Minimum Wage

Friday Funnies: Obama and the Minimum Wage

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Obama and the minimum wage

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Henry Payne

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  1. Nailed it.

  2. Food and Drug Administration

    Needs more labels.

    1. Auric Demonocles

      I have no idea what anything is supposed to be. I’m not even sure that’s a picture, since it doesn’t have a label of alt-text

    2. Anomalous

      I think yu speld that rong.

  3. Almanian!

    Good to see Loomis Simmons working again. (SFW)

    Not bad, not bad. Therefore, not perfect.

    Happy Friday anyway, Reasonoids. Fuck Wesley Clark.

    1. “Fuck Wesley Clark”

      I’ve been hating that self absorbed, smug SOB since 1997. Good to see the club is more than just me.

  4. UnCivilServant

    I haven’t worked for minimum wage since it was still $5.15/hr. Mind you, this was the summer between high school and college, so I was still living rent free, and was among the population that normally does make minimum wage. That was 100% discretionary income for me.

    1. Ayn Random Variation

      My first real job was a summer job in the mail room of an investment company on Wall St. I made 4.50/hr. This was before I knew anything about anything, and yet I still never once complained about how I could possibly raise a family of 4 on that salary. I was grateful for the entry level job so that I could learn some basic jobs skills, and I admired the people there who were working for real money.

      1. Mine was $3.35/hr (oh, and get off of my lawn!) in a bookstore. I learned a lot about how not to treat customers, suppliers, or employees.

        1. Almanian!

          $2.30 FTW…wait, FTL. 1978. It went up to – I think – $2.65 after that.

          Burger King. Worked from high school through college there. Only work available in my podunk farm town.

          Now get off the lawn of my nursing home, you whippersnappers!!

          *wanders off into a field – found next day frozen to death*

          1. SugarFree

            $2.30 FTW…wait, FTL. 1978. It went up to – I think – $2.65 after that.

            You. are. so. old.

            Are you actually my grandpa?

            1. Loki

              Aren’t you your own grandpa?

          2. newshutz

            $2.35 in 1977, which was a dime higher than minimum wage, because it was a late night job.

            So beat you two ways Alamanian!

            and,

            “Get off my lawn!” hack, cough

        2. I was a $3.35er too – washing dishes at 15. Got “bumped up” to a mighty $3.85 an hour doing screenprinting work. There were adults working there – mostly moms – making some extra family income. It was real interesting being a upper middle class kid working with a bunch of black women. I learned a lot about people there.

        3. WTF

          $1.60 in 1972. I was 14 and was working after school and on weekends in a local mom and pop store down the road because when I was 14 my parents informed me that if expected to have a car when I was 17 I had better get a job and start saving money.

          1. WTF

            Only now do I realize I should have been complaining that I couldn’t support a family of four on that wage.

            1. UnCivilServant

              You had two kids at 14? You’ve got bigger problems than working minimum wage.

              1. WTF

                You have no idea.

          2. GregMax

            Started at McDonalds at 1.25/hr. I could buy 5 gallons of gas with that.

            1. alan_s

              Okay, now it’s getting too old. $1.25 is right out.

            2. $3.35
              1981
              McDonald’s

              Good times.

        4. JW

          $3.10 for me in 1980.

          I will note here that I also took a pay cut to from $31,000 in a dead-end job to $22,000/year to get a job that would set me up for career advancement, in 1994. That was a very lean 2 years.

          I survived and the decision has paid off in spades. Note to self: I should ask for more spades next year.

          1. gimmeasammich

            +1 Archie Bunker

    2. Will4Freedom

      When I got out of the Navy with a wife and kid, I worked for $3.50 an hour and made it without gov. assistance.

    3. VicRattlehead

      Im a fellow 5.15er but i never made that, did pizza delivery for my first year of college before i realized i hated it, then i worked in landscaping for 10 an hour when min got jacked up to 7.50, then i had to get a job as an electrician to keep up my standard of living since the price of living closely followed the min wage jumps….or i guess the media says that was my imagination and that we really live in a better world because the arbitrary amount established as min is higher than it was and didnt magically take value away from my current pay which never seems to go up when the min does

    4. mad.casual

      Bailing straw at $3.10/hr. You sweat. You bleed. You get sunburned. You get straw and dust in every orifice of your body. You take a shower, get some sleep and do it again the next day.

      Nothing smells or feels like mown straw in a nice breeze on a warm summer day. Nothing sucks worse than being up in the top of a barn, between the straw and metal roof in the heat of June.

      Forget raising a family on the wage. If you weren’t in charge after the first decade or two, the job would probably kill you… and you’d be glad to get the rest.

      1. c5c5

        Add to the pain of the labor of baling straw/hay with having allergies. The air in the area at the time is clogged with particles….eyes burn and itch and sneezing all the time.

        To think I used to do it for free!

    5. wadair

      My first W4 job was for $1.60/hr in 1973. It was a bellhop’s job at a Ramada Inn. I was thrilled when they gave me a desk clerk position that paid, I think, $2.25. I worked with people who actually supported a family on this.

      When I got out of the Navy, in 1980, I took a job for $5.00 in a machine shop that, along with the GI Bill, paid the bills and my way through engineering school. My wife was working for just above minwage and paying her way (with the help of education loans) through nursing school.

      The cost of college has ballooned since then, of course, but it’s still possible to make a better life for one’s self and family by starting on the bottom.

    6. BigT

      In 1968 I was paid $2.00/hr as a camp counselor, 20 hrs/wk, no benefits. I worked 2 summers in my father’s business for nothing.

  5. Ayn Random Variation

    Please. These companies have millions of dollars just sitting around. There’s no reason they can’t use some of that money to pay a living wage and provide free rubbers and pre school for women.

    1. Fast-food joints should absorb the increase by cutting the managers’ salaries. Yes, someone actually said that. It’s not my fault that progtard arguments are so cerebrally challenged that they look like straw men.

      1. Almanian!

        Lulz. Don’t know what it is now, but when I was “promoted” to asst mgr at the old BK in the 80’s, I made some increment above the min. It was still a shitty hourly rate.

        The “big” store mgr made some salary – hardly a “King’s” (haha!) ransom. I made more my first year out of college in the auto bidness.

        So, yeah – let’s steal it from the fast food mgrs. Cause THAT’S WHERE THE MONEY IS!

      2. Hillary's Clitdong

        If any people have lots of extra cash, it’s Wendy’s managers.

      3. Auric Demonocles

        They can just increase all their prices. Remember, as Tulpa taught us a couple of weeks ago, if they raise their prices by 1 cent it will have literally no effect on how many items they sell. Just repeat the process every few weeks and in a couple of months they’ll have covered the extra costs!

    2. Will4Freedom

      Yeah! And let’s raise a loaf of bread to $20. These rich companies can afford it!

  6. Pompey

    Why that’s not a terribly effective sales pitch!

    1. Almanian!

      The issue is with US, Pompey. If we would just HEAR the President’s message (PBUH), everything would be fine.

      But we don’t listen. Which is why he has to beat us. He beats us because he loves us, Pompey.

      1. Pompey

        Is it abnormal that I feel aroused after this explanation?

        1. DontShootMe

          You just better hope CGI Federal is in charge of the NSA – Department of Child Services data exchange. It’s your only hope.

          1. UnCivilServant

            Accenture will do just as poorly.

  7. WTF

    This cartoon is actually pretty good. What the hell happened?

    1. UnCivilServant

      Something about blind chickens and corn, I think.

      1. Almanian!

        We’ve had to move on to chickens because the server squirrels got all the acorns.

        Good to know.

      2. Also Fried Chicken.

  8. Bee Tagger

    If Bush was still president, the lefties on the marketing campaign would have been shouting “NO BLOOD RED FOR OIL,” but where are they now?

    1. wareagle

      the first clause of your sentence pretty much answers the last one.

  9. wareagle

    the administration has set a new bar for ginned up issues. Who is paid minimum, 5% of the population or less? Let them keep talking about it as this demonstrates that, for the moment anyway, the White House has run out of ideas that can screw far more people than hiking the minimum. And I date back to the two-dollars-something era which was more than plenty to keep the Mustang gassed up and support my social life.

  10. sarcasmic

    This wasn’t the first time I’ve seen this cartoon. Someone posted it in the comments section of a letter I wrote to the local paper on the minimum wage. The rest of the comments were along the lines of how my saying low skilled workers don’t deserve a living wage equals support for slavery, and how I’m a Teabagger lining my pockets off the labor of the poor.

    1. WTF

      how I’m a Teabagger lining my pockets off the labor of the poor.

      I hope you responded with some snarky comment about your orphan monocle-polishers.

      1. sarcasmic

        To post you need a paid subscription. Fuck that.

    2. If you can’t attack someone’s logic, attack what you imagine that person’s motives to be.

      1. sarcasmic

        I’ve engaged some of these idiots before, years ago on a different newspaper forum.

        They’re the typical libtards who, when faced with anything they disagree with, slaughter Republican straw men.

  11. Hillary's Clitdong

    I don’t recall ever getting paid the minimum wage. My first real job was as a gopher for a contruction contractor. I mean, I guess the weekly payments started out below minimum wage and were above minimum wage by the end of the year. I probably undercut some good Murican union job by doing so. I was a committed scab even in my youth.

  12. PRX

    would shreek get a raise or have to comment more times per hour?

    1. UnCivilServant

      I know why Reason doesn’t have an edit button – they plan to implement a charge per post ‘feature’ in the future.

      Though a timed window for edits – say within two minutes of posting – for gross mistakes rather than cheating at debating would be the best option.

      1. Auric Demonocles

        And you could always have a separate indicator stating when the post had been edited. Unfortunately, such a system is impossible, and even if it was possible would lead to everyone cheating at debates and getting away with it.

        1. PM

          I hate to be that guy, but if the best argument you have for anything, I don’t care what it is, is Reddit, you need to rethink your strategy.

          1. Auric Demonocles

            The entire point of that is that Reddit has managed to implement this type of system. That’s how easy it is.

    2. EDG reppin' LBC

      Shreek doesn’t get paid in money. Twice daily his handlers come by and throw a bunch of bananas into his cage.

      1. wareagle

        so you insult the gorillas?

        1. newshutz

          no, he uses the bananas to keep the gorillas from flinging poo at him.

    3. Maybe he is doing piece-work?

    4. PM

      The useful idiots in any religion don’t get paid – only the minister and his staff. The True Believers are the worst kind.

    5. Invisible Finger

      I would think employing shreek, even as a slave, would be the definition of “malinvestment”.

  13. sarcasmic

    My first and only minimum wage job paid $3.85.

  14. The Late P Brooks

    Actually, that “40% increase” is probably a lowball estimate.

  15. alan_s

    I think this comic definitely requires some more explanation. Also, is that steel rebar reinforcing his suit or some kind of carbon fiber?

  16. GILMORE

    I don’t get it

  17. american socialist

    American workers should be happy to get paid 0.00000001 BTC/hr on the MtGox exchange and stop their bitching. I’m going to become a shareholder of McDonalds so I can demand that the executive board get a raise because its vital that we pay executives 8 digit salaries to sell hamburgers. I find the claim of poverty by fast food executives to be completely credible when they dole out billions of dollars in stock options to 100 or so of their top burger flippers. I enjoy the human suffering parts of “Grapes of Wrath”

    1. Sevo

      american socialist|2.28.14 @ 12:46PM|#
      “American workers should be happy to get paid 0.00000001 BTC/hr on the MtGox exchange and stop their bitching. I’m going…”

      You’re a fucking idiot. Get lost.

  18. DarrenM

    This is just idiocy. There are wide variances in the cost of living and of labor between the states. Imposing a uniform minimum wage on every person in the U.S. is a dumb idea. States can set their own minimum wage level. If you don’t like it, move someplace that has a higher minimum wage (and probably a higher cost of living). I suspect this is more a move to attack those states with lower costs of living and therefore lower minimum wages. Who do these states tend to vote for in general?

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