McDonalds Introduces Self Serving Kiosks in Response to Min Wage Increase

[TomParks]

At least the self serve kiosks won't put cream and sugar into your black coffee.

You get some old geezer backing up the line at lunch hour not knowing how to use the damn machine you are screwed!

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

As liberals showed with the failed Stimulus Bill (packed with 7,000 pieces of DNC pork), fiscal intelligence / responsibility is not their strong suit.

The stimulus bill added 2M jobs. How is that a failure? Then, of course, it wouldn't have been necessary if Bush had done his job.

The failure in Washington has been Republicans not pushing for living wages for American workers.

Right, because that's what DumBama and the Democrats did when they had full power of the federal government.

That was in the late 70's.

No, it was when DumBama first took office. How do you think he got Commie Care passed--with Republicans?

The Democrats had the White House and a majority in the Senate and House? Are you sure about that?

Positive. They regained leadership in Congress back in 2006, and then regained leadership in the Senate back in 2007. They lost Congress in 2010 and the Senate last midterms.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Again, it has nothing to do with what McDonald's can afford, it has to do with paying people a wage the job is worth. Only a fool would pay somebody more money than they need to.

How much do you pay an employee that makes you all of your money?

The value of an employee is what an employer can get another person do to the same job for. That's it.

That's not an answer, it's an ignorant statement.

Ignorant in what way? That's exactly how your worth is determined.

How much do you pay an employee that makes you all of you money. Worth is not a mathematical factor.

It is a mathematical factor because most employers do pay a person what they are worth. As an employee, you are only worth as much as another person willing to do the same job, the same quality as you for the same money. If you demand too much money or more money than you are worth, the employer lets you go on your way as he can easily find a replacement to do your job.

 

[QuickHitCurepon]

People might end up ordering a lot more food that way. It might be very tempting for them to just push a button here and there when they see a whole bunch of choices right in front of them, and they can get it by just pushing a button. And suspend common sense.

 

[initforme]

Yes ray you are right. A smart employee walks right out the door. I walked out on 3 jobs...3... Dang near best 3 days of my life...no notice nothing. Talk about elation. I owed my employers nothing not even notice. Try it...you will love it.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

Yes ray you are right. A smart employee walks right out the door. I walked out on 3 jobs...3... Dang near best 3 days of my life...no notice nothing. Talk about elation. I owed my employers nothing not even notice. Try it...you will love it.

I did try it once when I was young and stupid. Couldn't find another decent full-time job for a couple of years due to the bad reference. Afterwards I concentrated on creating great references and kept doing better in life when I decided to change employment. While my current employers were not happy with me leaving, they couldn't blackball me because I did the right and responsible thing and they respected me for that.

Yes, instant gratification does feel great, but so does the money in your hand after you rob a bank. Like I said, young and stupid. I really believed at the time I was getting even with my employer. But guess what? He found somebody to replace me and continued growing his business while I struggled for the next couple of years. So who won that battle?

When I think back, I sometimes wonder what that dumb mistake cost me in cash and possible promotions with some of the good companies I applied with. Maybe you should do the same if you for once want to be honest with yourself.

 

[usmbguest5318]

According to the National Restaurant Association [NRA], a $15.00 minimum wage equates a 4.3% increase in cost to a Big Mac.

Hmmm....How could the NRA know that? Is that figure just an estimate on their part and that is extrapolated (by the NRA or by you) from some sort of industry wide data? The COGs for a Big Mac is a very specific thing and a data point that would be proprietary to McDonald's. ("Cost" and "price" are not the same things. They may and can be to you as a consumer, but to a business, they are not. I wouldn't raise that point were it you sharing your own ideas for I'd presume you mean "price" not "cost," but you are ostensibly sharing an financial measurement data point calculated by an industry organization; therefore the distinction becomes relevant.)

I found a similar assertion to yours, but it's not at all the same assertion. What I found is, "Raising wages to $15 an hour for limited-service restaurant employees would lead to an estimated 4.3 percent increase in prices at those restaurants, according to a recent study." A 4.3% price increase is something that applies across the board -- all producers and their offerings throughout the industry -- but the specific impact will be less at companies that are less dependent on labor and more at companies that rely more heavily on labor.

What's the real impact of that? That's not easy to say outside of at very high levels and withing an economics context. Why? Well, take a look at the various dimensions at which restaurant labor compensated. Here are some considerations:

• In the presence of an increased minimum wage whereby all employees were paid below $15/hour, will all workers be content with their statutorily granted raise or will more skilled/senior workers demand relatively higher wages than lower skilled workers, even though both just received a decent pay increase? I don't know.
• In locales where the monopsony effect will occur, the mandated wage increase is a better thing than a worse thing. Thus, small-enough town America stands to benefit greatly from minimum wage increases, whereas larger cities, and definitely big ones, will benefit differently. We can talk about those different types of benefits if you want, but the short of it is that the big city benefit is a better quality of life due to lower crime rates. That's actually better for city dwellers as well as visitors.

Those are just two examples, but if you read the content at the links, you'll surely see the complexity of the matter as well as the insufficiency of concluding based on one metric.

One other thing:

• That 4.3% price increase is wide open to question. I can't say what yielded the 4.3% figure (assuming it comes from Ma & Ghiselli's study that I earlier referred to), and it may well be that there are contextual limitations omitted from the article I read about the study. It could also be that you and I are referring to different studies.
  • Does the Minimum Wage Bite into Fast-Food Prices?
    
  • The Minimum Wage, Restaurant Prices, and Labor Market Structure
    
  • The Effects of Increasing the Minimum Wage on Prices: Analyzing the Incidence of Policy Design and Context

I don't eat at McDonald's because I can't eat chemically laden food, but if I did, paying $0.17 more for a Big Mac isn't going to break me, especially if my income tax bill is reduced by several hundred dollars for doing so.

Having taxpayers support low wage workers through EIC's and food stamps so that prices won't rise by a small percentage, is a lot more fiscally sound that having every taxpaying American sudsidize Walmart to the tune of $2,500 per year.

Assuming the $0.17 is correct (see discussion above), McDonald's is thrilled about your expressed relatively price inelastic stance; moreover they are counting on that being so for millions of other people. (McD's knows the demand for their produces is relatively inelastic.) They are because that seventeen cents to McDonald's is some ~$93M.

Do you really want to go there? The National Restaurant Association is the industry representative.

Go where?

• Do you mean my questioning how the NRA is privy to McD's proprietary per unit COGs inventory costs?
• Are you asking whether I want you to confirm that the metric you cited is 100% accurate as quoted? If so, yes, I do. A link to the NRA report that states what you stated will be sufficient. I'm somewhat okay with eh 4.3% metric as an industry average or as an industry median. I'm not at all of a mind to accept the unsubstantiated claim that 4.3% is the per unit COGs increase specifically applicable to Mickey D's Big Macs.
• Someplace other than those two notions?

 

[Winston]

Look. You don't seem to understand. Mostly because you can't stop worrying about those other people in the cart. Again, who is pushing, who is pulling, and who is riding is secondary to where the cart is going.

But more importantly, you are missing two critical realities. First, there is not that much difference between the CEO and the welfare queen. Just like the welfare queen, the CEO could be DESTROYING value and hurting the economy. Worse, the CEO can do it to the tune of millions of dollars a year. Even the biggest welfare queen is only going to cost thousands of dollars a year, not millions.

Yes, I do worry about those other people in the cart because my country is quickly approaching 20 trillion dollars in debt and it's my money they are living on in that cart. They should be out working and creating tax dollars instead of sucking them up. These people are not real Americans as they don't give a damn about the future of this country.

If a CEO does a crummy job, that's between him and his company. It has nothing to do with taxpayers and he will lose value in employment if he allows his company to take a dive. Unlike the welfare queen, he is flying around all over the country and perhaps out of the country. He wakes up and goes to work every morning. He has a huge responsibility on his hands.

Look, I have enjoyed it, but you don't seem to be paying attention and I can't help but believe it is due to your obsession about the people in the cart. In all honesty, it seems kind of crazy to worry about the people riding in the cart when some mofros are blowing up the track ahead and taking apart the cart as it is traveling down the track.

Same thing about the debt and tax dollars. Why worry about the pennies--that is welfare, when the government is bleeding dollars in the form of tax expenditures to subsidize everything from your mortgage to Richey Rich's yacht. And that CEO---that is where you are not paying attention. He is not building wealth, nor is it getting a return on capital. He is EXTRACTING wealth and HARVESTING capital. And damn skippy he has got a responsibility, to his shareholders, not to himself. When those CEOs structure stock buybacks simply to inflate stock prices that explode their own compensation, off the balance sheets, they are not adequately fulfilling their obligation to the shareholders, and worse--they are not riding in the cart. They really are tearing up the tracks and cannibalizing parts of the cart.

Nobody is blowing up anything. Companies create wealth in order to pay those people in that cart. If you are poor, what country would you rather be in than a capitalist one?

As for welfare spending, I hardly call spending over 1 trillion dollars a year "pennies" as you put it.

And you prove my point. First, you are not paying attention. If the total amount of money spent on stock repurchase arrangements exceeds the total amount of new capital formation--those CEO's and corporations are not creating shit. They are harvesting it. They are selling the proverbial milk cow. And over the last decade or more, that is precisely what has happened. So yes, they really are destroying CAPITAL. The very rails that our economy cart rolls on.

And that one trillion dollars in welfare is right at the same amount the government spends on "tax expenditures". If we can't afford the welfare we damn sure as hell can't afford those "tax expenditures". So yeah, it's pennies on the dollar. Matter of fact, the government gives the same amount of "welfare" to corporations and working individuals in the form of the tax treatment of company provided health insurance, tax deductions for mortgage interest, and depletion allowances for mineral extraction.

In the end, it is just like I said, you just can't keep your mind off those people riding in the cart. It is not important. What is important is where the hell the cart is going. And right now, well it is going nowhere fast.

What really is happening. Well we are destroying capital. Hell, the cart is rolling down hill. The cart is rolling down hill and the one percent are sitting in it. Yep, the welfare queens are in there with em. It is why the one percent wants to throw them out, they stinking up the damn place, and hogging all the shrimp on the buffet. But the ones you claim are working and pulling the cart, they done got run over and are being left behind.

Why are you so focused on what the private market does compared to the public? Don't worry about the private market, they have survived for centuries without your help or opinion. Worry more about the public since that involves all of us.

And no, once again, welfare is not letting people keep their very own money. That's leftist talk for "all money belongs to government, and what they allow you to keep is a gift from government to you" which is utter BS. Letting taxpayers keep one trillion dollars of their own money is altogether different than government giving people one trillion dollars so they don't have to work or accept any responsibility in life.

And no, the one percent are not in the cart, they are pulling the cart the hardest. That's how they became the one percent in the first place. Nobody in the cart gets ahead in life.

A tax expenditure and a welfare payment are one and the same. It is not a conservative thing. It is not a liberal thing. It is an economic thing and it is called opportunity cost.

And no, the one percent is not pulling the cart. Let's do it this way. Let's say you got a two dairy farms. They have several hundred cows, dozens of workers, and spend thousands of dollars on equipment, fertilizer, pesticides, and seeds since they also produce the crops to feed the cows. Of course, they sell the milk.

Now one of the dairy farmers is a good operator. He turns a profit and invests it in better equipment, training for his employees, and even a few additional cows every year. The other farmer, well he ain't so swooft. But he turns a profit every year. He doesn't make enough selling milk to cover his expenses, but he sells several cows every year, lays off a few employees, and sells off some of his equipment while replacing it with leased equipment.

Tell me, which one is contributing to the economy and which one is riding along in the cart? Most of our largest corporations are operating like the last dairy farmer, not the first. They are not contributing to the economy no matter how badly you want them to.

 

[Wyatt earp]

Yes, I do worry about those other people in the cart because my country is quickly approaching 20 trillion dollars in debt and it's my money they are living on in that cart. They should be out working and creating tax dollars instead of sucking them up. These people are not real Americans as they don't give a damn about the future of this country.

If a CEO does a crummy job, that's between him and his company. It has nothing to do with taxpayers and he will lose value in employment if he allows his company to take a dive. Unlike the welfare queen, he is flying around all over the country and perhaps out of the country. He wakes up and goes to work every morning. He has a huge responsibility on his hands.

Look, I have enjoyed it, but you don't seem to be paying attention and I can't help but believe it is due to your obsession about the people in the cart. In all honesty, it seems kind of crazy to worry about the people riding in the cart when some mofros are blowing up the track ahead and taking apart the cart as it is traveling down the track.

Same thing about the debt and tax dollars. Why worry about the pennies--that is welfare, when the government is bleeding dollars in the form of tax expenditures to subsidize everything from your mortgage to Richey Rich's yacht. And that CEO---that is where you are not paying attention. He is not building wealth, nor is it getting a return on capital. He is EXTRACTING wealth and HARVESTING capital. And damn skippy he has got a responsibility, to his shareholders, not to himself. When those CEOs structure stock buybacks simply to inflate stock prices that explode their own compensation, off the balance sheets, they are not adequately fulfilling their obligation to the shareholders, and worse--they are not riding in the cart. They really are tearing up the tracks and cannibalizing parts of the cart.

Nobody is blowing up anything. Companies create wealth in order to pay those people in that cart. If you are poor, what country would you rather be in than a capitalist one?

As for welfare spending, I hardly call spending over 1 trillion dollars a year "pennies" as you put it.

And you prove my point. First, you are not paying attention. If the total amount of money spent on stock repurchase arrangements exceeds the total amount of new capital formation--those CEO's and corporations are not creating shit. They are harvesting it. They are selling the proverbial milk cow. And over the last decade or more, that is precisely what has happened. So yes, they really are destroying CAPITAL. The very rails that our economy cart rolls on.

And that one trillion dollars in welfare is right at the same amount the government spends on "tax expenditures". If we can't afford the welfare we damn sure as hell can't afford those "tax expenditures". So yeah, it's pennies on the dollar. Matter of fact, the government gives the same amount of "welfare" to corporations and working individuals in the form of the tax treatment of company provided health insurance, tax deductions for mortgage interest, and depletion allowances for mineral extraction.

In the end, it is just like I said, you just can't keep your mind off those people riding in the cart. It is not important. What is important is where the hell the cart is going. And right now, well it is going nowhere fast.

What really is happening. Well we are destroying capital. Hell, the cart is rolling down hill. The cart is rolling down hill and the one percent are sitting in it. Yep, the welfare queens are in there with em. It is why the one percent wants to throw them out, they stinking up the damn place, and hogging all the shrimp on the buffet. But the ones you claim are working and pulling the cart, they done got run over and are being left behind.

Why are you so focused on what the private market does compared to the public? Don't worry about the private market, they have survived for centuries without your help or opinion. Worry more about the public since that involves all of us.

And no, once again, welfare is not letting people keep their very own money. That's leftist talk for "all money belongs to government, and what they allow you to keep is a gift from government to you" which is utter BS. Letting taxpayers keep one trillion dollars of their own money is altogether different than government giving people one trillion dollars so they don't have to work or accept any responsibility in life.

And no, the one percent are not in the cart, they are pulling the cart the hardest. That's how they became the one percent in the first place. Nobody in the cart gets ahead in life.

A tax expenditure and a welfare payment are one and the same. It is not a conservative thing. It is not a liberal thing. It is an economic thing and it is called opportunity cost.

And no, the one percent is not pulling the cart. Let's do it this way. Let's say you got a two dairy farms. They have several hundred cows, dozens of workers, and spend thousands of dollars on equipment, fertilizer, pesticides, and seeds since they also produce the crops to feed the cows. Of course, they sell the milk.

Now one of the dairy farmers is a good operator. He turns a profit and invests it in better equipment, training for his employees, and even a few additional cows every year. The other farmer, well he ain't so swooft. But he turns a profit every year. He doesn't make enough selling milk to cover his expenses, but he sells several cows every year, lays off a few employees, and sells off some of his equipment while replacing it with leased equipment.

Tell me, which one is contributing to the economy and which one is riding along in the cart? Most of our largest corporations are operating like the last dairy farmer, not the first. They are not contributing to the economy no matter how badly you want them to.

Is it just me or does this post need more cow bells?

 

[Jarlaxle]

If you are selling a car for less than that I think it's worth, and I buy your car, did I steal anything from you? Of course not. We both agreed on the deal.

Don't work that way hoss. If you know the car is worth significantly more than the price being paid you are STEALING the savings. The courts have ruled as much several times and it does not matter if you both agreed to the deal.

Come on, watch any TV. Pawn Stars, American Pickers---when the seller asks for a price that is too low the buyers tell them the price is too low and pays more. You think they are doing that because they are nice, because it is on TV? They are doing it because they don't want to find themselves in court.

Urine idiot.

 

[Jarlaxle]

If vendors start offering a small discount to use machines, that will be the end of human labor. It's just like what happened years ago when we converted from full service gasoline islands to self-serve. They offered a discount to those that pumped their own gas. As time went on, more and more people crowded the self-service island. After a while, they got rid of full service because nobody used them any longer.

Or they can be New Jersey (and one other state forgot which one) and just outlaw them...


I still can't believe in the year 2017 the good folks in NJ can't even pump their own gas


.

Oregon.

 

[Jarlaxle]

Thanks to the left, now even high school kids can't get jobs.

Thanks To 'Fight For $15' Minimum Wage, McDonald's Unveils Job-Replacing Self-Service Kiosks Nationwide

Till they come up with a way to continuously sanitize them I'll never touch one. You don't know what kinds of viruses or bacteria are on the hands of the people ahead of you.

DO you always wear a respirator when you leave your house. Mr. Hughes?

 

[Jarlaxle]

No american should ever be picking strawberries period. Once the illegals are gone I would hope and pray those businesses cannot find workers. Screw them they don't deserve american labor which is by far the most productive, least complaining, and hardest working in the world.

And they can't pick strawberries? You starting to see the problem.

My son spent a couple of summers in high school working the tomato fields. He and his friend, who got him the job, were the only "Americans" in the bunch. He didn't pick, doubt he could have made it. He is six four, his friend, six six. It was comical watching them work their way through the fields with the Mexicans. He planted, pruned, and staked. It is the hardest work there is--field work. I was hesitate to even allow it, but it turned out to be much more rewarding than anyone could have expected. It gave him a foundation that has served him well.

Kids need to learn what work is.

Yep, that's how I learned. I'm a son of a bricklayer. I've been working since the age of 11. I would carry bricks to my father, mix cement by hand, work until past dark in the summer, and he paid me $1.00 per hour. I would come home beat, loaded with sand and cement from head to toe, took a shower and went to bed.

I hated it back then, but now that I'm older and see other people at work, I was so fortunate for my childhood experiences.

18 year olds in Israel have 2 choices: 2 years military or 4 years law enforcement.
It's what we need to do.

Slavery is not the answer.

 

[Ray From Cleveland]

A tax expenditure and a welfare payment are one and the same. It is not a conservative thing. It is not a liberal thing. It is an economic thing and it is called opportunity cost.

And no, the one percent is not pulling the cart. Let's do it this way. Let's say you got a two dairy farms. They have several hundred cows, dozens of workers, and spend thousands of dollars on equipment, fertilizer, pesticides, and seeds since they also produce the crops to feed the cows. Of course, they sell the milk.

Now one of the dairy farmers is a good operator. He turns a profit and invests it in better equipment, training for his employees, and even a few additional cows every year. The other farmer, well he ain't so swooft. But he turns a profit every year. He doesn't make enough selling milk to cover his expenses, but he sells several cows every year, lays off a few employees, and sells off some of his equipment while replacing it with leased equipment.

Tell me, which one is contributing to the economy and which one is riding along in the cart? Most of our largest corporations are operating like the last dairy farmer, not the first. They are not contributing to the economy no matter how badly you want them to.

How is a tax expenditure and welfare the same thing? I just got done explaining this to you.

Don't worry about the second farmer because the second farmer will be out of business in a matter of time. And from experience dealing in industry, I can tell you that the first farm could go out of business as well, so your scenario doesn't hold any water.

Furthermore all businesses pay taxes, employ people, and provide a profit for their investors which yes, are taxed. Even if you are fortunate enough to just be able to sit home, trade stocks or commodities, make a profit, you are pulling the cart harder than the guy that cleans toilets for a living.

 

[Winston]

A tax expenditure and a welfare payment are one and the same. It is not a conservative thing. It is not a liberal thing. It is an economic thing and it is called opportunity cost.

And no, the one percent is not pulling the cart. Let's do it this way. Let's say you got a two dairy farms. They have several hundred cows, dozens of workers, and spend thousands of dollars on equipment, fertilizer, pesticides, and seeds since they also produce the crops to feed the cows. Of course, they sell the milk.

Now one of the dairy farmers is a good operator. He turns a profit and invests it in better equipment, training for his employees, and even a few additional cows every year. The other farmer, well he ain't so swooft. But he turns a profit every year. He doesn't make enough selling milk to cover his expenses, but he sells several cows every year, lays off a few employees, and sells off some of his equipment while replacing it with leased equipment.

Tell me, which one is contributing to the economy and which one is riding along in the cart? Most of our largest corporations are operating like the last dairy farmer, not the first. They are not contributing to the economy no matter how badly you want them to.

How is a tax expenditure and welfare the same thing? I just got done explaining this to you.

Don't worry about the second farmer because the second farmer will be out of business in a matter of time. And from experience dealing in industry, I can tell you that the first farm could go out of business as well, so your scenario doesn't hold any water.

Furthermore all businesses pay taxes, employ people, and provide a profit for their investors which yes, are taxed. Even if you are fortunate enough to just be able to sit home, trade stocks or commodities, make a profit, you are pulling the cart harder than the guy that cleans toilets for a living.

Look, if you don't understand the basic concept of opportunity costs I am wasting my time. Don't feel bad, most Economic professors have trouble with opportunity costs. But I am pretty sure you have a grip on it. You understand pretty well that your renter had an opportunity cost for not working. Works the same way for the government. Hell, welfare helps people keep more of their own money. If they get two hundred dollars in food stamps it is two hundred dollars of THEIR MONEY that they don't have to spend on food. They get to, wait for it, KEEP IT.

And I am pretty sure you knew the last part was full of shit. Hundreds of companies pay no taxes, even some of our largest. You know that. I own a business. I don't employ anyone. And finally, not all businesses turn a profit.

Again. Really slow. Over at least the last decade, the amount of money spent on stock buybacks has EXCEEDED the total amount of new capital. If we took away all the money that was spent on stock buybacks the total market capitalization of the equities market would be LOWER. Those CEO's are not providing a return on equity, they are harvesting it just like that second dairy farmer was harvesting his cows. It is the same damn thing.

And to your coupon clipper. Sorry hoss, he does not create shit. He does not contribute anything to the economy. He TAKES from it. Tell me, when you purchase a hundred shares of Apple Stock, does Apple get any of the money? Hell no. The only thing that happens is that speculator, not investor, who had the stock is going to get money for it. A return of the money they had placed in the market. And if it is a profit, well that is MORE money now tied up in the market than was there before. That money did absolutely NOTHING in the period between sales. It didn't create any jobs. It didn't make any profit. The only thing it did was COLLECT RENT.

Now, you get back to me when you understand opportunity cost. You get back to me when you understand the difference between investing and savings. Buying stocks on the exchange is not investing, it is saving. And I can't emphasize enough, read the following.

https://www.ineteconomics.org/uploa...lliam_Profits-without-Prosperity-20140406.pdf

An old school real economist explains exactly what has happened over the last forty years.

 

[danielpalos]

Look. You don't seem to understand. Mostly because you can't stop worrying about those other people in the cart. Again, who is pushing, who is pulling, and who is riding is secondary to where the cart is going.

But more importantly, you are missing two critical realities. First, there is not that much difference between the CEO and the welfare queen. Just like the welfare queen, the CEO could be DESTROYING value and hurting the economy. Worse, the CEO can do it to the tune of millions of dollars a year. Even the biggest welfare queen is only going to cost thousands of dollars a year, not millions.

Yes, I do worry about those other people in the cart because my country is quickly approaching 20 trillion dollars in debt and it's my money they are living on in that cart. They should be out working and creating tax dollars instead of sucking them up. These people are not real Americans as they don't give a damn about the future of this country.

If a CEO does a crummy job, that's between him and his company. It has nothing to do with taxpayers and he will lose value in employment if he allows his company to take a dive. Unlike the welfare queen, he is flying around all over the country and perhaps out of the country. He wakes up and goes to work every morning. He has a huge responsibility on his hands.

Look, I have enjoyed it, but you don't seem to be paying attention and I can't help but believe it is due to your obsession about the people in the cart. In all honesty, it seems kind of crazy to worry about the people riding in the cart when some mofros are blowing up the track ahead and taking apart the cart as it is traveling down the track.

Same thing about the debt and tax dollars. Why worry about the pennies--that is welfare, when the government is bleeding dollars in the form of tax expenditures to subsidize everything from your mortgage to Richey Rich's yacht. And that CEO---that is where you are not paying attention. He is not building wealth, nor is it getting a return on capital. He is EXTRACTING wealth and HARVESTING capital. And damn skippy he has got a responsibility, to his shareholders, not to himself. When those CEOs structure stock buybacks simply to inflate stock prices that explode their own compensation, off the balance sheets, they are not adequately fulfilling their obligation to the shareholders, and worse--they are not riding in the cart. They really are tearing up the tracks and cannibalizing parts of the cart.

Nobody is blowing up anything. Companies create wealth in order to pay those people in that cart. If you are poor, what country would you rather be in than a capitalist one?

As for welfare spending, I hardly call spending over 1 trillion dollars a year "pennies" as you put it.

our wars on crime, drugs, and terror, cost more.

 

[NYcarbineer]

Walmart voluntarily raised their in-house minimum wage while at the same time they're pushing self-serve checkout.

Go ahead and explain that if you think higher minimum wage is what's driving automation.

Refuse to use the self-serve check out.

I do.

 

[danielpalos]

Did you read the article you quoted? McDonalds head office takes 35% of that $2.6 million for rent, franchise fees and various other charges.

Considering that McDonalds made 9 billion net profit last year, they could certainly afford to adjust those fees to assist franchise owners with changes in the minimum wage.

McDonalds in Canada manages to pay $12 per hour and our prices are lower on some items that they are in the US. So does Walmart. Both corporations are very profitable in Canada. Puts the lie to the idea that these companies can't afford a wage hike.



Sent from my iPhone using USMessageBoard.com

Again, it has nothing to do with what McDonald's can afford, it has to do with paying people a wage the job is worth. Only a fool would pay somebody more money than they need to.

How much do you pay an employee that makes you all of your money?

The value of an employee is what an employer can get another person do to the same job for. That's it.

That's not an answer, it's an ignorant statement.

Ignorant in what way? That's exactly how your worth is determined.

that would be true, if it was, what you know that gets you the job instead of, who you know.

 

[danielpalos]

People might end up ordering a lot more food that way. It might be very tempting for them to just push a button here and there when they see a whole bunch of choices right in front of them, and they can get it by just pushing a button. And suspend common sense.

that usually happens to me, when i have a petty cash fund for that purpose.

 

[rdean]

Thanks to the left, now even high school kids can't get jobs.

Thanks To 'Fight For $15' Minimum Wage, McDonald's Unveils Job-Replacing Self-Service Kiosks Nationwide

If people making $172 dollars a month are being replaced by machines, then why would you think workers wouldn't be replaced unless they worked for free?

Foxconn replaces '60,000 factory workers with robots' - BBC News

Oh these Republicans. They just can't learn. How will they have jobs in the future?