Anti-Miminum Wage Contra Statism?

[Is the symbolism too subtle?]

I recently had a chance to observe some comments on social media when someone posted something supporting an increase in the national minimum wage in the United States. The reactions included claims of socialism as well as fears of creeping statism in the name of compassion.

Rather than getting into an extended debate over the issue, which rarely has any potential or opportunity for serious or legitimate discussion on places like Facebook, I chose to pose the following questions instead:

1A: Is anything that questions neoclassic economic theory and neoliberal economic policy automatically now labeled "socialist", and, is that supposed to be a warning or fear marker rather than a policy critique?

2A: Is the potential loss of jobs for youth entering the workplace worth more than the well-being and dignity of those who need to support themselves and their families at minimum wage jobs?

2B: As a corollary to the last question, is the only money in play from a low wage worker-vs low wage worker in a zero sum game, or is it OK to look at the money in CEO salaries and corporate profits as part of the equation as well?

3A: Does anyone disagree that the current legal and cultural climate sets up corporations as somewhat amoral "persons" whose primary overriding goal and responsibility is to increase the monetary value of the business to shareholders?

3B: Do the potential employee and employer represent two individuals with equal power who meet face to face to discuss the social and monetary value of the employee's labor, the value of the employer's business, capital, and product, and what a fair and livable arrangement would be in terms of work schedule, salary, benefits, and so on until a mutually satisfactory arrangement is reached and legally bound in a contract?

3C: If not, what forms of recourse should a current or potential employee have to counter the ability of the employer to demand more value from the worker's labor than the worker receives in useful compensation? To arbitrate a fair and livable arrangement?

3D: Is not the goal of immediate, short-term corporate profit and the power of the employer relative to the worker going to tend toward lower wages, fewer benefits, and an unfair and unlivable arrangement?  Do not labor unions and legal protections help to balance out the interests of such myopic profit motives?

3E: Are there not corporations and cooperative-based businesses that pursue long-term benefit to community and worker above the profit motive yet still make money? If so, why shouldn't the legal and cultural climate favoring the less generous and sustainable business practices be criticized, restricted, and ultimately replaced?

3F: For those who favor the libertarian style solution to corrupt and unfair business practice, do you assume that employee and employer have equal power? That the employee has multiple readily available options of equal value to choose from? That these choices, if they exist, do not carry additional burdens? That being fired (for objecting to workplace conditions or questioning compensation) or quitting in protest has no social repercussions and no effect on gaining future employment (especially in the same industry)? And even if these things were true, is there no ethical obligation to those who must suffer until the situation resolves itself by such Laissez-faire principles?

3G: If, based on the last question, workers do not have the social, cultural, and economic freedom to choose their way out of a bad employment situation (either doing so with great difficulty or peril or simply lacking any viable options), or if it is not ethical to let people suffer until Laissez-faire principles eventually intercede and improve working conditions and employment options, does not the government have the obligation to intervene? Especially since the welfare of the people is one the primary duties of government in the US Constitution?

As the questions imply, if you are going to have a state level society, you have problems that governments are capable of and tasked with addressing. Of course, one can have a goal of moving away from a state level society but you would need something to move toward.

Perhaps such a devolved society could mimic the decentralized, non-monetary economies found in a few remaining small-societies. Just scrap nation-states in favor of clusters of small interdependent communities wherein kinship and a social obligation to care for others negates the excesses of self interest. That would mean, however, that issues of justice, security, and fairness would be left to each community to decide, and not everyone would have the option of moving someplace that better fit their identity and preferences. Moreover, the kind of organization and funding needed for things like large-scale public works and institutions such as large research universities and initiatives would also be difficult or impossible to maintain. For those who find such an alternative appealing -- and it does have its merits -- the road to overturning the state is called anarchy, so follow that path and go where it leads.

For those who don't prefer that route or find it too implausbile, institutions like the government are necessary to ensure that the legal and economic playing field is fair and level. Those people are statists, even if only minimally so. How such an institution should do so is certainly a fair issue for debate. Leveling and redistribution mechanisms have always existed (at least in name) in even in the smallest societies, including well-known examples such as the potlatch ceremony. In larger ones the only way to enforce such mechanisms is through an institution with the scope and charter to look after the social welfare of all citizens. There are too many citizens for everyone to know and personally empathize with everyone else, and resources are always distributed unequally, making reliance on local charity insufficiently available to everyone who may need it.

As for leaving things in the hands of free-from-regulation markets and the pursuits of private ambition, substituting corporate bureaucrats who are generally motivated by (short-term) monetary profit for government bureaucrats who, at least in principle, are elected from, represent, and are charged to look after the welfare of the people, doesn't really sound like a solution to the ills of predatory capitalism.

The simplistic idea that progressives want larger, more powerful, and more intrusive government while conservatives want the opposite is readily dispensed with. Statists of all persuasion want more of the government programs and influences they approve of and less of what they don't approve of. The size of the military? Coporate or personal welfare? Enforcement of conservative or progressive spins on morality (emphasizing personal or collective responsibility)? Some progressives want more a more limited central government when it comes to some aspects of economic activity, military funding, and imposition of religious values on social and medical freedoms. Some conservatives want a more expansive government in these very areas. We have to ask not just how larger or involved the state should be but in which areas. Which areas should see more or less government influence or intervention?

To give a simple illustration, here is how my own political views were plotted a few years ago based on the Political Compass website which gives two dimensions for such influence (having taken it a few times back then it varied more on the horizontal axis, but never cross over either midway line):

The picture is an amalgam of how the website's founders plotted past and recent political leaders (relevant at the time I took the test) as well as my own results, placing me near Nelson Mandela and His Holiness the16th Dalai Lama. While my economic views regarding communal responsibility of society and private property have me on the left, my views on the overall social power and control of government in the lives of its citizens have me well away from any kind of state totalitarianism. For a more current anchoring of the graph, here is how the major candidates in the 2012 US Presidential election were plotted by the site. The test isn't overly detailed or exhaustive, so I tend to focus more on which quadrant people land in rather than precisely the spot they occupy in that quadrant.

Be well.