Thursday, January 30, 2020
Minimum Wage Essay Example for Free
Minimum Wage Essay The minimum wage is the lowest rate at which a worker can be played. There she minimum wage laws pegged to hourly, daily and even monthly rates, although U. S. law is pegged to an hourly wage. Also, a minimum wage law usually makes it illegal for a person to sell his labor for less than the minimum wage rate The general purpose of the minimum wage is to guarantee a living wage to all workers who work a standard period of time, whatever that might be. In theory, any labor who works 40 houses a week on minimum wage should be at or above the poverty level line. However, the minimum wage has not kept up pace with the inflation in the United States and the cost of living increases more than the wage increases that are given and that way behind the standards Minimum wage laws were first started in Australia and New Zealand in the 1890s. The first minimum wage to be law was in Massachusetts in the 1912 but it only applied to children and women. The federal minimum wage was established in 1938 by the Fair Labor Standards Act. Initially set at 25 cents an hour, the wage has been raised periodically to reflect changes in inflation and productivity. That the mimic wages often involve protracted political battles, Did you know that one in five Americans worked in the poverty levels by the guide lines of the federal government,†Paul Oysterman, an economist at the M. I. T. Sloan School of Management wrote in a recent New York Times editorial. He says the current minimum wage is lower, in inflation-adjusted terms, than it was in 1968. Currently, 6 percent of all hourly workers make no more than the federal minimum wage of $7. 25, TIME. com In theory it sounds like a good idea to give everybody a raise, but at what expense? By raising minimum wage it was supposed to make it where people would be able to support themselves and get off of government assistance. Well, they did get a raise and are still on government assist. So my question is: what do you think they should make to be able to totally take care of themselves and their family? Do you think raising minimum wage is the answer? Do you realize that the businesses must be able to meet a payroll? When you raise minimum wage it causes a business to have to raise their prices if all possible which in turns makes their customer base upset, which in turn could cause layoff and less businesses hiring, which in turn means the business will not be properly taken care of because you cannot afford to staff it properly because you cannot afford to pay the higher wages. I own a restaurant which hires people 16 years and older. Now when you hire a person in and they start off earning top wages and there is no bottom, then there is no reason from them to try and do better because you cannot afford to give them raises. I feel like the government is wanting business to be the new welfare system and we cannot afford to be. Please stop this and let the business decide how much an employee is worth. Minimum wage was created to be a starting point in people lives not a living. Our government doesnt want good paying jobs so they are trying to make minimum wage work for the people and it will not! Restaurants and other businesses that pay minimum wage are for a reason. We do not charge a lot for our products, therefore, we cannot afford to pay a lot for our help and you do not need a college education to work at a minimum wage job. Stop this before there are even fewer jobs. Right now I have to raise my prices due to Ohio raising their minimum wage again. Let me decide who gets the raise not the government! Twenty percent of those living on the minimum wage the last time it was raised in 1991 were in poverty, and an additional 13% were near poverty. In 1993, the President expanded the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC), which raised income for 15 million families, helping many working families move above the poverty line. Yet to complete the goal of insuring that full-time working families are out of poverty, we need to raise the minimum wage. Recent analysis by the Economic Policy Institute and preliminary work by the Department of Health and Human Services suggests that 300,000 people would be lifted out of poverty if the minimum wage was raised to $5. 15 per hour. This figure includes 100,000 children who are currently living in poverty. But the debate has been muddied by several myths that anti-minimum wage forces repeat at every opportunity. Myth: The only Americans working for the minimum wage are teenagers. Reality: 63 percent of minimum-wage workers are adults age 20 or over. (Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics) Myth: Minimum wage workers dont support families. Reality: The last time the federal minimum wage was increased, the average minimum wage worker brought home 51 percent of his or her familys weekly earnings. (Source: Analysis of Census Bureaus Current Population Survey by Professors David Card and Alan Krueger) Myth: Raising the minimum wage hurts the poor by causing job loss. Reality: Nearly 10 million working Americans would get a pay raise if the minimum wage is increased to $5. l5 per hour. As Nobel Prize-winning economist Robert Solow said, [T]his evidence of job loss is weak. And the fact that the evidence is weak suggests that the impact on jobs is small. (Source: New York Times, January 12, 1995) Myth: The only study showing that raising the minimum wage does not cost jobs was a study funded by the U. S. Labor Department. Reality: One major study conducted in 1992 and financed by Princeton University and the University of Wisconsin was published by two Princeton University economists. One of those economists later joined the Labor Department. (Source: Washington Post, January 11, 1995) Furthermore, a similar conclusion has been reached by at least ten other independent studies. Myth: Raising the minimum wage will have a negligible impact on peoples lives. Reality: A 90-cent per hour increase in the minimum wage means an additional $l,800 for a minimum wage earner who works full-time, year round as much as the average family spends on groceries in more than 7 months. (Source: Bureau of Labor Statistics) Myth: Increasing the minimum wage has always been a bitter, partisan issue that only Democrats have supported. Reality: In 1989, the last time the minimum wage was increased, the House of Representatives vote in favor of the the current poverty line for a family of 4 is $15,600. A family of 4 with one worker earning $4. 5 an hour and working full-time year round ($8,500) would receive a tax credit of $3,400 under the 1996 provisions of the EITC, will collect food stamps worth $3,5l6, and will pay $650 in payroll taxes. This family would end up $834 below the poverty line. On the other hand, for a family of 4 with one worker earning $l0,300 (a full-time year round worker at $5. l5 per hour), the EITC would provide the maximum tax credit ($3,560), food stamps would provide $2,876, and they would pay $788 in payroll taxes. The increase in the minimum wage along with EITC and food stamps would lift this family out of poverty. Overtime Federal law requires that employees who are not exempt receive overtime pay for any time worked beyond forty hours in any one workweek. The rate of overtime pay is one and one-half times the employees regular rate of pay, and must be paid in wages, not in goods or time off. A workweek is defined as one period of 168 hours, or seven consecutive twenty-four hour periods. The workweek may start at any time, or on any day, as long as the starting day and time are applied consistently. Employees who are eligible for overtime pay may not waive their right to receive overtime
Wednesday, January 22, 2020
Just Taxation :: essays research papers
Index: I.     Introduction     2 II.     Introducing the problem     2 III.     Income vs. Consumption Tax     3 IV.     A just tax base?     5 V.     Liberutopia     6 VI.     Conclusion     8 VII.     References     9 Table of Figures: Figure 1: Consumption vs. income tax     3 Figure 2: Floating money and deposit money     4 I.     Introduction In the debate of just taxation an argument came up, which insisted that any tax that distorts individual preferences should be considered as unjust. This argument is known as the â€Å"fairness-to- savers-argument†. The intention of this essay is to explain of what the fairness to savers argument consists, how to approach it and foremost why it is wrong. At first I will therefore explain the argument on the basis of it’s most common example. The following chapter will then provide a better insight into to exact circumstances, under which the fairness to savers argument might arise. Here the functionalities of the, in the example presented, tax bases will be addressed. To approach the rejection of the argument correctly, it will be necessary to determine what exactly â€Å"just†means and this will lead us to some assumption, which need to be made to prove the argument wrong. But before that, I will present the approach Murphy and Nagel make in their book â€Å"The myth of ownership†and why they are not able to reject the argument completely. Afterwards I will introduce my approach, which basically will show, that any kind of taxation will distort individual preferences and there from I derive, that the fairness to savers argu-ment must be invalid. II.     Introducing the problem The basic problem of the fairness to savers argument, is the effect of different tax bases on individual preferences. The name of the argument follows from it’s most vivid example, which I want to address at first, for a better understanding of the issue. The example is often illustrated with the comparison between two individuals preference for saving, both taxed once under an income tax and once under a consumption tax. Let’s consider two people, Steve and John, both earn in t0 100$, the rate of return is in every period constantly at 10% and they are in every aspect totally similar, despite their individual time preference, which is for Steve at 3% and for John at 9%. That means exactly, that Steve is willing to save his money as long he gets at least a net return rate of 3% and John is willing to save his money as long he gets at least a net return rate of 9%. In case their time preference is higher than the net return rate, the utility they derive from immediate co nsumption will be greater than the utility they derive from saving, thus they won’t save their money.
Monday, January 13, 2020
Romeo and Juliet Film Review
Probably the worlds most famous love story has been retold in 1997 under the watchful hand of Baz Luhrman (Also directed Moulin Rouge and Strictly Ballroom) who is trying to give this old Shakespeare classic, a more modern touch. Baz Luhrman simply takes the tragedy from the past, and drops it into the 21st century. In this strange new setting, the swords are tossed aside for guns but the old language, remains. Also the film is refreshed by young popular actors such as Leonardo di Caprio. This creates a bizarre mix, where the audience is left to think whether this is still the same old tragedy or something completely different. The actors mostly play their parts very well, but I think that Pete Postlethwaite (Friar Lawrence) who was also seen in In the Name of the Father and Miriam Margolyes (Nurse) were outstanding at portraying their characters and the best actors on the set. On the other hand I found the performance by the main figures Leonardo Di Caprio(Romeo) and Claire Danes (Juliet) appauling and it kind of felt like they knew their lines, but had no idea what they were actually talking about. An example of this is how Romeo sometimes says his words without expression or with expression in the wrong place. I think that these roles should have been taken over by more experienced actors, who have played Shakespeare plays before but Leonardo Di Caprio will probably be a reason for many teenagers to see this film so the reason why he was cast is probably because he will attract a bigger young audience There are not many special effects in this film, but definitely many more than in other versions of the story. I think that the camera was one of the major participants in this film as Luhrman did so many different types of shots and scenes that it just makes this film much more viewable. Examples of this are at the very beginning of the film, there are about 30 different shots right after one another which creates a very fast pace. Other examples include long shots of Verona which are shown very often all through the film, where you can see two big buildings, one with a Montague sign and the other one with a Capulet and a twirl of the camera as transitions between scenes. As always in love stories or tragedies, music is also a major helper in this film. A slow, romantic song is played when Romeo and Juliet first meet and funky loud music when Romeo and his friends enter the ball. What Luhrman mainly tries to do with this film, is to make the story more interesting and more appealing to a younger audience, which has decided to try and achieve this with more action packed scenes and fighting. This does though sometimes make the film seem unrealistic, childish even, like a teenagers version of the tragedy. This is for sure the most modern and action filled version of the play and I think it can be described as something fresh and new and completely different. This film is a great way of getting a younger generation of people interested in Shakespeare, as it included lots of action and fighting but I am not sure if this film is really a better version of Romeo and Juliet. Although it may not be as interesting and action packed, I think I still prefer the old boring classic Shakespeare tragedy.
Sunday, January 5, 2020
The Invention of Velcro
Its hard to imagine what we would do without Velcro, the versatile hook-and-loop fastener used in so many aspects of modern lifeâ€â€from disposable diapers to the aerospace industry. Yet the ingenious invention came about almost by accident. Velcro was the creation of Swiss engineer Georges de Mestral, who had been inspired by a walk in the woods with his dog in 1941. Upon their return home, de Mestral noticed that burrs (from the burdock plant) had attached themselves to his pants and to his dogs fur. De Mestral, an amateur inventor and a curious man by nature, examined the burrs under a microscope. What he saw intrigued him. De Mestral would spend the next 14 years attempting to duplicate what he saw under that microscope before introducing Velcro to the world in 1955. Examining the Burr Most of us have had the experience of burrs clinging to our clothing (or our pets), and considered it a mere annoyance, never wondering why it actually happens. Mother Nature, however, never does anything without a specific reason. Burrs have long served the purpose of ensuring the survival of various plant species. When a burr (a form of a seed pod) attaches itself to an animals fur, it is carried by the animal to another location where it eventually falls off and grows into a new plant. De Mestral was more concerned with the how than the why. How did so small an object exert such a stronghold? Under the microscope, de Mestral could see that the tips of the burr, which appeared to the naked eye as stiff and straight, actually contained tiny hooks that can attach themselves to fibers in clothing, similar to a hook-and-eye fastener. De Mestral knew that if he could somehow recreate the simple hook system of the burr, he would be able to produce an incredibly strong fastener, one with many practical uses. Finding the Right Stuff De Mestrals first challenge was finding a fabric he could use to create a strong bonding system. Enlisting the help of a weaver in Lyon, France (an important textile center), de Mestral first tried using cotton. The weaver produced a prototype with one cotton strip containing thousands of hooks and the other strip made up of thousands of loops. De Mestral found, however, that the cotton was too softâ€â€it could not stand up to repeated openings and closures. For several years, de Mestral continued his research, looking for the best material for his product, as well as the optimal size of loops and hooks. After repeated testing, de Mestral eventually learned that synthetics worked best, and settled on heat-treated nylon, a strong and durable substance. In order to mass-produce his new product, de Mestral also needed to design a special type of loom that could weave the fibers in just the right size, shape, and densityâ€â€this took him several more years. By 1955, de Mestral had completed his improved version of the product. Each square inch of material contained 300 hooks, a density that had proven strong enough to stay fastened, yet was easy enough to pull apart when needed. Velcro Gets a Name and a Patent De Mestral christened his new product Velcro, from the French words velours (velvet) and crochet (hook). (The name Velcro refers only to the trademarked brand created by de Mestral). In 1955, de Mestral received a patent for Velcro from the Swiss government. He took out a loan to begin mass-producing Velcro, opening plants in Europe and eventually expanding into Canada and the United States. His Velcro USA plant opened in Manchester, New Hampshire in 1957 and is still there today. Velcro Takes Off De Mestral had originally intended Velcro to be used for clothing as a zipper-less zipper, but that idea was not initially successful. During a 1959 New York City fashion show that highlighted clothing with Velcro, critics deemed it ugly and cheap-looking. Velcro thus became associated more with athletic wear and equipment than with haute couture. In the early 1960s, Velcro received a huge boost in popularity when NASA began using the product to keep objects from floating around under zero-gravity conditions. NASA later added Velcro to astronauts space suits and helmets, finding it more convenient than the snaps and zippers that were previously used. In 1968, Velcro replaced shoelaces for the first time when athletic shoe manufacturer Puma introduced the worlds first sneakers fastened with Velcro. Since then, Velcro fasteners have revolutionized footwear for children. Even the very young are able to independently fasten their own Velcro shoes well before they learn how to tie their laces. How We Use Velcro Today Today, Velcro is in use seemingly everywhere, from the healthcare setting (blood pressure cuffs, orthopedic devices, and surgeons gowns) to clothing and footwear, sporting and camping equipment, toys and recreation, airline seat cushions, and more. Most impressively, Velcro was used in the first human artificial heart transplantation to hold together parts of the device. Velcro is also used by the military but has recently undergone some modifications. Because Velcro can be too noisy in a combat setting, and because it has a tendency to become less effective in dust-prone areas (such as Afghanistan), it has been temporarily removed from military uniforms. In 1984, on his late-night television show, comedian David Letterman, wearing a Velcro suit, had himself catapulted onto a Velcro wall. His successful experiment launched a new trend: Velcro-wall jumping. De Mestrals Legacy Over the years, Velcro has evolved from a novelty item into a near-necessity in the developed world. De Mestral very likely never dreamed of how popular his product would become, nor the countless ways it could be used. The process de Mestral used to develop Velcroâ€â€examining an aspect of nature and using its properties for practical applicationsâ€â€has come to be known as biomimicry. Thanks to Velcros phenomenal success, de Mestral became a very wealthy man. After his patent expired in 1978, many other companies began producing hook-and-loop fasteners, but none are allowed to call their product Velcro, a trademarked name. Most of us, howeverâ€â€just as we call tissues Kleenexâ€â€refer to all hook-and-loop fasteners as Velcro. Georges de Mestral died in 1990 at the age of 82. He was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame in 1999.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)