Some mental contortions in the vein of "Wage hike will hurt poor" - don't you just love commentaries?
This morning, as usual, I read my way through my Saturday morning print fare (since I don't care to destroy any ideas of me being well-read and -informed in any potential reader of these lines I shall not tell you what these publications are) and I came across a gem of a commentary in one of the eminently important papers I read, the Palo Alto Daily News. Personally, I am a great fan of this publication. The "Palo Alto Daily News" and the "San Jose Mercury News" are both great examples of what a small local rag should be. Unlike the "Palo Alto Daily News" however the "San Jose Mercury News" has delusions of adequacy and thinks it actually is a national paper. Now, I am not American and thus can't speak with absolute authority here, but no! Noone would consider the Mercury News a national paper. Please tell me it isn't so!
Now, those guys in Palo Alto have the important ideas of local newsreporting licked: their esteemed publication is free (which is bound to keep the punters coming back), it gives me stories with local appeal (as anyone I prefer my murders and other assorted crimes to have happened to someone else in my own neighbourhood, and I want to read about it the very next day), it gives reviews on shops, restaurants and other companies that I actually come across in my daily maneuvering around the place, and even better, for once I can even put the coupons to their intended use! I can find out about nicer houses in my community I'll never be able to afford and I can find out where I could buy one of those monstrous contraptions Americans consider cars (in old Europe most people would consider a SUV to be a truck, and as such a bit too expensive to operate).
The "Palo Alto Daily News"of course does not ignore the wider world and offers me a couple of pages with news "Around The Globe", which, I suspect, come from wire services and such and are actual news, untinted by opinion and actually just telling me the barebones information (this is also the reason why I suspect those articles are from wire services - most papers here seem to be unable to keep their opinions out of the reporting of news. You don't believe me? How about their title of today's frontpage headline: "Murdering moms walk free". I can't help feeling that this implies just a wee bit opinion, no? Unfortunately, I seem to be alone in this, certainly it isn't shared by many editors).
And last not least they give you opinions, where for once the journalists are actually allowed to hang it all out. Here I stumbled about this gem of a commentary, by Mr. Roland Nethaway (rnethaway@dailynewsgroup.com) in which he asserts, rather assertively, that a "wage hike will hurt poor". That I just had to read. Now it might be of interest to the gentle reader that by American standards I am politically somewhat to the left of Karl Marx while most Europeans would consider me slighly to the left, old Labour, Social Democrat or something like that.
Mr Nethaway's commentary did not dissappoint: First he tells his readers that raising the minimum wage to a whooping $7 an hour will undoubtedly only lead to the expected major job loss and outsourcing. Then, in a mental contortion of amazing proportions he states the prediction that any increase in labor costs will cause "foreign competition ...[to]...eat them alive" (the American industry saddled with paying everyone at least$7 an hour I suppose) and follows it with the breathtaking conclusion that "...if government attemps to freeze out foreign competition with tariffs, taxes, quotas and other isolationist trade protections, the predictable results m include inflation, recession, depression and a heightened vulnerability to national security."
Wow. What an amazing set of dominoe stones he set up there, all poised to collapse just as he wants them to. It is a thing of sheer beauty, no doubt about it. I believe the only thing he forgot to mention as a result of raising the minimum wage is global warming and earthquakes.
The only people he mentions that would profit from an increase is teenage workers (he doesn't bother mentioning any adults in those crappy jobs that need to live and feed a family on these meagre earnings) and legions of illegal immigrants just waiting there wanting and desperate to work for less. Somehow I was sure they'd be mentioned in the end.
Now, those guys in Palo Alto have the important ideas of local newsreporting licked: their esteemed publication is free (which is bound to keep the punters coming back), it gives me stories with local appeal (as anyone I prefer my murders and other assorted crimes to have happened to someone else in my own neighbourhood, and I want to read about it the very next day), it gives reviews on shops, restaurants and other companies that I actually come across in my daily maneuvering around the place, and even better, for once I can even put the coupons to their intended use! I can find out about nicer houses in my community I'll never be able to afford and I can find out where I could buy one of those monstrous contraptions Americans consider cars (in old Europe most people would consider a SUV to be a truck, and as such a bit too expensive to operate).
The "Palo Alto Daily News"of course does not ignore the wider world and offers me a couple of pages with news "Around The Globe", which, I suspect, come from wire services and such and are actual news, untinted by opinion and actually just telling me the barebones information (this is also the reason why I suspect those articles are from wire services - most papers here seem to be unable to keep their opinions out of the reporting of news. You don't believe me? How about their title of today's frontpage headline: "Murdering moms walk free". I can't help feeling that this implies just a wee bit opinion, no? Unfortunately, I seem to be alone in this, certainly it isn't shared by many editors).
And last not least they give you opinions, where for once the journalists are actually allowed to hang it all out. Here I stumbled about this gem of a commentary, by Mr. Roland Nethaway (rnethaway@dailynewsgroup.com) in which he asserts, rather assertively, that a "wage hike will hurt poor". That I just had to read. Now it might be of interest to the gentle reader that by American standards I am politically somewhat to the left of Karl Marx while most Europeans would consider me slighly to the left, old Labour, Social Democrat or something like that.
Mr Nethaway's commentary did not dissappoint: First he tells his readers that raising the minimum wage to a whooping $7 an hour will undoubtedly only lead to the expected major job loss and outsourcing. Then, in a mental contortion of amazing proportions he states the prediction that any increase in labor costs will cause "foreign competition ...[to]...eat them alive" (the American industry saddled with paying everyone at least$7 an hour I suppose) and follows it with the breathtaking conclusion that "...if government attemps to freeze out foreign competition with tariffs, taxes, quotas and other isolationist trade protections, the predictable results m include inflation, recession, depression and a heightened vulnerability to national security."
Wow. What an amazing set of dominoe stones he set up there, all poised to collapse just as he wants them to. It is a thing of sheer beauty, no doubt about it. I believe the only thing he forgot to mention as a result of raising the minimum wage is global warming and earthquakes.
The only people he mentions that would profit from an increase is teenage workers (he doesn't bother mentioning any adults in those crappy jobs that need to live and feed a family on these meagre earnings) and legions of illegal immigrants just waiting there wanting and desperate to work for less. Somehow I was sure they'd be mentioned in the end.
posted by An Opinionated Woman @ 3:59 PM
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