Draw or imagine a line running from negative infinity dollars to positive infinity dollars. Now draw a point somewhere in the middle of this line and label it “zero dollars” or “$0”. Now draw another point on this line, somewhere to the right of $0, and label it “X dollars” or “$X”.
Now apply the following labels:
A: everything to the left of, but not including, zero dollars.
B: everything between, but not including, zero dollars and X dollars.
C: everything to the right of and including X dollars.
So hopefully we now have something that looks like this:
Got it? Good. The line represents all possible wages that a boss might pay a worker per hour. Point $X is the minimum wage.
It is legal to pay a worker a wage that falls in section (erm… segment? ray? vector?) A. This is usually a college internship or some other form of training, where employees essentially pay to be allowed to work.
It is legal to pay a worker a wage of exactly zero dollars. This is volunteer work.
It is illegal to pay a worker a wage that falls in section B.
It is legal to pay a worker a wage of $X or greater, i.e., a wage that falls in section C.
Can anyone successfully explain to me why section B should be off limits?
Now where’s the button to Tweet/Facebook/etc this post?
While it’s not illegal yet, I would say there is definitely political and social sentiment that there exists a boundary in segment C in which it is wrong to pass. The whole idea that some people make too much and we should tax them back to an amount deemed proper.
I’m sure that certain types of work face maxima in Region C.
So Region A is still legal, though there are efforts to reduce the number of people operating in Region A and shift them to Region C.
I’m interested to see which number of unpaid internships (broadly defined) is greatest: those that continue on as usual, those that convert to paid internships, or those that cease to exist altogether.
I’ll also be interested to see the reaction of those people whose current skills correspond to Region A but can no longer be “employed” in Region A. I fear it’ll be the same as too many of those whose current skills correspond to Region B but can’t be employed in Region B, which is to shift Point X to the right. Both groups will have no clue why this happened.
Still waiting on a convincing answer to my original question: what’s the deal with Region B?
So everyone should get paid the average or more?
Tell you what: answer the question as if A is generally legal and B is not, and then answer the question as if A and B are the same region, separated only by the volunteer’s wage of $0.
Now you’re just a few steps away from selling ad space 😉
I’d like to believe all that, but it’s probably more a function of the fact that only, like, eight people read this blog.
A response is coming, but are you (a) giving a rationale for the structure or (b) suggesting a course of action?
The negative income tax (EITC is based on it) is similar to what you discuss; it’s a welfare payment, but you can only increase your total (welfare + nonwelfare) income by working more.