[HN Gopher] New California law raises minimum wage for fast food...
       ___________________________________________________________________
        
       New California law raises minimum wage for fast food workers to $20
       per hour
        
       Author : grecy
       Score  : 52 points
       Date   : 2023-09-28 21:50 UTC (1 hours ago)
        
 (HTM) web link (apnews.com)
 (TXT) w3m dump (apnews.com)
        
       | gruez wrote:
       | Why fast food workers specifically? I suppose their jobs is worse
       | than a desk job, or even a retail job, but there are arguably far
       | worse jobs out there (eg. delivery workers, landscapers, or
       | agricultural workers). The article's explanation of "most of the
       | often overlooked workforce are the primary earners for their low-
       | income households" isn't really convincing. Delivery drivers or
       | agricultural workers are probably even easier to overlook than
       | someone you have face to face interaction with, and I don't see
       | any reason why primary earners would prefer fast food jobs over
       | other jobs.
        
         | neilv wrote:
         | This later paragraph sounds relevant:
         | 
         | > _It also settles -- for now, at least -- a fight between
         | labor and business groups over how to regulate the industry. In
         | exchange for higher pay, labor unions have dropped their
         | attempt to make fast food corporations liable for the misdeeds
         | of their independent franchise operators in California, an
         | action that could have upended the business model on which the
         | industry is based. The industry, meanwhile, has agreed to pull
         | a referendum related to worker wages off the 2024 ballot._
        
         | [deleted]
        
         | mech765 wrote:
         | If they raised the minimum wage for all workers, it would have
         | a greater destabilizing effect, so they limited it to a smaller
         | group so they could get their message across while minimizing
         | the change they cause.
        
           | lotsofpulp wrote:
           | It just so happens that that particular tribe of people has
           | sufficient political power to push through an increase for
           | themselves.
           | 
           | See non English speaking farm workers that have their very
           | own exclusions to minimum wage laws, even on the west coast.
           | They just don't happen to have the political power, so they
           | get shafted.
           | 
           | Fracturing your opposition is a tried and true method to
           | break consensus.
           | 
           | Edit: I find it hilarious that even in this tribal
           | delineation, somehow people who work at a business that bakes
           | things got screwed.
        
           | JumpCrisscross wrote:
           | > _raised the minimum wage for all workers, it would have a
           | greater destabilizing effect_
           | 
           | Theory suggests this will happen at some point. Evidence
           | shows we aren't close to it.
           | 
           | Raising the minimum wage--across the board--to $25/hour in
           | non-rural counties and something lower in rural (where COL is
           | lower) would likely cause growth. Because while costs have
           | gone up, there is a massive purchasing power unleashed.
           | (Critically, this could only be done after zoning reform.
           | Otherwise the surplus will just go to landowners.)
        
           | TheOtherHobbes wrote:
           | Constantly raising and capturing profits has a far more
           | destabilising effect.
           | 
           | At some point this reality will become clear to US corporate
           | culture. But it may well be rather late and very messy.
        
         | akira2501 wrote:
         | I'm guessing because Newsom would like his name on the
         | presidential ticket next year and he's in the process of
         | backroom political negotiations "necessary" to shore up that
         | support. The specific mention of union negotiations bolsters
         | this conclusion.
         | 
         | This seems like a very shabby pitch to beleaguered American
         | workers and encodes the sad expectation that people supporting
         | a family of 4 should be doing so on a fast food job and now
         | they can, temporarily, due to a wage hike in an election year.
         | 
         | A boring dystopia, indeed.
        
           | tnel77 wrote:
           | Why is it that people working <less good jobs> shouldn't have
           | families? Why does half the country have such a firm belief
           | that the bottom tier of society has no place procreating?
        
             | dotnet00 wrote:
             | Probably because typically jobs such as in fast food are
             | seen as being for those too young to have a family,
             | teenagers, college students etc.
        
               | nickthegreek wrote:
               | Is that the reality of the fast food labor force though?
               | I don't think it is. I see less kids working at fast food
               | in my city than adults.
        
             | akira2501 wrote:
             | I don't believe that at all. I just don't believe that
             | minimum wage "hacks" like this are the correct tools to
             | solve the problem. I think policy energy would be much
             | better spent dealing with the over monopolization of our
             | economy and in creating new industries for these people to
             | own and to be employed by.
        
             | gmadsen wrote:
             | probably because there isn't much support for the
             | collective subsidizing the very personal choice of
             | procreating
        
               | Retric wrote:
               | Which looks really silly once significant negative
               | population growth kicks in. With US well below
               | replacement rate and net immigration rate down 58% since
               | 1998 and continuing to trend down. So things may start
               | getting interesting fairly soon.
               | 
               | https://www.macrotrends.net/countries/USA/united-
               | states/popu...
        
               | toomuchtodo wrote:
               | Sounds better than an economic system that demands
               | surplus labor to treat as disposable. Drive that total
               | fertility rate down.
        
               | Retric wrote:
               | Ultimately population scales the demand just as it scales
               | the workforce, so it's not inherently going to change
               | anything outside of extreme situations. Significant
               | negative population growth is however unpleasant because
               | the infrastructure you build today ends up excessive in
               | the future.
               | 
               | As to surplus labor you need flexibility simply from
               | people changing jobs. Average 1 month searching every 4
               | years and that's a 2.1% unemployment rate. Yes, many
               | people keep their jobs for very long periods but other
               | people job hop regularly.
        
               | adamisom wrote:
               | "the collective subsidizing the very personal choice of
               | procreating" I support massive subsidies because the sum
               | of these personal choices is equivalent to the next
               | generation's collective
        
         | fdr wrote:
         | Mechanism might be interesting. It's a rudimentary sectoral
         | bargaining arrangement
         | 
         | https://onlabor.org/california-fast-food-workers-secure-big-...
         | 
         | > Undeterred, labor advocates worked with progressive lawmakers
         | to gather enough votes to pass two more significant pieces of
         | labor legislation. First, AB 102, which was signed into law in
         | July, increased funding for California's Industrial Welfare
         | Commission (IWC), a long-dormant century-old wage board with
         | the power to set wages, hours, and working conditions by
         | industry. Second, AB 1228, which would have made franchisors
         | jointly liable for labor violations -- a long sought-after
         | provision that was taken out of the final version of the FAST
         | Act. According to reports, Governor Newsom led negotiations
         | between industry groups and unions over the summer, and with AB
         | 1228 set to pass this week -- the final week of California's
         | legislative session -- industry groups finally caved, agreeing
         | to withdraw the referendum in exchange for a rewritten AB 1228.
         | 
         | > The new bill, which the legislature passed on Thursday,
         | ditches joint franchisor liability entirely and officially
         | repeals AB 257. (As part of the negotiations, legislators also
         | agreed to defund the IWC.) But the bill largely keeps in place
         | the Fast Food Council -- with some important changes. First,
         | the government representatives on the Council are reduced to
         | nonvoting members, and the bill adds an independent member of
         | the public who will serve as chairperson, presumably carrying a
         | tiebreaking vote. The Council's standards would apply to
         | "limited-service" restaurants with over 60 establishments
         | nationwide that share a common brand. But instead of
         | promulgating standards with the force of law, the Council must
         | now submit any standard to the Labor Commissioner, who, upon
         | finding that it is consistent with the Council's mandate, will
         | then engage in a rulemaking process in accordance with
         | California's Administrative Procedure Act.
         | 
         | > The bill would set the hourly wage for fast-food workers at
         | $20 effective on April 1, 2024, and the Council may set wages
         | annually thereafter beginning in 2025
        
       | abtinf wrote:
       | Why are they trying to get rid of fast food workers?
        
       | yasp wrote:
       | Why not $100 per hour?
        
       | bhaney wrote:
       | I can't help but think that this is just going to accelerate
       | efforts to automate fast food workers. Then once the technology
       | works well enough to replace expensive labor in California,
       | there'll be very little stopping it from spreading everywhere
       | else, regardless of the minimum wage in other places.
        
         | JumpCrisscross wrote:
         | > _can 't help but think that this is just going to accelerate
         | efforts to automate fast food workers_
         | 
         | Given projected demographic-driven labour shortages, this is
         | good.
        
         | paulpauper wrote:
         | automation is expensive and hard to do at scale, and also prone
         | to problems. It also does not replace humans. Self-checkout
         | kiosks have been around for 15+ years but have not replaced
         | cashiers. Many fast food places have self-ordering kiosks but
         | this has not made employees obsolete.
        
           | mathgeek wrote:
           | The reality and likely future lies in the middle. Kiosks
           | reduce cashiers per shift rather than replacing them
           | completely. Many retailers only staff a single cashiered lane
           | with many self checkouts, for example.
        
         | hotpotamus wrote:
         | It doesn't appear that Flippy has taken off. I spent a bit of
         | time in a fast food kitchen around 20 years ago and it was
         | already pretty automated, but it seems like human hands are
         | quite hard to beat.
        
           | imchillyb wrote:
           | > https://www.indianarrative.com/culture-news/watch-
           | mcdonalds-...
           | 
           | December of 2022, McDonald's installed its first fully
           | automated restaurant in Texas.
           | 
           | This concept is only about 1-2 years away from burning across
           | the US like a wildfire.
        
           | bhaney wrote:
           | Cooks seem harder to automate, but I'm seeing kiosks replace
           | cashiers more and more lately.
        
             | CTDOCodebases wrote:
             | This was inevitable.
             | 
             | As a human it's hard to compete with a screen when the
             | person who needs to interact with you has used them for as
             | long as they can remember.
        
             | MrFoof wrote:
             | My local McDonald's just renovated with what I assume is
             | their newest layout concept. The front counter has exactly
             | two registers/terminals, of which even at a busy time
             | _(school out, so tons of teenagers packed into the place)_
             | , only one was staffed. Very small ordering counter. On the
             | other side of the area is a much larger pick up area with
             | order status screens.
             | 
             | There's only two electronic menu boards down from the
             | previous four. Yet six total self-order kiosks (three
             | double-sided), but the real expectation is people will just
             | place the order with the phone via mobile ordering. After
             | all, that's what most of the teenagers order did, in order
             | to get their $0.50 Double Cheeseburger _(with no additional
             | purchase)_.
             | 
             | Moreover, you can't see into the kitchen anymore _at all_.
             | It was a solid wood-decorated wall behind the counter,
             | clearly a  "hallway" or partition behind that, of which
             | behind that is likely the actual kitchen. They increased
             | the space of the dining area somewhat as a result.
        
               | dmoy wrote:
               | > in order to get their $0.50 Double Cheeseburger
               | 
               | I haven't been to McDonald's (in the US at least) in like
               | 20 years. Double cheeseburgers are only $0.50?? After
               | inflation that feels like it costs 25% of what I used to
               | pay.
        
               | bhaney wrote:
               | It's a special offer for using the app, not the normal
               | price
        
               | mathgeek wrote:
               | It's a promotional offer to get folks using the app and
               | hopefully turning on ads via notifications.
        
               | MrFoof wrote:
               | Absolutely not.
               | 
               | As others have mentioned, in-app coupon. Haven't seen it
               | recur since _(this was a few weeks ago)_.
               | 
               | Normal price of a Double Cheeseburger at that location is
               | $3.89 _($4.13 with sales tax)_.
        
             | calmworm wrote:
             | I much prefer a kiosk or ordering on my phone... and I also
             | rarely do a drive thru order. There is less chance of a
             | mistake when I enter the order myself.
        
         | doctorpangloss wrote:
         | Why would you bother, when the demand for hamburgers that cost
         | 2x as much is going to evaporate sooner than the robots get
         | invented?
         | 
         | Anyway, the restaurant & food business is complicated. Can or
         | will McDonald's serve hard alcohol in a drive-thru? Will
         | immigrant (illegal) labor even afford transportation to cities?
         | If the answer is yes to both questions, then a $20 minimum wage
         | won't matter.
        
         | georgeburdell wrote:
         | If McDonalds is any indication, they're more interested in
         | stuffing anti patterns and pop-up deals into the kiosk UI to
         | make them meaningful replacements for cashiers
        
           | nirav72 wrote:
           | I think McDonald's already saw the writing on the wall in
           | terms of lowering their labor cost. Where I live here in the
           | South-eastern U.S, most McDonald's have moved to Kiosks or
           | ordering via App. They started with 2 Kiosks shortly after
           | the post-2020 labor shortage. Then they added 4 more kiosks
           | to handle the morning and lunch time rush.
        
           | toast0 wrote:
           | McDonalds doesn't automate away a whole position at once,
           | just a bit here and there and soon enough you might be able
           | to handle a rush with one less person, or handle off peak
           | with one less person, or if you can't drop one person, one
           | person has more time to make sure the store is clean and
           | supplies are well stocked etc.
           | 
           | The push to self-ordering via kiosk and mobile ordering isn't
           | likely to be 100%, but the registers might be empty at times.
           | The automated soda dispensers don't do all the work, but they
           | reduce labor here and there. The thing to put ketchup and
           | mustard on at the same time saves a step.
        
         | LAC-Tech wrote:
         | I did a search, and 9% of Californias workforce are
         | undocumented. So you're just likely to see a shift away from
         | the de jure workforce to the de facto workforce, since the
         | costs are lower.
        
         | ejb999 wrote:
         | Yep, $20/hr plus benefits means for a 168 hour per week worker,
         | you (as an business owner) need to possibly pay as much as
         | $285K per year to cover a single worker 24 hours per day - even
         | if a robot cost a $1,000,000 it would pay for itself in less
         | than 4 years...Elon Musk (and other robot manufacturers) thanks
         | you for this law.
        
         | mensetmanusman wrote:
         | That's good for society when those technologies are scaled,
         | things become more anti-fragile.
        
         | hellojesus wrote:
         | It also means that anyone that can provide only $18/hour of
         | economic value is now banned from working at a fast food
         | restaurant.
        
           | aaomidi wrote:
           | So, how are you gauging if someone is offering $18 or $20?
        
           | woodruffw wrote:
           | That's not how wages work. Hourly wages aren't based on
           | _actual_ economic value; they 're based on a complex of
           | factors that make someone accept or leave a job (convenience,
           | opportunity cost, bargaining power, prior experience, etc.).
           | 
           | Fast food restaurants _clearly_ realize more than $20 /hr in
           | economic value from their hourly employees in California,
           | much like they do in Europe.
        
             | hellojesus wrote:
             | Of course there are multiple dimensions to the employees
             | decision of how much they are willing to trade their time
             | for, but they are always boiled down to a singular
             | financial value. This value is what they are paid.
             | 
             | I reject your assertion that an employee _clearly_ realizes
             | more than $20 /hr in value to their employer. But even if
             | they did: why should the employer be forced to pay them
             | more, when the job itself is unskilled and therefore has a
             | surplus of folks demanding the position, even at their
             | current rates of pay?
        
             | nwiswell wrote:
             | > Fast food restaurants clearly realize more than $20/hr in
             | economic value from their hourly employees in California,
             | much like they do in Europe.
             | 
             | This is certainly true on the whole, but it is not
             | necessarily true _at the margin_. It 's quite likely that
             | in response, fast food restaurants be motivated to slim
             | down their staffing more than they would otherwise.
        
           | nwah1 wrote:
           | "Legal Minimum Wage positively increases the productivity of
           | the nation's industry, by ensuring that the surplus of
           | unemployed workmen shall be exclusively the least efficient
           | workmen; or, to put it in another way, by ensuring that all
           | the situations shall be filled by the most efficient
           | operatives who are available...
           | 
           | What would be the result of a Legal Minimum Wage on the
           | employer's persistent desire to use boy labor, girl labor,
           | married women's labor, the labor of old men, of the feeble-
           | minded, of the decrepit and broken-down invalids and all the
           | other alternatives to the engagement of competent male adult
           | workers at a full Standard Rate? ... To put it shortly, all
           | such labor is parasitic on other classes of the community,
           | and is at present employed in this way only because it is
           | parasitic...
           | 
           | The unemployable, to put it bluntly, do not and cannot under
           | any circumstances earn their keep. What we have to do with
           | them is to see that as few as possible of them are produced."
           | 
           | - Sidney Webb, "The Economic Theory of the Minimum Wage"
        
           | leothecool wrote:
           | It would only mean that if wages were based on economic
           | value. Which, I guess could be true if hourly wage and
           | economic value mean the same thing.
        
             | hellojesus wrote:
             | Basic economics can be reduced to: Operate while
             | marginal_revenue >= marginal_cost (mr >= mc).
             | 
             | In this example, marginal cost just increased by some
             | delta, d, to get to $20. This means that anyone currently
             | working in such fashion that d > (mr - mc) now provides
             | negative value to their employer.
             | 
             | Furthermore, in any future venture, people will only be
             | hired if they can provide >= $20 in hourly revenue.
             | 
             | Likely fast food restaurants will raise prices to cover the
             | increased mc, so this ultimately gets passed on to the
             | consumer.
             | 
             | I don't understand why this is controversial.
        
           | KennyBlanken wrote:
           | Aside from that not being how labor economics work: no, it
           | reduces the business model of profiting off public and NPO
           | social assistance programs that enable corporations to employ
           | people at starvation wages.
           | 
           | If a business model relies upon paying people wages so low
           | they can't afford to live without government assistance, then
           | that business model is government subsidized.
           | 
           | The best example of this would be Walmart, who rake in
           | massive profits year after year while having employees whose
           | sole duty is to help employees with finding and filing for
           | public assistance programs, which the employees need because
           | they're paid so little.
           | 
           | No person in the US working a full-time job should be paid so
           | little that they cannot afford at a minimum the essentials
           | for living a healthy and happy life (ie, not just
           | food/shelter but for things like enough to be able to do
           | something in celebration of life's events, raise a child if
           | they wish, put money away for when they are at retirement,
           | etc.)
           | 
           | Among other things, this would substantially free up money
           | and administration resources to provide for those who are not
           | working and need help getting their life back together enough
           | to be employable again.
        
             | hellojesus wrote:
             | The government could easily solve this by not offering
             | welfare or social assistance programs.
             | 
             | In such cases, workers would simply be unwilling to work
             | somewhere that cannot provide an income to meet their
             | needs.
             | 
             | You describe a problem generated through moral hazard.
        
         | lefstathiou wrote:
         | Of course it will. And don't think the politicians don't
         | already know this. It's all part of the plan. Next on the
         | ballot is universal basic income for all who lost their jobs.
         | Voters for life.
        
         | toomuchtodo wrote:
         | Haven't automated CEOs away yet, so I'm sure these folks are
         | safe for now. CEOs are much more expensive and provide much
         | less value arguably. No CEO has ever served me a meal, for
         | example.
        
         | adrr wrote:
         | Warehouse workers get paid around the same rates in California
         | yet you don't see automated warehouses. You see things like
         | some goods to person robots and automated sortation and with
         | the big retailers like Amazon, they still throw labor at the
         | issue.
         | 
         | Industry has been trying to push automation with app based
         | ordering(eg: starbucks) even before this change.
         | 
         | https://www.indeed.com/q-amazon-warehouse-l-los-angeles,-ca-...
        
         | johnnyworker wrote:
         | That's just blackmail, like saying you have to legalize
         | prostitution to reduce rape. No. You have to stop exploiting
         | people or be eternally afraid of them, and eternally unable to
         | look in the mirror. That's what _needs_ doing.
        
       | pokstad wrote:
       | So weird. So now a non-fast food entry level job needs to compete
       | with a $20/hr fast food job? It'd be interesting to hear what
       | economists think about how this arbitrary incentive will
       | influence workers.
        
         | edgyquant wrote:
         | The biggest losers will be teenagers trying to get their first
         | job. Why would anyone hire that person when there will be
         | adults with job experience applying for the same pay. People
         | get triggered when you say these are jobs for kids, but some
         | jobs do need to be for them so they can earn money in high
         | school/college and have _something_ on a resume to prove they
         | showed up everyday.
        
           | digging wrote:
           | What? We really don't actually need high school kids working.
           | Most don't.
        
             | paulpauper wrote:
             | agree. that seems like an outdated concept by 50 years. i
             | would rather have employees with experience take those jobs
             | than teens who do their job poorly
        
               | UniverseHacker wrote:
               | How are they supposed to become adults with experience,
               | if they can't get jobs as teens?
               | 
               | I worked a ton of jobs as a teenager, and started a few
               | small businesses. I was highly motivated to prove myself
               | against adults with the attitude you have, so I was
               | working twice as hard and was making half the mistakes of
               | my adult co-workers.
               | 
               | I learned so much working as a teenager, and it was a
               | really enjoyable experience to feel useful, and to have
               | my own disposable income. Without it, my mental health
               | would have been much worse.
        
               | fzeroracer wrote:
               | All of these comments saying that you worked a ton of
               | jobs as a teenager and started small businesses: How many
               | of you even realize how out of date your concept of being
               | a teenager is like?
               | 
               | If a teenager is working it's in order to support their
               | parents nowadays. They're not building any sort of higher
               | experience flipping burgers or stocking shelves, they're
               | tanking their education in order to survive.
               | 
               | It certainly as hell wasn't aligned with my teenage
               | experience growing up poor. And more importantly think
               | about how far a minimum wage part time job as a teenager
               | is going to get you today vs 30 years ago relative to
               | inflation.
        
             | nickthegreek wrote:
             | We don't? I started working when I was 15 so I could buy a
             | car when I turned 16. With a car, all kinds of
             | opportunities open up. Like taking girls on dates, which,
             | what do you, costs money. Luckily for me I had a source of
             | income. Lord knows my parents couldn't afford to just give
             | me cash. I think about all the fun life experiences I would
             | have missed out on along with the character building that
             | comes along with doing a job well and earning a paycheck.
        
           | paulpauper wrote:
           | Given how much tuition has surged, the era of paying for
           | college with a crappy summer job is long over. Teens can make
           | more money anyway doing social media, video game reviews,
           | livestreams, and such. There are many more opportunities
           | today to make money that didn't exist 30 year ago.
        
             | paulddraper wrote:
             | lol you think the average twitch streamer makes a few
             | hundreds bucks a week
        
           | pawelmurias wrote:
           | > have something on a resume to prove they showed up
           | everyday.
           | 
           | Society shouldn't promote teenagers doing shit jobs. They
           | shouldn't be done by people with potential.
        
             | jacamera wrote:
             | This is the exact kind of sociopathic elitism that we
             | should seek to minimize by promoting a diverse array of
             | experiences for young developing adults, including working
             | jobs that are "beneath" them.
        
             | HEmanZ wrote:
             | Why shouldn't they be done by people with potential?
             | 
             | It seems to me the opposite. The world runs on a lot of
             | shit jobs. Young people on some path to important
             | leadership positions in society should with have real
             | experience in these positions.
             | 
             | E.g: I learned a lot about efficiency and working with
             | diverse and problematic people when I worked fast food as a
             | teenager. I learned a lot about automation and prison when
             | I worked in a factory in college. Both shaped a lot of my
             | mental model for the world, and I think both contributed a
             | lot to long term leadership skills.
             | 
             | The only shit high school job I don't think I learned
             | anything from was fruit picking. Other than maybe just how
             | miserable it is.
        
             | paulddraper wrote:
             | > Society shouldn't promote teenagers doing shit jobs.
             | 
             | Beg to differ.
             | 
             | There is an epidemic of delayed adulthood brought on by
             | lack of actual responsibility.
        
           | jacamera wrote:
           | Not to sound too grandiose, but I think that the tradition of
           | teenagers working in low-skilled retail and service jobs is
           | also important for societal cohesion. Nothing is going to
           | give you more empathy for the people working in those jobs
           | than having done it yourself for at least a couple years. For
           | teenagers in the middle class and above I'd say it's actually
           | the most important reason to work those types of jobs.
        
             | krapp wrote:
             | >Nothing is going to give you more empathy for the people
             | working in those jobs than having done it yourself for at
             | least a couple years.
             | 
             | Have you worked in a restaurant or retail? No one gets more
             | abuse than those workers.
             | 
             | The real reason we want teenagers in low-skilled jobs is to
             | keep wages low. That's it. Not tradition, not social
             | cohesion, not to teach anyone "responsibility" or "empathy"
             | but simply to undercut the labor market, because if more
             | adults worked those jobs, they would be paid more.
        
       | pc_edwin wrote:
       | One of my fantasies is becoming elected president and creating a
       | constitutional amendment against minimum wage.
       | 
       | It is truly one of the most egregious and inhuman concoctions of
       | modern collectivism.
       | 
       | No government or king should have that kind of power over its
       | people. You are dictating by fiat that there not be any jobs
       | below a certain price/threshold.
       | 
       | You are de-facto sentencing all the people below a certain IQ,
       | skill, competence, age, experience etc to be permanently
       | subjugated to government handouts or destitution.
       | 
       | You are eliminating the concept of teenage labor and
       | apprenticeships (almost) entirely. Why would I hire an
       | inexperienced guy for a job if I have to pay him the same as a
       | normal guy.
       | 
       | Same goes for kids, why would I hire kids? This is used to be a
       | crucial pillar of society. Not because the evil capitalist bakery
       | could exploit kids or because they kids need the money. Its a
       | crucial integration point.
       | 
       | The idea that you completely shield kids from society until after
       | college is a crime against humanity.
       | 
       | Do you have any idea how important it is to be given
       | responsibility, work hard and enjoy the fruits of your own labour
       | at a very young age. Even I can't fully grasp the consequences of
       | depriving this from our kids.
       | 
       | This is just the beginning what about low iq people? I mean
       | people that have IQs so low that they can't even pass the
       | military test. Something like 5% of the population falls in this
       | category. Should the be deprived of what ever dignity they have
       | left and live the remainder of the lives as a federal benefactor.
       | Same goes for a huge chunk of disabled people..
       | 
       | There are so many other examples I haven't even though of yet and
       | thats exactly the problem with you collectivists. You guys think
       | you have it all figured out and you can easily restructure the
       | millennia old experiment of civilisation itself from the top
       | down.
        
         | hparadiz wrote:
         | Everything you just wrote is wrong and I'm only commenting to
         | make you aware of that. Enjoy your downvotes.
        
         | timeon wrote:
         | > Why would I hire an inexperienced guy for a job if I have to
         | pay him the same as a normal guy.
         | 
         | You hire people not because of skill but the fact that they can
         | be exploited or not?
        
       | baggy_trough wrote:
       | Crazy times. Hope everyone loves inflation and higher
       | unemployment.
        
       | gdulli wrote:
       | Good for them but inflation has already hit fast food hard enough
       | that it no longer qualifies as cheap enough relative to other
       | food options to be worth the lower quality.
        
       | HEmanZ wrote:
       | Can anyone point me to any broad research or economic analysis
       | that shows that minimum wage laws do anything to help those with
       | low skill in the labor market? The economic consensus and data
       | evidence I find is that it basically does nothing in the medium
       | term, because the market just inflated to adjust, and pushes
       | people out of the workforce or into the black market at the
       | margins.
       | 
       | I'm liberal enough to be open to the idea, but it seems like the
       | least likely of left wing economic policies to actually improve
       | the quality of life of low skill workers.
        
       | lacker wrote:
       | What a funny set of rules. The law has "an exception for
       | restaurants that make and sell their own bread, like Panera
       | Bread". Time for McDonalds to start making their own bread!
       | 
       | The other weird thing is that Taco Bell has to pay $20/hour, but
       | a random taqueria only has to pay $15.50/hour.
        
         | bhb916 wrote:
         | These laws are not made to be coherent or actually help people.
         | They are made to curry favor with a particular base. It creates
         | all these super strange situations where it's impossible to
         | know what the rules will be. These nonsensical laws meant to
         | target specific people and/or companies will be the norm going
         | forward.
        
         | tylersmith wrote:
         | I'm pretty sure McDonald's does already make the bread they
         | sell wrapped around half their menu items.
        
         | OkayPhysicist wrote:
         | Taco Bell vs taqueria does make sense, IMO. Smaller businesses
         | have less economy of scale, and thus less ability to pay higher
         | wages. Taco Bell, in contrast, has vastly larger scale, and
         | thus the ability to pay workers more. Plus, it gives smaller,
         | local businesses a potential leg up, fostering competition.
         | 
         | The bread thing definitely reeks of corruption.
        
         | paulddraper wrote:
         | It's funny only if you don't understand the purpose of the
         | rules.
        
       | jacamera wrote:
       | > The new minimum wage for fast food workers will apply to
       | restaurants with at least 60 locations nationwide, with an
       | exception for restaurants that make and sell their own bread,
       | like Panera Bread.
       | 
       | The exception for small restaurants makes sense, but does anyone
       | have any idea what the bread exception is all about? How many
       | loaves a day does a restaurant have to make in order to qualify
       | for the exemption?
        
         | staringback wrote:
         | Big Bread corporate lobbying
        
       | hellojesus wrote:
       | I've said it in a response and so have others, but it's really
       | important to point out that:
       | 
       | This law now makes it illegal for anyone that can only provide
       | $19/hour of economic revenue from working at a fast food
       | restaurant.
        
         | doctorpangloss wrote:
         | I don't think this is the gotchya or insight porn you think it
         | is.
         | 
         | For starters it's nonsensical.
         | 
         | Don't get me started with the jargon. "Economic revenue?"
         | "Illegal?"
         | 
         | While I don't think you deserve to get downvoted for such
         | nonsense, because maybe it is interesting for someone to
         | explore the premise of what you're actually saying, even if you
         | are saying it extremely poorly, I am at least trying to explain
         | for you personally why a normal person will read this and
         | think, "What is this guy talking about?"
        
         | nrb wrote:
         | Excuse me while I belly laugh at the notion that fast food
         | workers deliver anywhere near that low of labor value in CA.
        
         | timeon wrote:
         | They can now provide $20/hour of economic revenue.
        
         | hparadiz wrote:
         | It's sort of amazing to me that you even wrote this. It's
         | shocking.
         | 
         | A typical fast food establishment. Say Chikfila will clear 15k
         | of revenue on a typical slow night. On a good night easily 25k.
         | 
         | An 8 hour shift at $20 an hour is $160. You need to have 5
         | people in the kitchen and 6-7 out front bagging and taking
         | orders. 12*160 = 1920
         | 
         | Typically wages are your most expensive line item.
         | 
         | So essentially everyone on HN is arguing over $500 a night from
         | revenue that is already hitting 80% profit.
         | 
         | If anything the minimum wage should be $30.
         | 
         | It's almost like techies should stay in their lane and stop
         | talking about economics they know nothing about.
        
       ___________________________________________________________________
       (page generated 2023-09-28 23:02 UTC)