I know you’ve thought of this, but could you charge your employees for their RV spot, so that this would discount the higher wages you’re forced to pay? Or is there any way to change this into contract work? Your contractors (former employees) bid for the summer job; your costs would be lower in more desirable locations, etc.

I’d love to hear of the different workarounds you’ve thought of/tried to solve this problem, and why you don’t think they work. And what you see as the limitations of making someone a contractor.

It’s a pain to have to spend so much time/energy to work around government regulation, but that’s the reality of the situation. In my line of work (computer field) it seems more and more work is being done on a contract basis, which allows a lot more flexability between customer and contractor.

While the end result of these “living” wage proposals is a national mandate (remember, it’s not a slippery slope fallacy when it’s the actual desired end-state of the proponents), I don’t have an issue with each state making whatever idiotic labor cost pricing laws they can dream up. The point of the constitutional republic is to constrain the federal government and give the states great leeway. Some states will embrace socialism and some will tend to leave people alone. And people would be free to move to whatever state meets their standards. A free market in choosing what government to live under, essentially.
But of course nowadays the Constitution has little say over what the federal government actually does, and each state is quite constrained by federal regulation to make the experiments between the States hold much water. But when it comes to dictating the minimum wage for workers in a State, I’m not sure what the federal Constitution can say about it. But a disclaimer: just like politicians in DC, I’m no Constitutional scholar.

Many of the minimum wage entry level positions are trying to teach valuable work skills you may take for granted. Show up, preferably ontime. Don’t curse at the customers. Perform some actual work, even if it is boring.

Minimum wage, like the internship programs, is not the destination. It is one of the first steps (after, and often mixed with, education) to a career. Raise or block the first steps and it is like the bottom of a fire escape. You can see the stairs going all the way up, but how do you get to them when you can’t reach the ground floor level ladder.

One would think so. However, the Supreme Court has shown that it doesn’t have to pay much attention to the Counstitution.

In West Coast Hotel vs. Parrish, 1937, the Supreme Court ruled that a state could establish minimum wage laws. They basically held that the constitution permits restrictions on liberty of contract where such restrictions protect vulernable groups.

West Coaast hotel vs Parrish

It’s simple. The Gov doesn’t consider you qualified to make that negotiation. These people (working for the minimum) are part of the oppressed masses and must be protected from their vile capitalist oppressors (such as the host of this blog.)

/snide_remarks_off

In my business we used developmentally disabled people to sort bulk mailings. They had diminshed capacity and even at minimum wage they were not as efficient as a machine. When they raised minimum wage, we went with the machines. It didn’t make sense to use people at that point. And if I wanted, I could just cut a check to a chairity for developmentally disabled people and at least that was tax deductable. The problem is, that just like non-developmentally disabled people, these people gained a sense of worth from the work that they did and it was better than sitting in the day room watching Opra. Plus they got to keep the money they earned so they had something to spend.

Frickin’ shame if you ask me.