The Piggery Award

While pondering Congress’s rejection of a minimum wage increase this week, it’s helpful to recall the basic taxonomic distinction between Predators and Pigs. Predators – in this case, those who employ people at unlivable wages – suck the marrow out of their employees, transform eager young women into stress-injured cripples, and virtually orphan the children whose parents are forced to work two or more jobs to support them.

Pigs, on the other hand, sit by wriggling with delight at these cannibalistic proceedings. It’s their job to oink out choruses of praise for the Predators. “Predation is Prosperity!” they proclaim, all the while hoping that some little scraps of flesh will fall their way.

So the Piggery of the Month award goes to those members of the US Congress who voted themselves a “cost of living adjustment” raise of $3300 while refusing to raise the minimum wage from a pathetic $5.15 an hour. As economic commentator Holly Sklar notes, Congressional pay will have increased by $34,900 between 1997 and 2007—an amount that it would take three minimum wage workers one year to earn (or one minimum wage worker three years) – to $171,800 a year, plus luxurious benefits.

From a Congress that has consistently cut taxes for the wealthy, themselves included, while cutting programs that serve the poor and the middle class, the minimum wage vote is not entirely surprising. What merits special notice in this instance is the unctuous rhetoric that arose from the sties as Republicans rushed to explain that by holding down the minimum wage they were actually helping the poor. If we don’t keep wages down, they said, grease dripping from the corners of their mouths, the Predators might find their prey less tasty, and unemployment will rise!

Never mind that there is no empirical evidence for this prediction. Employment didn’t plunge the last time the minimum wage was increased, in 1997, nor has this happened in any of the states – Massachusetts for example – that have raised their own minimum wages in the last few years. I grant you that there might be trouble if the minimum wage were to rise at the same rate as CEO pay. As the Institute for Policy Studies reported in 2005, “If the minimum wage had risen as fast as CEO pay since 1990, the lowest paid workers in the US would be earning $23.03 an hour today, not $5.15 an hour.”

Nor is it true, incidentally, that the minimum wage is paid mostly to teenagers working to support their Abercrombie and Fitch habits. According to economist Heather Boushey at the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities, fewer than one in five minimum wage workers is under the age of 20. In my experience, many of those youthful minimum wage workers are in fact making important contributions, however tiny, to their families’ inadequate incomes.

But maybe the Congressional Republicans are right about something. Maybe the number of jobs should go down as the pay rises – beginning in Congress itself. If you consider the high cost of a typical Congressperson – not only in salary but in botched and pro-Predation policies – you have to ask: Do we really need all those states?

Some states aren’t waiting for Congress. In Arizona, Arkansas, Michigan, Montana, Nevada, and Ohio, coalitions are working to increase the state minimum wage through ballot initiatives.

Otherwise there are the fall Congressional elections to consider, when any number of Pigs may come to comprehend the concept of ham.

Comments

[Greg]

But what about that Senator who got up after Kennedy--shaking his head. I've seen that head shaking before...at home, at work... (Bush is a head shaker too I think).

Is their no defense to the shaking head?--especially following anything remotely having to do with Kennedy?

Do we drop what Kennedy is supporting (common good)? Or is their a way to weave a clear and concise message--an "elevator pitch" into a broader narrative that overwhelms the shaking heads. (reading Crashing the Gate)

By the way, what do you think of this site:
http://www.livingwagecampaign.org/index.php?id=1953

[realpc]

I wonder if Ted Kennedy voted against the $33,000 raise?

[Greg]

What difference would it make?

[realpc]

It would show that liberals can be pigs also!

A much better idea than raising the minimum wage would be to stop businesses from hiring illegal immigrants. The demand for unskilled labor would increase dramatically, and wages would automatically rise.

I actually think the minimum wage concept is an insult -- it tells people they are being paid more than they're worth, out of the kindness of the government.
If someone is not satisified with their income, that could motivate them to improve their skills. People are capable of so much when motiviated, and of so little when treated like helpless victims.

[David Rosnick]

Pardon me, but is a minor correction in order? I think Heather will be surprised to find out she works for CBPP. When I last saw her, that was at the Center for Economic and Policy Research.

[JP Merzetti]

Ah, luvly stuff with that early morning first cuppa coffee!
Reminds me of our provincial minister back in 1995 and his comment about how poor people could get a little more creative inventing new recipes for canned tuna.............
(as most other forms of protein were moving beyond their budgets.)

Last raise in minimum wage all the way back to 1997?
And just how much has the cost of living gone up in that time? 9 years is an epoch to the neocons.

Loved the quip about the nation of orphans due to multiple-job parents.

-while indentured college grads duke it out with middle-aged parents for these jobs, minimum-waged or otherwise - globalists ponder the fact that this "wage" (living or dead)
is still miles beyond what a Chinese (or Mexican, for that matter) worker will toil for.
(can you say "reduction"?)

-reduction: what Congress will not consider when it comes to wasteful consumption of non-renewable resources (global warming and its consequences be damned) let alone a better plan all around for a quality of life we always could afford, had we made that a priority.

The cost of labor - has become a cute trick of "now you see it, now you don't" monopoly economists who never seem to stop and consider just what it is that people actually live on - (other than their home equity.)

The piggies are all too well aware of what it takes to pay the bills these days.
I suppose just like everything else they'd love to retract back into boardroomed corporate control, they appear to be well on the way of having privatized the legislature as well.

[realpc]

I am not sure things are really as bad as progressives claim. Most Americans are still happily watching DVDs on their new flat screen TVs and driving huge SUVs.

The poverty statistics are not simple to interpret, but of course there is still poverty and of course many Americans are struggling to pay for medical drugs and their kids' college (which they have been brainwashed to believe they absolutely need).

So what do progressives recommend as a solution to poverty? Many of them, including Barbara, agree that state-controlled socialism is not an answer. The opposite -- extreme libertarianism -- has not been tried, but would obviously result in chaos and gangster government.
Worker-owned co-ops might work in relatively small and simple contexts, but would not scale.
parecon seems like a hideously complex and convoluted scheme that, like worker co-ops, could only function in small and simple contexts, if at all.

I think the best solution is what has evolved naturally in all the advanced nations -- free enterprise controlled by laws. The laws must be constantly revised and improved as conditions change.

And we need more turnover in congress.

[Barbara E]

To David -- Yikes! Sorry for mislocating Heather, and grateful for the correction.

[Greg]

"I actually think the minimum wage concept is an insult -- it tells people they are being paid more than they're worth"

I think people are worth more than they're being paid.

I suppose that's the essential difference between you and me.

Just because people want to be paid what they're worth (the Senate) doesn't make them pigs.

A pig is someone who denies paying what someone is worth.

[Sharon]

It's already illegal for businesses to hire illegal immigrants, realpc. What's your point?

[realpc]

The law is not being enforced, as everyone can see. And maybe the penalty has to be increased.

[Paul]

Minimum wage in Canada varies from province to province, but overall, it is a few dollars higher than $5.15 (including taking into account the exchange rate)

ref: http://canadaonline.about.com/library/bl/blminwage.htm

For those that suddenly find themselves unemployed, and have been paying into the national employment insurance (EI) program, they may qualify to recieve unemployment insurance benefits for a period of about 28 weeks. The basic benefit rate is 55% of your average insured earnings up to a maximum amount of $413 per week. Your EI payment is a taxable income, meaning federal and provincial or territorial — if it applies — taxes will be deducted.

Ref: http://www.hrsdc.gc.ca/asp/gateway.asp?hr=/en/ei/types/regular.shtml&hs=aed#much

[A Canadian]

Since these politicians are so smart (of yeah, and you all elected them in the first place!) don't you think it would be a good idea to raise the minimum wage? After all it would mean more tax money to pay for their own pay increases! Since income tax is based on a percentage of income wouldn't it make sense to increase the minimum wage so that the govenment coffers (or should I say troughs!) grow?

[Ceci]

If you want to understand more fully what Barbara intuitively knew and showed us as day to day experiences in her books, then I can recommend another book I just found yesterday. It's called "The Post-Corporate World: Life After Capitalism" by David D. Korten. Thanks to his book I'm learning a bit more about the economic policies that are driving us (like lemmings?) toward the edge of a precipice we might not be able to climb back up.

FWIW...the book is available to read from many libraries as online editions. Try searching local university libraries and you mght find that it's available online for free for you too.

[Ceci]

Oooops! The author's name is David C. Korten...not D.

[Bobby Decker]

I've watched Republicans by the time the next Presidental election 1998 I will have seen them milk the promise of takeing America back to the good old days [1950s] Ronald Regean was the master.{ Read { WHATS THE MATER WITH KANSAS } the problem since I was 10 and 11 is a real Democrat has'nt got a chance in hell of being elected President, "Paul Wellstone" Russ Feingold".And am so tired of crying over the so called Liberal media,when I was a boy they called it the Jew controled media its the same let them eat cake croud they just changed the title to liberal media, funny thing most media is owned by rich Repuplican Multinational corporate types of people.Now on the miniminum wage it needs to be replaced by a national living wage probally around $10.00 an hour, and should be automaticaly indexed to the { REAL RATE} of inflation every year plus a smaller extra amount added above just the rate of inflation so every generation of the bottom 20-25% will be movine away from the lingering underclass and dont get me started on how the Federal Reserve keeps wages down by creating a recesion every time the underclass starts moving up.

[mickeymouse]

Interestingly, the logical fallacies Barbara may be said to employ in her recent blog entry are 'horse laughs' and 'ad hominem' attacks.

The horse laugh attempts to dissuade true examination of an issue by rendering the opponent ridiculous in the eyes of the audience by poking fun. This takes the form of dividing business owners and congresspeople into two stereotypical, and hence comic, categories: predators and pigs.

Moreover, the ad-hominem attacks are flat-out unnecessary if the point of the blog entry is to contruct a good argument for a minimum wage increase; psuedo logic is never necessary when there exists genuine concern and evidence.

How does the phrase 'grease dripping from their mouths' necessarily detract from the unemployment argument? It doesn't - rather, the phrase is meant to distract the reader from actually examining the merits of Barbara's argument, that is, whether or not the unemployment argument holds water.

[Amber]

I find nothing comical about predators or pigs and appreciate Ehrenreich's use of metaphor. Capitalists do prey upon the disenfranchisement of those who must work for minimum wage. Senators do act in self-serving, near-sighted and greedy ways. The comparison is apt. How sad that a literary device becomes reduced to an 'ad hominem' attack. (Though if you are going to pick a nit, mickeymouse, then take issue with the unfair stereotyping of the literal pig, not the metaphorical ones. Pigs are noble beasts that deserve better than constant analogous ties to politicians.)

Many could lay out a persuasive pro vs. con essay about an increased minimum wage's effects on unemployment. Graphs and data tables and flow charts would no-doubt be involved. Few, however, can write a concise, thought-provoking, and cleverly biting editorial on the Senate's hypocrisy vis a vis the minimum wage issue.

[Claire]

The minimum wage being introduced into the UK hasn't exactly scuppered our healthy employment situation (so healthy we are employing workers from Central Europe by the bucketload). And its a fair bit more generous than five bucks an hour.

[yuriy]

Hi,
I Found Absolutely FREE PlayBoy & PentHouse:
http://www.playmates-girls.com
http://www.oxpe.net
If I find something else I'll inform you.
Best Regards, Yuriy

[KelleyBell]

I long for the day when our elders are considered wise, when they act in unison for the greater good, and think long term, "for the seventh generation."

[Alex]

I for one AM in favor of outsourcing...and we should start with the Congress, the Senate, and even the President.

After all, those are positions that can be performed cheaper and more effectively than they are today.

These people vote themselves pay raises, full-retirement, and health insurance coverage when no one's looking.

So, those are positions that are perfect to see if they can done elsewhere.