Why minimum wage is wrong

First off, how many people actually work for minimum wage? Not many. If you do, you are probably unskilled or just started your job.

Minimum wage is for high school students, college kids, and those people just entering the work force.

If the minimum wage were required to force employers to pay employees enough money, why aren't we all working for minimum wage? I'll tell you why, COMPETITION. As workers we have to compete for jobs and if you are willing to work for less, than you will probably get the job over me. But if I wanted to work for less than minimum wage in order to get a job, the law wouldn't allow me to. That is a violation of my rights. But, our employers also have to compete. If one company is offering me more money than another, I will get a job with the company offering more money.

Second, no one said you are supposed to work for minimum wage for 40 hours a week for the rest of your life. Get experience, move up, make more money.

Minimum wage only serves to raise the bar for everyone. Those who were making for more than minimum wage will now ask their employers for an equal raise to what the minimum wage workers got. Anyone making only minimum wage might actually have the bar raised over their heads if their employer cannot afford to pay them anymore.

So two things happen when minimum wage rates are raised, people lose their jobs when employers can't afford the rate hike, and everyone else wants a raise too thus canceling out any benefit to making more money since prices will be raised in turn to pay for the higher wages.

Let's not forget that as long as the Federal Government keeps borrowing and the Federal Reserve keeps printing money for them, the value of the dollar will continue to decline until it is totally worthless.

So lets not worry so much about minimum wages and focus instead on fiscally responsible government. That way you can have your minimum wage if you want it and it will never have to raised.

So next time you hear that they want to raise the minimum wage why don't you ask them, "Why do you want to lay people off and raise prices?"

Thanks for the Rewards Citi!

So I received my $100 JCPenny gift card that I purchased with the thank you points from my Citi Diamond prefered Rewards AmEx card. It felt good buying clothes and only having to pay 45 cents. So now that I've got my free $100 in clothes I've swithced my rewards card over to the Dividend card so I can start earning cash. There is only one thing left to do... Get a balance transfer check from my Citi MasterCard and start playing the balance transfer game. I love Citi bank!

Mass Health?

I ran across this editorial on The Wallstreet Journal online. In it Betsy McCaughey covers some of the finer points of the new Massachusetts Health Care bill. I for one won't be starting a business in Mass. anytime soon.

My Observations

Wow, I haven't posted in a long time. I guess I'm not much of a "blogger." I do, however, like to observe the world and try to tie everything together. So I've had plenty of time to gather information over the past month and with that I would like to make some predictions. Let me know what you think.

High commodity prices will lead tax payers to question our government's policies and lawmakers will demand retribution in the form of taxing corporations that actually make money. They will get re-elected because they "care." Prices will not go down, employer won't pay people more because their taxes will be too high.

In the meantime we will be fighting Iran, not because we are afraid of them militarily, but because all Ahmadinejad has to do is open his mouth and the price of oil goes up. The war will be expensive, so it's a good thing taxes went up on companies that actually produce results.

So in turn with oil prices the price of everything will go up. Inflation will be steadily increasing and the fed will continue to raise interest rates. It will be a great time to buy foreclosed property. Gold and commodities will be the only way to keep up with inflation. Gold will hit $2000 an oz, not because it is valuable, but because the dollar is worthless. The economy will collapse under the weight of war and tax burdens, but military recruiting will not be a problem because people will need to find work somewhere.

While the rest of the world is busy with Iran, China will make deals around the world to buy up resources before their dollars become worthless, driving the dollar down further. Within 50 years they will have the most powerful country in the world and will beginning showing their force by destroying anything that is anti-communist like democracy.

I hope you all like fried rice.

The 411 on 411

I was at a friends house tonight and before I got over there he had called for some pizza. He didn't know the number of the pizza place so he called 411 to get it. When he told me that, I became very disappointed in myself. I had known about free411 for a while now and I hadn't told him. When he found that out he told me that he calls 411 all the time.

So, since I feel so guilty I have to tell all of you, DON'T EVER DIAL 411. It's a waste of money. There is a free 411 service with the ingenious phone number of 1-800-FREE-411. Brilliant. So it real does cost nothing. To pay for it they will play you an add before they give you the number you want, but sometimes they don't and they just give you the number anyway. So please, please, please, never dial 411 again in your life, call 1-800-FREE-411 instead. It will make me feel better, thanks.

Massachusetts to provide health care for all

It sounds like a great idea, but is it really? The state of Massachusetts has passed a bill requiring all citizens who can afford it to have health insurance. Anyone who can't afford it will get help from the state. All they need now is the gov's signature to make it law.

I'm worried that the state will make it too easy for people to claim that they don't make enough money to afford insurance, forking the costs over to tax payers. Apparently the state isn't worried about that, "Political leaders in the state's capital, Boston, claim the law will have only a minimal impact on the state budget, with a large chunk of the needed cash coming from the federal government." I don't think that that is right. The state essentially will have no consequences if the plan doesn't work and the rest of us will have to pay for it.

I see two major problems with this plan. Individuals who don't carry health insurance may be required to pay a $1000 fine for not having health insurance, but most of those people who don't have insurance don't have it for the simple reason of affordability. So how does this help other than to spend more tax money. They are not going to be collecting very many fines. And how will they determine if you have insurance in the first place? I can understand requiring car insurance. If you want a license plate you must prove you have insurance, that makes sense. Apparently Massachusetts is saying that if you want a LIFE you must prove you have insurance. I really don't see how this can be constitutional. If I don't want car insurance I don't have to have a car, but what if I don't want health insurance?

The second problem I see is the fines that they are going to put on employers with over 10 employees. "At the same time the bill envisages levying fees from private businesses with more than 10 workers that fail to provide health insurance for their payrolls. The fee would be $295 per worker per year." Maybe I'm wrong, but doesn't it already cost employers much more than that to provide healthcare? Heck, I pay more than that myself for my share of my healthcare plan at work. So if you own a business it might be cheaper just to pay the fine. Now we are talking about all kinds of employers dumping their employee healthcare plans. That is not good, but perhaps it might kickstart a change in the health insurance business and end up with lower fees for individuals, but I doubt it since they will pay whatever it takes to get insurance before paying the fines. Or maybe they won't since a $1000 fine is cheaper than actually getting the insurance anyway. And what does that mean provide health insurance? Does that mean pay the full cost or provide the option to the employee without the business paying anything?

This whole thing wreaks of poor planning, but I am still anxious to see what happens when the government intervenes in the free market. The government doesn't belong in the insurance business. That can be witnessed by social security and medicare/medicaid.

Cashed in bonus points, Now cashing out credit card

I cashed in my bonus points from making a purchase with my Citi AMEX rewards cards. I used the 10,000 points for a $100 JCPenny gift card.

Now I'm thinking of converting the card over to a dividend card (I hate rewards, but I love cash). So if they let me I will stop using my Citi MC Dividends card and switch to the AMEX. That way I can use the higher credit limit on the Master Card and take a 0% balance transfer and put it in the bank. Sounds like a plan to me, I just hope I don't get burned somehow. If anyone has any advcie on balance transfers let me know, I could use it.

Free After Rebate (May take up to one year)

So I finally received my rebate from PCUSA. In an earlier post I mentioned that I had applied for this rebate over a year ago. After not hearing anything after 4 months or so I tried to contact PCUSA and got nowhere. I completely forgot about the rebate until I was cleaning my room a couple months back and found copies of the request, so I decided to try again. This time I actually got a response. They still told me that there was no record of me requesting the rebate, but I made some noise and now I am $15 richer today. I know it's only $15 but it didn't take that much time to write the emails, it just took alot of waiting to get my check. So all of you out there waiting for rebates, don't give up, make some noise, and let them know that your not going away.