Nothing Should Be Free

"A reported 30 million Americans — one in four workers — make less than $8.70 an hour, which is not enough to lift an American family of four out of poverty.
"These days, productivity is high, unemployment is low and 30 million Americans can't keep their heads above water."
http://www.mysanantonio.com/opinion/columnists/vlanda/stories/
MYSA090406.2O.landa.2122d8f.html

Harold Meyerson wrote something similar last week for the American Prospect and the Washington Post, although his was much sappier and bitter.

During the debate to raise the minimum wage recently, it was reported that the number of minimum wage-earners who support a family was less than 10%. No doubt there is some overlap between that figure and the 30 million who make less than $8.70/hour. Most who make that much are not the primary breadwinners in the family. They are more likely the stay-at-home spouse looking for a little extra income, the senior citizen looking to supplement retirement savings or the teenager living at home working his/her first job. Incidentally, the latter represents the worker who is most hurt by the minimum wage. As long as an employer has to pay a government-mandated wage, he/she may as well hire someone with more work experience thereby depriving the inexperienced teen the chance to ascend that first rung on the work ladder up.

Despite the >10% figure, it should be said that it's on the provider(s) of the household to do better. We live in a country where education is the key to getting ahead. (Thanks to anti-choice teachers' unions, that's even hard to get for some.) And that's not a bad thing. It's a fact of life. I knew working for and supporting myself on approximately double the minimum wage (before it was raised the last time) wasn't going to cut it, so I did something about it. The government, whether local, state or federal, only hurts people when it sets such a wage floor. Not only does it price people out of the labor market, it encourages those who are hired at that wage to park their lives there.

Incidentally, the reason why the minimum wage failed recently was that Democrats insisted on sticking it to people who worked hard enough to attain a sizable estate. They want to help and improve the lives of the poor, but when they earn too much, they want to confiscate more than half of it when you die.