I have never thought that anyone would make me miss Loren Steffy.....
Higher wages bring indirect benefits to all. Chris Tomlinson, HoustonChronicle.com ($$$)
Benefits to everyone except:
1. The people who get laid-off because their businesses could not afford the increased cost and had to close.
2. Those who find themselves on the downside of the cost/benefit analysis of humans vs. technology
3. The poor, who might find that the places where they buy most things, those places most dependent on minimum-wage or exempt from overtime workers have to pass those costs on to customers.
To the other side.
It's true, an increase in take-home salary will, of course, help low-income workers purchase more over time. And, in the interest of full disclosure, I'm more sympathetic to not allowing companies to pay managers a pittance while working them 80 hour weeks with no threat of overtime. But to act as if there's no downside to this, that only the 'rich and middle class' are going to feel pain from it is just stupid and insipid analysis.
As with all government interventions into the market, there will be unintended consequences. To pretend like their won't be is to ignore pretty much all of history. Of course, there are unintended consequences from free-markets as well. For years, the American societal compact was that we preferred the unintended consequences of the latter over those of the former. While I admit that this preference is changing (and the American dream is dying because of this change) that still doesn't mean that what Obama is proposing will be all whistle's and lollipop's for those who benefit from this rule.
My guess is that it will be a slight drag on the economy, as businesses struggle to meet America's ever changing and restrictive regulatory environment many are retrenching financially or looking at shifting operations to more secure harbors (when did you think you'd ever hear THAT line about America). The companies that stand to feel the most pain from these rules (restaurants) have already made expansion overseas a lynch-pin of their growth strategy. Not that they're ever going to abandon the American market (no one credible is suggesting that), but they are certainly allocating their growth capital elsewhere.
This is yet another in a long-line of anti-business, business columns from the Chron's new guy and I think by now we've established a pattern. Tomlinson is no economist yet he continually writes about the economy. He is not a businessman, yet he offers unsolicited advice to businessmen, as a matter of fact, he's shown neither insight into nor a very unique take on the boardroom at all. It's becoming more and more clear with each column he writes that he has spent very little time actually in one, making a budget, trying to satisfy investors workers and increasingly irrational customers. (often in that order).
A good idea for the Chron would be to let this guy (and the rest of the editorial staff ) go. There is plenty of syndicated business, political and arts writing out there that none of it would be missed. Instead of the Editorial Board endorsing candidates, they could offer OpEd space to both a Progressive and Conservative organization to print theirs. Instead of one member of the media opining on business, they could offer space to actual businessmen and activists who stand against them. Instead of the Chron's miserable arts critic, they could offer review space to a wide variety of individuals.
As a matter of fact, the ONLY non-news positions that I would keep there are the sports reporters, and the food critics.
Get rid of all the rest, use the newly available resources to hire news reporters for local beats and bring in a couple of editors.
Sure, it might sting at first but overall the newspaper will benefit.
(See what I did there?)
