Here's a statement of the obvious: The opinions expressed here are those of the participants, not those of the Mutual Fund Observer. We cannot vouch for the accuracy or appropriateness of any of it, though we do encourage civility and good humor.
@BrianW What I find deeply offensive is the CNBC author's assertion that:
Businesses face a very challenging environment there as well. Puerto Rico imposes the same federal minimum wage as we have in the 50 states, making it much more costly to employ workers there than on its neighboring islands in the Caribbean. So not only is there a strong incentive not to work in Puerto Rico, there's also a pretty good reason not to create jobs there as well.
Is he basically saying that Puerto Rican-Americans should be willing to accept lower wages than their fellow Americans simply because their non-U.S. neighbors accept less? Is he implying they're not real Americans and therefore don't deserve to be paid as much? I think so. Yet they are by law U.S. citizens. The way Puerto Rico has been treated by the U.S. for decades now is rather dispicable. Or worse, does he think all Americans should be willing to accept slave wages because there are other countries that permit this?
It's also time to be honest about who resides in the real welfare states:
Since 1967 they have been trying to build a consensus by holding referenda.
In 1967, about 60 percent of Puerto Ricans on the island voted to keep their territorial status, and 39 percent voted for statehood. Only 1 percent voted for independence.
Twenty-six years later, in 1993, about 48 percent voted to remain a territory, while 46 percent voted for statehood and 4 percent voted for independence.
When the third referendum was introduced in 1998, the anti-statehood political party organized a boycott of the vote over the wording on the ballot, amending it to include a “none of the above” box. As a form of protest, 50 percent of voters chose that option, while 47 voted for statehood and 2.5 percent for independence.
The fourth vote was in 2012, when the legislature divided the ballot into two questions. The first asked whether the island should keep its commonwealth status. A majority (54 percent) said no. But the second question created more confusion. Charles Venator-Santiago, a political science professor at the University of Connecticut, explains it this way:
"the same federal minimum wage as we have in the 50 states,"
That's misleading. The federal minimum wage is a floor. While that floor exists in all states, the majority of states have minimum wages that exceed the federal floor. Heck, even some of the islands closest to PR have higher minimum wages than that.
Never mind that these other islands got hit harder than PR (two category 5 hurricanes within ten days), or that this resulted in greater job losses than in PR (by percentage).
Studies have shown that increasing the minimum wage does not have a negative effect on small business, as some have claimed, and in fact contributes to an increase in the overall health of local economies.
The sponsor of the bill, Senator Jean Forde, had said that $7.25 was simply not enough to earn a decent living. “This is a tremendous victory for working people, as the plain fact is that the minimum wage of $7.25 is simply not enough to live on,” Mr. Forde said after the bill was signed into law. “It is heartbreaking to see people going out and working hard every day, only to find that their paychecks cannot meet even their most basic needs.”
Comments
What I find deeply offensive is the CNBC author's assertion that: Is he basically saying that Puerto Rican-Americans should be willing to accept lower wages than their fellow Americans simply because their non-U.S. neighbors accept less? Is he implying they're not real Americans and therefore don't deserve to be paid as much? I think so. Yet they are by law U.S. citizens. The way Puerto Rico has been treated by the U.S. for decades now is rather dispicable. Or worse, does he think all Americans should be willing to accept slave wages because there are other countries that permit this?
It's also time to be honest about who resides in the real welfare states:
For a more up to date analysis you can also click here: https://wallethub.com/edu/states-most-least-dependent-on-the-federal-government/2700/
Yet the truth remains: red states with politicians and voters hostile to any form of taxation are the most dependent on welfare from the federal government.
Regards,
Ted
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Independence_movement_in_Puerto_Rico
https://vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/1/11/15782544/puerto-rico-pushes-for-statehood-explained
That's misleading. The federal minimum wage is a floor. While that floor exists in all states, the majority of states have minimum wages that exceed the federal floor. Heck, even some of the islands closest to PR have higher minimum wages than that.
Never mind that these other islands got hit harder than PR (two category 5 hurricanes within ten days), or that this resulted in greater job losses than in PR (by percentage). https://viconsortium.com/featured/minimum-wage-goes-up-to-10-50-on-june-in-u-s-virgin-islands/
WTOP (Washington): US Virgin Islands: What about us?
https://wtop.com/government/2018/09/us-virgin-islands-what-about-us/
and aside from that
https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/02/21/magazine/minimum-wage-saving-lives.html
For more, drill waaaaay down this thread (krug, ritholtz, et alia)
https://twitter.com/paulkrugman/status/1079438656706961408
many good lines, one near the bottom:
\\ poor people deserve to be poor until they don't. ... As Lincoln said: Wealth hoarders are our better [angels] !