualified due to life choices. For example, if they have kids, they can get food stamps at higher incomes than people without children. So you are saying that if a person chooses to have a child, the company should have to pay them more? If the woman chooses to be a single parent, that the company should have to pay them more? That if the person refuses to work a second job to be responsible for their life choices, that the company should pay them more? The wage the company pays is already enough to have a decent life on. but people feel entitled to more and more without taking on more responsibility to get it. I heard some young people saying they are entitled to a house simply for being born :/

@@waltermh111 The problem with your argument is that ultimately you're saying it is okay to pay people so little that they can not do normal things like have children and you're expecting people to be okay with that so long as the individual can survive. There is no way you will ever get people to be okay with not being able to do such fundamental things just because a corporation feels it needs to pay its upper echelon hundreds of times what they pay their average worker.

@@pariasdark No, I am saying that you arent supposed to be able to raise a family on a front line job, and you never have been able to. You are an irresponsible parent if you try to, no matter how much they pay you because a front line job will never pay enough to do so well. If the minimum wage gets higher, so will the cost of living in the area to match what the majority of people make, the majority making close to the minimum wage. A responsible parent will take on more work responsibility to raise the kid better. And if you teach parents to be better with their financials and live within their means, they can raise kids on a lower wage than you might expect, but if you teach them only to be professional victims then they will stay poor and struggling no matter what you pay them. Also, teaching them to raise children with a mother and father, and not as single mothers, will also help as that always has the best outcome for children and allows people to raise a child with a better household income (assuming again that they stop trying to live outside of their means, aka trying to get a house before they are ready for it). As for what the upper class is paid, when you create jobs, you can choose your pay, but all I hear from people jealous of the upper management is that they dont want the responsibility for creating and keeping jobs around by creating a strong company, no, they want more without doing more.

@Cousin Vinny Actually, in January, I got promoted to the next level and make nearly $16/h But it is my goal to become supervisor. I have the advantage that I actually love responsibility. I thrive on doing things I can be proud of and I have a business mind. But my point is that even if you dont like responsibility, it is a necessary part of a thriving life. People need to stop being so entitled and expecting me to pay for their lack of responsibility. I know that some of it is poor education and poor parental raising of children, but when you tell them over and over again how to fix their life and they make excuses as an adult, it upsets me. I am on the path to real estate as a side income, yes, on $16/h in expensive CO. Because I am planning well. When I try to teach people how to do it, they make excuses, act like its not important to them to be financially stable and growing, yet want to beg for others to give them more stuff. Disgusts me when I know 100% they can do better based on their situation.

Why would they pay more when there's no competition to steal thier employees?

Afaik, theres no obligation to work in corporations with poor dirt wages.

Please cite your sources

@@jacobmurphy7333 can find it easily. He should've added the year. Although this makes sense and I'm not going to fact check it.

The enemy of capitalism is capitalism itself. Capitalism's endgame is fucking horrifying, dude.

@@MrTalithan What endgame?

@@counterfeit1148 The ownership and commodification of literally everything.

@@MrTalithan so you mean everything is a monopoly?

@@counterfeit1148 It pretty much is. the vast majority of our food is owned by 5 corporations, Internet? 4. But when I say everything, I mean everything. They've already essentially commodified human lives. You can see it in how poorly the big, big companies pay their workers.

It's not even that, it wasn't a wage issue it was a salary issue. Meaning they cooked the numbers and only talk about the Amazon employees that were part time, meaning they weren't getting enough hours not that the hourly wage was too low. If you work 40 hours a week at even minimum wage you don't qualify for virtually any government aid (unless you have kids of course)

I'm a pretty Conservative guy aswell, but I support Labor Unions in the private sector in order to prevent abuse like this.

Your education has let you down, my friend. You have no idea what Socialism even means, nor Fascism for that matter. And it blatantly shows, by your comment.

@@nevadataylor They aren't even the same thing

Sure, his product causes the downfall of society. But he is a private business, he can do whatever he wants

Get a job you bum!!! lol

They have been mailed! :P

its been given to illegals.

Food stamps hurt capitalism physically and emotionally.

Where are my tax cuts? I want to operate a multinational business here, guys. I just don't want to pay any taxes.

No, when the federal minimum wage was raised 87% in 1950 it had little to no effect on inflation or employment

TheSeptessentialRavenclaw, this $15/hour BS is the globalist's idea of a "universal, livable wage". They're abolishing borders, destroying nationalism, removing opportunities, corralling people into pack-n - stack cities, stealing all natural resources. They're creating 2 classes- the very, very, very rich and the dirt poor "workers of the world". They know full well what the f**k they're doing. Bezo is a globalist. The moronic lefties w/in society are just dumbed down people that have been duped into believing big government is some benevolent uncle there to "help" them rather than shackle them. Leftist politicians are either one of the dumbed-down people ignorantly believing they're "helping" others or just total sellouts, riding this globalist tsunami and aiming for self-enrichment. Bezo is a globalist. This $15 -minimum wage- universal, "livable" wage is one thing. Control.

The reason the California loons want a national minimum wage is to keep people from leaving their horribly run State to better run areas. If everyone has to pay $15 an hour then they think people will stay. Of course the cost of living is so high there and the one party rule so toxic people are still fleeing.

Sowell knows his economics & FACTS..America will always have deadbeats and leaches..As long as it remains uneducated..

"I can't afford anything!!!" -Some millennial who eats only vegan food, lives in a luxury apartment in downtown Las Angeles, and is studying for a gender studies degree.

@@hemprope4326 And who takes out a loan for an iphone

Because that wasn't the point. Most situations have a string of asterisks behind them(CGP Grey illustrates this well). Yes, monopolies are by their very nature anti capitalist. Their are rules against monopolies, but they are rarely used. When it comes to Amazon specifically I don't think there is a good way to level the field. It will take another major innovation in the supply chain or change to make room for competition to truly happen.

I know that in Denmark and Sweden there's no state defined minimum wage, it's agreed between each workers union and employers.

Then you also have countries like Germany, Denmark, Sweden, Norway, and Switzerland that are doing extremely well without any minimum wage. Minimum wages are forced by Union workers to cut out entry level competition to get themselves a pay raise. Econ 101

gregorio canepa well they’re doing fine for now because minim wage was implemented a few years ago and economic decisions take a few years to show its unintended consequence. Also, I was looking at the unemployment rate in those countries for the youth and Australia has a 12.6% unemployment rate of 15-24 yr olds. New Zealand is 11.2% same age bracket and Holland is 7.6% which for them is the equal of 20% (I spoke to a Dutch person who lives near me). Minimum wage jobs are taken by that age bracket. This are entry level jobs, no skills you get a waitressing job or a delivery job or whatever. If you’re forced to pay someone without experience or skills a “living wage” which depends on the state you live in, then those entry jobs disappear because no one will hire someone who isn’t going to produce $2-5 more per hr than their forces to pay.

So far, but sliding. And they’ll get worse.

Why would you assume it's minimum wage, and not a litany of other factors that can be attributed to their success? If a nation is thriving with a minimum wage, it is *in spite* of it, not because of it.

Add a multitude of government conflicting rules,regulations ,fees, inspections. Three are 5 to 10 thousand dollars in fees before you can build a house. You have to put out thousands of dollars in government training required to work on finger nails. Business are forced to spend hundreds to millions to comply with government edicts . All of which we the costumers end up paying.

How does Walmart do that? Did they hold a gun to the customer's heads and force them to patronize their business over the local family-owned store? Or did they just provide a better store people xhose to shop at?

You know Walmart truck divers pay for your class to get a CDL and start you out at 100K right? Or you could go into construction or learn a useful trade other than "paper or plastic?"

If there are literally no other jobs in the area, either learn a trade so you can be self-employed, or move to a town where there are more job opportunities. People have been doing that for THOUSANDS of years.

@@JamesTaylor-on9nz But that you know takes effort. I'm seeing the Post office run off help faster then anyone in history. If you treat you're employees as bad as everyone says Walmart and Amazon are supposed they don't have to put up with it and wont. If they still work there its there best option, if they can't find enough help they have to change (or die off). You see it now in fast food. Its ironic that nowadays and without any law to force them to. all fast food restaurants start people off at this magical 15 dollars an hour, why? Because otherwise no one would show up. The market dictates what is a fair wage not someone on high.

@@JamesTaylor-on9nz It is not always that simple. The problem with this philosophy is that it reduces complicated personal circumstances to a very simplistic understanding. More people would listen if they weren't being denied a basic understanding of their circumstances.

And that's the problem, we don't have capitalism, we have a corporatocracy.

@@abatos1146 actually, corporatocracy, is just fascism. one of the original goal of fascism was for individuals to surrender to the greater good of all powerful corporations who where indistinguishable from government. not that you will hear antifa point that out while they are cheering for the violent suppression of comedians and non-corporate news.

I don't think corporations are really the problem either. Even the most corrupt corporation could not enforce its barriers to entry without the complicity of government. Meanwhile government could do so without the aid of corrupt corporations. Government holds the power.

@@squee116 as i pointed out earlier, one of the goals of fascism was to create all powerful corporations that where inseparable from the state. and increasingly, that is what we are getting. corporations can not exist without the government protecting them, and the government can not keep its current structure without corporate money. if you believe the concept of "rule of law" means the law applies equally to all, then you cant accept corporations.

@@MrJay_White Another goal of some forms of fascism was to create all powerful white people and them inseparable from the state. Should we revile them without context or nuance as well?

Wow holy shit dude you look exactly like me just a bit more chubby and i can't grow a beard

@@user-vv1do1wg1j Are you also 6'5?

Its all fine while you are single and until you want to have a family with x amout of kids, its no longer affordable to have a family

So basically people go to Amazon because that is their best choice. But if you take that choice away you are not helping them you are hurting them. They would be even worse off without Amazon. And calling them "slavers" is an insult to actual slaves. Were you whipped for disobedience? Were you forced to work on gunpoint? If a black slave from 1800s was transported forward in time and told that Amazon employees are slaves, he would have laughed. Nobody is forcing you to do anything, except pay taxes and die. You can disagree with a company all right, but enough with the "slave" -arguments. Most people in US have no idea what it's like to be an actual slave with no choice or rights.

Lmao 🤣 🤣 🤣 🤣

"Maths is racist, sexist, xenophobic..."

No, 'everyone should earn enough money to at the very least live something resembling a stable life, and not be one missed check from homelessness' /the left.

@@MrTalithan By increasing the minimum wage it would make the wealth gap bigger. Increase minimum wage > value of the dollar goes down > things get more expensive, and employment rate goes lower > corporations exploit this to become even richer > the poor get poorer.

@@badman5363 >don't increase minimum wage > shit still gets more expensive only now the majority of people can't afford to exist> the rich craters the economy again because they can and gets even richer off people being poor and government bailouts. There is no data that says what you say will happen will happen. Taxing the shit out of the rich helps to offset that. No more bailouts for Wall Street.

That is what he is saying: "Walmart is so bad but everything else is even worse..." Also...in what way are they worse and who are they? What are these jobs that are worse than Walmart and Amazon?

You can't have unpaid internships in most fields any longer

Why can't we bring them back or make internships exempt from the minimum wage but cannot last longer than a year.

Only internships I know of are either paid or for school credit, now.

Some employers just couldn't help themself and misused it. Hence the regulation.

Christopher Schuh Oh you mean the thing that capitalist companies basically used as legal slavery?

I think it was pretty clear he was upset at Amazon lobbying the government to interfere with his competition while sidestepping the issue through automation.

That's why there has to be more job opportunities. Then, people will stop signing for awful job contracts just for the money. Earn money for doing whatever you want: the true American dream.

It's far more the other way around Corporations pwyi their way into control

Serban Andrei Marin Yes, that as well.

LMAO 1872

There shouldn't be one at all

Higher minimum wages push smaller business, like family businesses going out of business because they need employers, but can't hire as many for as long. That just creates a monopoly for the bigger guys as they lobby for higher and higher minimum wages. Nothing stops employers from paying employees more from the minimum wages.

Technically, it does, depending on how widely you interpret the commerce clause. I would have thought the Contract's Clause would impede this, but I was wrong.

Sure it does. You can't have slaves can you? The question isn't what the government can tell you to do with your business, the question is, how low is the lowest bar justifiable in an affluent society that attempts to prevent citizens falling below a certain standard of living? The bar is currently set higher than slave, and don't starve to death in the street (food stamps), but is that as high as it should be or should there be a higher one? I would argue, anyone who requires taxpayer paid subsidy to survive, and any business that relies on workers that are in that situation, is economically the same as a government subsidizing the business and essentially socialist.

@@shaunclarkson7131 I think that argument would be a flawed one without first ensuring the subsidy is actually designed to provide the amount of money needed to survive as opposed to live a comfortable life. Our definition of poverty in this country is comical compared to actual poverty.

@@squee116 Doesn't commerce mean the goods being sold, not what the people are paid?

@@shaunclarkson7131 I agree slavery is bad, but if a company pays say $0.10/hr, why would you even consider working for them, find employment elsewhere. The government telling you what to pay employees is a form of slavery itself.

"Long term, automation has to instituted slowly. " This is most likely completely false. True automation will completely change our economic system if not totally break its back. "Capitalism" in the current sense of the word has its days numbered. I'm not against capitalism at all just its time is up. Sources: Calum Chace's The Economic Singularity and Alvin Toffler's The Third Wave. I have other books for further reading I can recommend if you are interested in the topic.

The reason why capitalism is practically down for the count is the same reason it took so long to come into common understanding - freedom is hard and not politically as profitable as government control for the sake of the politicians friends and own ego (socialism, mercantilism, etc.) @@minerva31

@@minerva31 you may be correct in terms of true automation. However, I don't think we'll see true automation right away. The movers and shakers in society need peyote to be able to buy the products they produce. If all jobs are automated to the point where no-one has a job then no-one can be a customer. For this reason I think automation would be something that slowly creeps into society. How fast do you think automation will enter society and what impacts do you think it'll have at that rate?

@@minerva31 - Capitalism's "time" will only be up when people stop having needs or desires. As long as those exists, capitalism will live.

@@simplegarak That is a ridiculous statement. People had needs and desires in Feudalist, Mercantilist, and even Communist systems. The goal of a system is to fulfill the needs if those in it. Feudalism had its day, so did Mercantilism, Communism was just a disaster, and eventually the day of modern capitalism will end. It depends how you define Capitalism I suppose. The future will hold a new system, especially as we move closer to a post scarcity era.

Without those large companies, where would u work? I'm sure amazon pays way more in taxes thn u even with all the credits. The problem is ppl like u who hate corporations and keep voting on laws that put them in these kinds of situations in the 1st place. If u don't like ur pay, work elsewhere

Well I mourn that you've chosen to become a Bernie fanatic with his standard talking points. "Without any regulation, companies grow to such larger sizes that they take over entire industries and can do whatever they want." You have it backwards. Companies grew larger in size by using regulations to crush their competitors. Without regulations, doing business would be much easier, hence, the big guys would have a lot of competition. Monopoly means lack of competition, so competition (free market) does not amplify monopoly. "...Let's just look at what the results are of our free market." Straw man. You're misrepresenting this current system as a free market in order for you to attack the free market. We have a mixed economy with heavy government interference, so it's not a free market. We ranked 18th last year on the economic freedom index. Every one of those problems you listed have the fingerprint of government. Inflation doesn't fall from the sky, it's deliberately stoked by government via printing an unlimited money, which devalues our cash. Today's wars, wealth disparity, and expensive healthcare are thanks to government selling its power to corporations (as long as government has power, it'll continue selling it). "The top tax rate used to be over 90% on wealthier Americans." Hardly anyone paid those barbaric rates. Government actually earned more tax revenue after it lowered taxes. "These smaller companies would likely pay better as they would need to be more competitive to attract talent instead of being so big that they control most of the labor market for their industry." Small companies cannot compete with the large ones with all these costly regulations. The big ones are big because they have little competition (because of regulations). "Saying the restaurant worker wouldn’t get her job with a higher minimum wage is another lie. A higher minimum wage would mean that instead of customers subsidizing the employers payroll by paying tips they would just pay slightly higher prices." Non sequitur; the two sentences are argumentatively unrelated. Inexperienced workers are more likely to not have their first jobs if minimum wage is raised because businesses would only be seeking experienced ones. And are you stating that higher minimum wage leads to higher consumer prices? I agree. "...It’s misleading to say he’s a 'craven opportunist' for wanting a federal minimum wage of $15/hour. Yes sometimes companies lobby for regulations that help them and hurt their competitors but this is a little different." Why because you happen to agree with it? "This is a law that would be applied to all businesses unlike say car dealerships lobbying successfully so Tesla can’t sell cars in Texas." The fact that the law is applied to all businesses is exactly why Bezos is in on it. This law will hurt many small businesses nationwide but not him, granting him more monopoly. He's a craven opportunist. "And these other competitors could also largely replace their employees with robots so that’s a silly argument." No doubt they will thanks to minimum wage increases and more regulations that make hiring humans undesirable. "And furthermore, Stossel, what’s your solution for that which will continue to be a long term problem? Robots taking most humans jobs." Not minimum wage increase that's for sure. The solution is the free market (absent government intrusion). Government getting out of the way creates lots of opportunities. "That will only lead to greater inequality and destruction of the middle class so free markets will become even more unfortunate for 90% of America as robots advance. " Again, your characterization of today's restrained system as free market is inaccurate. Minimum wage increase and other regulations speed up automation. What leads to greater income inequality is government reconstructing the playing field for large businesses. "Libertarians claim to be against many of the things that their version of an economic system causes. Their view of the world is about as rosy and inaccurate as a pure socialist. " A mixed economy with corporatism is not the libertarian's economic system, actual free market is. You know what's rosy? Mindlessly believing that government looks after our interests when time and time again it has demonstrated that it hasn't.

Ben G I think we agree on the same things as the problems, we just disagree on the solutions. We agree that the problem is corporations influencing government. We disagree over the solutions. I feel that this is a common symptom of capitalism that eventually corporations realize its more effective to use government for their interests then to innovate and provide value. I agree that often regulations are used by big corporations to keep out small business’ from competing with them. But that doesn’t mean all regulations do that. That’s about as oversimplifying as liberals who blame guns for violence. I think the idea of a truly free market economy being possible is like pure socialists thinking their utopia will work. I think progressives and libertarians can at least agree on a few very important things and fight the corporatists and deep state together on: Ending the corrupt wars, legalize drugs, and end the surveillance state and the trampling of our civil liberties. Maybe we can agree to make lobbying illegal to some extent with the form it’s practiced currently? Kavanaugh should have never been put on the Supreme Court and not because of the sex-assault accusations. That traitor helped write the Patriot Act which violated our 1st, 4th, 5th and 6th amendment rights. Then after our hero Snowden revealed what the NSA was doing Kavanaugh said it was ok for them to do it. At least libertarians and progressives can agree on many more issues than people realize.

@@bengood5499 I am curious what the libertarian explanation of the American "gilded age" is, since it consisted of monopolies and trusts forming within a mostly free market environment.

So basically what you are saying is: "Regulation is bad, but we can fix things by applying even more regulation."

@@LouisVictor767 "I feel that this is a common symptom of capitalism that eventually corporations realize it's more effective to use government for their interests than to innovate and provide value." No that's the common symptom of a mixed economy, not capitalism. Capitalism can perfectly exist without any government interference, but not a mixed economy. "I agree that often regulations are used by big corporations to keep out small businesses from competing with them. But that doesn't mean all regulations do that." All regulations are an inconvenience. It's basically government saying, "You cannot do this or I'll extort/jail you." Some degree of prosperity is attained in spite of these inconveniences. The more we're free, the more we'll be prosperous. "That's about as oversimplifying as liberals who blame guns." Not all oversimplifications are wrong. Just because the oversimplification of guns by liberals is wrong, it doesn't mean my oversimpification of regulations being inconvenient is wrong. "I think the idea of a truly free market economy being possible is like pure socialists thinking their utopia will work." Conflating one's liberty-based utopia with a big government utopia and concluding that all utopias don't work is disingenuous. From what we can see so far, government doesn't seem to be working. "Maybe we can agree to make lobbying illegal to some extent with the form it's practiced currently?" Good luck with that. Politicians willingly shutting down their most lucrative means of income is a wishful thinking. Not to mention they might still try taking bribes behind the curtains. You don't fix a problem just by making it illegal on a piece of paper. If you want to get rid of lobbying, the only way is to dismantle the very thing lobbyists crave to purchase; government power. Progressives are generally libertarian on social issues, but authoritarian on ecomomic issues. I'm afraid it's going to be hard to get along especially on economic issues.

Unless they’re handicapped?

To be more clear, I mean that unless there is a particular concrete reason why someone cannot improve in their productivity, one ought to strive to add more value to what they are doing and thus get compensated more. I am certainly not saying that handicapped people should be paid min. wage!

Lol 50% of workers in the US makes less then 30k a year. Give your head a shake not everyone can make good money. The hardest worker are the minimum wage worker. I make awesome money and work half as hard as someone on minimum wage.

I'm not sure what your point is

My point is most people are stuck in these dead end jobs making minimum wage. Everyone says there entry level jobs but yet 50 percent of workers in the state make 30k. Its not because every one cant make good money. Its capitalism drives the wages down to make more money. Lossing unions drove the wages down. I bet you are thinking thats why all the companies left, no its the capitalist that want to exploit wages in third world countries to make more money. If the company's were co-op's they would not be able to move without the approval of the workers and I dont think many would move. The problem is this bs free market were the rich get richer.

shut the fuck up and keep your fucking idiotic mouth shut. you shouldn't speak since you clearly don't even have two brain cells to rub together.

@@HamguyBacon Well aren't you just an adorable little cupcake. Any reason for the totally reasonable outburst? Has your mommy not rubbed one out for you lately? Little pent up frustration perhaps? Anyway, thanks for the chuckle you knuckle dragger ^_^ It's nice to know drooling basement whales are still pounding their foreheads against keyboards in anger at opinions they disagree with. Good luck in life n all that. God knows you're going to need it.

We've already tried that in history and major companies took advantage of it. Pay attention to history man and quit being so hard core Republican that you forget they aren't always right. This is coming from a independent that swings right keep in mind.

@@kysier6015 The reason is you are a fucking idiot with idiotic ideas. nothing you said would ever work. companies would choose the lowest wage and it is not employee's that will compete but the employers since they are the ones who offer the jobs. if you don't accept working for 2cents then you could always find another job.

@@smothmc The purpose of the minimum wage was to stabilize the post-depression economy and protect the workers in the labor force. The minimum wage or rather, the FLSA enacted in 1938 was designed to create a minimum standard of living to protect the health and well-being of employees. It's primary focus was under skilled workers or workers in low demand jobs that lacked the ability to bargain for their wages. During the time it worked exceptionally well, allowing the bottom 5% to climb out of poverty and have an acceptable standard of living. In terms of inflation, the idea was congress would review and increase the minimum wage every year to account for rising prices, as predicting the rate of inflation was quite difficult. Unfortunately the wording did not require congress to make any changes at all, only to review it. Up until 1981 the rate was indeed increased every year, usually by an increment of .30 to .50 an hour. Between 1981 and 1991 it was not increased at all, even though inflation substantially rose. Between 91 and 96 it was increased once, and then again was not increased until 2007, and of course, we have not seen an increase since 2009. None of the previous changes accounted for the severe gaps in between, and as such, the minimum wage no longer provides what the original act intended it to, and that is a standard of living that allows for all basic needs to be met at 30-40 hours a week. (Had it followed the rate of inflation, Min wage would fall somewhere between 10.25/h and 11.50/h). *The real reason* I argue for no Min wage, is because I find it highly unlikely we will see another min wage increase anytime soon, as republicans feverishly fight it now. Makes little sense, considering the GOP are what created the wage, and up until somewhat recently it was standard practice to raise it yearly. But anyway, considering in many states they are managing to lower the wage to the federal standard, and in washington they have prevented it from being raised for nearly a decade, it seems that no longer is an option. At the current rates, especially in high cost states, many are living in a state of poverty due to low wages. That's not an assumption, but a statistical fact. Since raising the wage to a reasonable rate seems an impossibility (democrats are pushing for it to be too high, republicans refuse to budge, and we have a stalemate, ad infinitum), a desperate act such as removing min wage seems only viable option left. *Please understand* my view point comes from a clear lack of options. That is all. *Also* I'm a moderate, slightly right leaning, and as you can see @Hamguy Bacon I'm not just talking out of my ass.

I think you missed the point

I make only $12/h and I dont qualify for food stamps nor do I need them. No Amazon employee qualified due to their pay. They qualified due to life choices. For example, if they have kids, they can get food stamps at higher incomes than people without children. So you are saying that if a person chooses to have a child, the company should have to pay them more? If the woman chooses to be a single parent, that the company should have to pay them more? That if the person refuses to work a second job to be responsible for their life choices, that the company should pay them more? The wage the company pays is already enough to have a decent life on. but people feel entitled to more and more without taking on more responsibility to get it. I heard some young people saying they are entitled to a house simply for being born :/

@@waltermh111 Okay; I admit that I'm not from the US so am not familiar with the way the American be edits system works. In the UK, there is a similar debate going on around Amazon and a thing called "Working Tax Credit" - which is literally a wage subsidy. Nor do I really have a concept of purchasing power in USD, so I have not really been comparing like with like. Addressing your actual point though; children are unusual since there are few life choices that are literally necessary for our species to continue. I would personally say that based on that, you should be able to raise a child on a basic wage. If you disagree with me, then that's fair enough, that's you're prerogative.

@@italktoomuch6442 No, never since the beginning of time has that been a rule of thumb. It has always been that once a couple has a child, the father, if he hadnt already, would assume more responsibility to care for the child. It is entitlement to think you are owed more for doing a basic job that anybody else could do. But even so, I guarantee that I could raise a child on $12/h but then I was taught how to use money as a child. So instead of feeding into victim mentality, why not teach people how to be responsible? For example, move out of the expensive area even if it means commuting another 15 minutes each way. Use handmedowns, thrift stores, handmade toys (used to be all the rage before people became spoiled and thought kids always needed the latest things), and so on. Being smart with money is key, but it needs to be taught. There are also many charities in cities to help people get by. Use them. The right donate and volunteer far more than the left does, because they care about community, not virtue signaling and forcing others to give. Promoting volunteerism without the virtue signaling or moreso the gatekeeping is great :) If people cant or refuse to learn to better their lives, then you dont make them dependent on what you force others to give, you focus on volunteerism and accept that some people just wont make it. Clearly under liberalism, things are only getting worse for the lower class, so dont act like everybody makes it under that system. Heck, the most liberal of systems, marxism, has the most deaths of any ideology attributed to it.

@@waltermh111 Hey, I'm not going to pretend that the present system is working for anyone. (Though to anyone outside the US, calling an interventionist system "liberal" is completely backwards, but that's just semantics.) Everywhere other than the US - the only country in the western world without paid parental leave - that IS the rule of thumb. And can I just say, well done on beating the system to provide a tolerable life for your hypothetical child with eighteen years of blood, sweat and tears, by the way. Christ, it is hard enough being an impoverished working single parent without having to make them toys with your bare hands. I'm sorry, I am slightly biased because I know too many people in that situation, and I never cease to be amazed at their ability to keep going. What I am trying to say is that the present crappy system appears to be exactly what Stossel is advocating for. I fail to see why sponging off charity is any different to sponging off government - it is still relying on others' money to make up for money you could have earned for yourself. From the receiver's point of view it is still dependency. And we should not be advocating for a system that necessitates either dependency, or using every single fibre of one's being merely for your family to survive, before you even talk about social mobility. (Since most single parents don't actually CHOOSE to be single.) I'm not saying that we should make higher wages mandatory, it just amazes me that we have created a culture where keeping people on crappy wages when you are ABLE to pay them more is considered a virtuous thing. In the west, that virtue is pretty unique to the US and UK as well, by the way. Go to Germany and do that and people consider your company a failure because you have to resort to that. They look after their workers. That's why they can reap the benefits of having fewer labour regulations - the culture means their workers don't need them.

@@waltermh111 (And all of that is before you start talking about worker motivation and productivity because they simply have more energy, and the macroeconomic benefits of higher middle class purchasing power.)

Jack MeOff reasons!!!!

You mean why should an unskilled worker get the same basic necessities as a skilled worker?