Crass Warfare

Sorry about missing yesterday. Thinking up something to be coherent about daily is harder than I thought.

So, today's subject is the minimum wage increase, and the opposition to it. Frankly, I find it mystifying that this is even an issue. Inflation in prices has continued since the last minimum wage hike, so why shouldn't wages keep up? No, really, why shouldn't minimum wage hikes be triggered automatically, indexed to inflation? Because that would make life easier for those making the minimum? I know you've all heard the argument that we shouldn't make life easier for minimum-earners, because they are losers. Apparently, we're all still in high school, where the number one priority is being able to identify, feel superior to, and mock all the laaa-hooooooo-seers. It's especially important that we rub their face in their loserdom, it seems, lest they start to think of themselves as human beings with value not measured by their wallet's contents.

And this is where that real third rail of American politics, class, comes in. We're told, over and over, by very rich people,. and those on the payrolls of the very rich, that there are no classes in America. That really, the interests of the richest of the rich are our own interests, because there's no class. That wages are best left to the "marketplace", because their we excel or fail based on our merit, because there is no class. There's a lack of class involved, all right, but not in the way it's portrayed.

As expected the "libertarian" defenders of all things free-market (as long as it benefits the rich), have rolled out the arguments against the very concept of a minimum wage, or any government regulation at all. Hell, I've seen it argued that it's tantamount to slavery. Yes, having to deal with minimum wages and affirmative action and OSHA laws is exactly like slavery. Excuse me while I roll my eyes. Look, the arguments against a minimum wage seem to be dependent on certain assumptions. For instance, that the consequences of not taking a job are exactly the same as those of not offering one. Or that all employers will make an immediate, accurate, honest, and fair evaluation of a prospective employee's potential contribution, and then offer a wage exactly in line with that. And a dishonest boss will be promptly driven out of business by the invisible hand. And anyway, there's no way that an employer would take advantage of someone from a lower socioeconomic class, because there is no class. Because we live in a pure and perfect meritocracy.

And if you'll buy that, come see me after this post, because I'd like to have an exciting conversation with you about the many merits of bridge ownership.

EDIT: Hot damn, we won this one.