You don't seem like the bullshitter type so I'm going to assume that the Fox News style propaganda and the Koch machine got you here. Sure. Maybe only 1.1% of people earn EXACTLY minimum wage. But probably close to 25% make under $10. In fact in fast food the median wage is below $10. Using that 1.1% statistic is almost dishonest then since it obviously doesn't include people making one penny more.

That it isn't a career (and sadly for many it does become a career of sorts) is just another excuse used to keep the wages low for them so the owners can keep more of the profit. The fact is many years ago many of these jobs were considered middle class and somewhat respectable. But the perception has been changed over time in order to justify paying them less. But the whole notion of insulting someone who works and does their job is just ridiculous and pretentious in the first place.

Here is a super good video which explains what an average is and how you would do the math to arrive at an average:



Fewer than 12% of Americans have ANY graduate degree. So anyone with an MBA (a graduate degree), by definition, has a higher level of education than 88% of the population. That is above average.

According to the Census, 76.5% of Americans are adults and the population is approximately 316,128,839. 76.5% of 316,128,839 is 241,838,561 adults.

11.57% of adults having a graduate degree out of 241,838,561 is 27,980,721. Do you think we have 27 million CEOs in this country? We certainly do, if you are counting the guy down the street who owns the block donut shop and the webmaster who earns affiliate income without having to go to an office. I don't think that is what you mean by CEO though.

If you are talking about the number of people with MBA degrees versus the number of people who become CEO of a large corporation, the percentage who become CEO is tiny. Hence here again CEOs are not average.

My son just got hired at Panda Express a month ago and makes $10 an hour with no previous fast food experience. He's been working at boys & girls club for almost 2 years and got a raise to $8 an hour 6 months ago. Most others in his position are volunteers. He is the only one without a degree getting paid at the Boys & Girls club and the ones with degrees make around $10-$13 an hour.

I asked him which job he'll quit when he goes back to school next semester, he said Panda, because he's going for a teaching degree, a profession where he'll make about as much as he does at Panda after getting the degree :Oh crap

[QUOTE=signupdamnit;20096786]You don't seem like the bullshitter type so I'm going to assume that the Fox News style propaganda and the Koch machine got you here./QUOTE]

Nope. I don't listen to propaganda. I looked up the statistic.

This "raise the minimum wage" issue will affect 1.1% of all people working.

That isn't propaganda, it's what Al Gore would call: An Inconvenient Truth lol

Look...some jobs are shitty. That's why you work your ass off to rise above them.
That's the way life works. Isn't that how it worked for you?
Did somebody just decide to pay you more than what the job itself is worth?

Or did you bust your ass and make it on your own?

This isn't a hard issue to understand to me. You take my order at McDonalds? Then you get paid accordingly.
You learn a skill and bust your ass to get ahead? Then you get paid accordingly.

All this other nonsense is just a bunch of talk. A janitor shouldn't make $15 an hour. A guy taking my fast food order shouldn't make $15 an hour. I don't give a damn about anything else...the value of the job and the skills required to do it are the ONLY deciding factor.

If a person is doing a job that a monkey could be trained to do...then that person needs to take responsibility for getting themselves ahead.

The cream always rises. But now we are talking about giving them no incentive to rise. Everybody can make lots of money for doing an "average" job! :)

That's not the way I was raised, and not the way I live my life.

And the more people who think that it's all good to just be given stuff for nothing...are going to continue to spiral down as they have zero incentive to better themselves.

Sounds like your son has the right idea and the right work ethic!

He's the kind of guy who has ambition and drive.

Yea this exactly. Talking about raising the min wage is like directly insulting people it seems

I took plenty of stat courses in college. I also took a upper level math course or 2 on linear algebra, which is used in probability and statistics, albeit at a much higher lever.

Here's a cool video on linear algebra




Your census #s comparison to CEOs shows why you're off track from my initial post which was re: basic math, statistically speaking, most MBA grads have an average level of understanding/education and training, that's due to the largest group of CEOs being educated and the largest group of educated people graduate with average grades.

If you have any evidence that suggests that CEOs graduate with higher grades (in any field of study) than non-CEOs, I would be happy to read it.

Here is what I found from the Bureau of Labor:
When you look at the chart it shows 40%+ of those workers are age 16-19. Interestingly enough the total was around 3% in 2008 so it looks like it is on the rise. Part of this could be that there is currently a boom of kids getting into that 15-20 year old range.

While its not a LOT, teachers don't do that bad compared to the national avg.

Avg about $51,000 per year across the US. Starting avg is $36k, so the teachers with tenure are making around 65-70k.

Yeah, they are including 16 and 17 year olds in that (high school kids working part time) stat.

The true stat of adults working full time jobs for a living is 1.1% of the work force.

And that 1.1% includes waitresses and bartenders who make good money with tips. My ex-wife was a bartender in Ft. Lauderdale in the 1980's...she'd bring home $500 on a good night, all in cash. And money was worth more in 1984, $500 was a LOT of money then.

Most MBAs have an average level of understanding/education and training for MBAs.

Most CEOs have an average level of understanding/education and training for CEOs.

Most kittens have an average level of understanding/education and training for kittens.

These are truisms.

Most MBAs would happily take a $9 mill a year job as CEO. The vast majority of MBAs do not have a $9 mill a year job as CEO. So the people who have those jobs are not average for the general population, nor are they average for MBAs. Do you see what I am saying?

So a CEO of a multi-billion dollar company is obviously not average.

I have not made a deep study of CEOs of multi-billion dollar companies and I expect most of their transcripts would not be public knowledge. In my experience, people who have a passion to excel tend to try to excel at everything they do. So I'd guess that most CEOs of large corporations probably did get above average grades.

If education and hard work and excellence are not factors and most CEOs are average people, what do you think gets someone a job as CEO of a major corporation?

Sounds like you are raising a great kid :thumbsup

No. But I can't really blame you. Some of these right wing sources are releasing insane amounts of propaganda on this. You actually have billionaires paying people millions and setting up front organizations just to spread misinformation and half truths on this. And to be fair sometimes the liberals do it too.

Please check out this link, Robbie.

http://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_nat.htm#00-0000

tl/dr: Just check out the above link and see if you can digest it. The column headers are clickable to sort in descending or ascending order.

Firstly notice the first row labeled "All Occupations". Now find the column labeled "Median hourly wage". Note that it says "$16.87", What this means is that about half of the working population (in their FAQ they narrow down who counts exactly) makes $16.97 an hour or less. So in other words probably about 45% or so of people make $15 an hour or less. So if we are talking of raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour then that means we are talking about directly raising the minimum wage for about 45% of the working population and not just 1.1% of the population.

Also on that same link please note that the column headings are sortable. Click the one labeled "Employment" and sort it in descending order. Then find the row just a few rows down from the top labeled "Food Preparation and Serving Related Occupations" and find the corresponding column for "hourly median wage". You will see that it has a value of "$9.15". Again this means about 50% of people in that industry make $9.15 per hour or less. Now note the value for that row under the column "Employment per 1000 jobs". The value here is "89.861" which as a percent corresponds to about 8.98%. This means 8.98% of the employed workforce works in "Food Preparation and Serving Related Occupations". Half of this just a little under 4.5%. So 4.5% of the population makes $9.15 per hour or less in Food preparation and serving industry alone.

However, there are many others who make less than $10 per hour too. For example the median wage for "Retail service workers" is $9.58. That means about half of them make less than that. That is about another 4.2% of the population. right there.

As you can probably see a much higher percentage of the population makes under $15 per hour than you think. And this is still true for those making under $10 an hour.

what do grades have to do with anything? They likely poses other skills/attributes that make them desirable as CEOs? If not that, what do you think explains the fact that they earn so much?

You and I agree that there is a large portion of the population who has worked for free (internships, volunteer work, entrepreneurship) or gone to school (probably with concomitant debt load) or worked extra hard at whatever they started off in or stayed loyally in the same company for a long time . . . who earn over minimum but $15 an hour or less.

Most employers want to pay more than minimum wage, so only people who are just starting off or who have very little they are willing to do or who are severely disadvantaged (like the Ronald McDonald House workers) are likely to be making minimum.

So, if the people who really can't or won't bring much value to their jobs get $15 per hour, should all the income brackets above that be raised by the same %? If so, is there an income level you would say should be the cut-off for this raise? Or are you saying that people who work hard, put a lot into learning, are loyal to their employers, etc. should earn the same as a starting fast food worker at a low end fast food restaurant?

Those truisms were my original point, thank you for bringing the topic back around.

education and hard work and excellence are factors, which I pointed out already here:

My original comment was re: training, as you can see here:


which was in reply to this

It's interesting no one took issue with my statement that CEOs are anti-social psychopaths.

that's no big deal, ........but average? no way!

Well I don't know everything and I'm not an economist (though sometimes I pretend) but generally when looking at the wealth inequality charts in the US since 1970 and comparing it to productivity gain charts it seems to me that some trends should be reversed a bit.

Also (and partially because of the above) generally I think it is better for most workers (the bottom 90 or 80% let's say) for the minimum wage to be pushed up rather than down. This is because, yes, I think it will put some upward pressure on other more middle class wages. The reverse is also true too. If you say dropped the minimum wage to $3 or even eliminated it then it would probably put some downward pressure on wages.

Again I don't know everything but if you look at past charts which adjust for inflation a $9 minimum wage is about the average for much of the period past 1960 up until about the early 80s. I think a $9 minimum wage then is reasonable and thereafter I think it should be adjusted annually for inflation. I guess you might argue that it should be raised more to help reduce income and wealth inequality. I'm not sure that is the best option. For now stopping the bleeding would be a good first step.

You were objecting to Grapesoda saying CEOs tend to spend almost 20 years in school.

12 + 4 + 2 = 18 ~ 20

You asserted that most CEOs must have had average grades and average training.

An advanced degree is not average training.

People who excel while not being into school are unlikely to seek more school. People who seek more school who excel are likely to excel at school. So it seems unlikely that people who excel to the tune of $9 million a year would have performed at an average level in something they did on purpose.

Almost all MBAs would take a CEO job, yet almost none get one. So obviously the average MBA does not get to be CEO.

How do you think someone gets to be CEO? Do you seriously think it is just be average, do average stuff, be a sociopath, and "don't have bad luck"? Do you think CEO compensation is basically the lottery?

:1orglaugh

Not sure why your choosing to argue my belief that CEOs are not special but OK.

I didn't object to 20 years in school at all, In fact, my post sorts out the 20 years, i.e., grad school is only 2-6 years more than under grad, it's not like CEOs go to school for 20 years on something different that the 17 years the rest of us go on, including undergrad.

Again, for the 3rd time, if you have any evidence that supports your theory that CEOs are better trained, I'm happy to read it.

And as for how someone becomes a CEO, here's what some experts have observed::::

A little more color on these particular types of psychopaths:

These "financial psychopaths" generally lack empathy and interest in what other people feel or think. At the same time, they display an abundance of charm, charisma, intelligence, credentials, an unparalleled capacity for lying, fabrication, adn manipulation, and a drive for thrill seeking.

A financial psychopath can present as a perfect well-rounded job candidate, CEO, manager, co-worker, and team member because their destructive characteristics are practically invisible. They flourish in fast-paced industries and are experts in taking advantage of company systems and processes as well as exploiting communication weaknesses and promoting interpersonal conflicts.


:)

You are correct. And that 45% includes 16 and 17 year old kids in highschool, and as I said earlier...a lot of bartenders and waitresses who make unreported cash tips.

The real kicker to what you are showing is this: All of those people who are now making MORE than minimum wage had to work to that point. That guy making $14.75 might have worked a few years to get to that point.

Now all his hard work? Didn't mean shit. He gets a 25 cent raise and makes the exact same money as some slack ass who is working for the weekend.

You just took 45% of the workforce and made them all "equal".

No way that's a good thing. No way that paying $15 an hour for a job that's worth $3 an hour is a good thing.

That's my viewpoint.

Nobody owes anybody anything in this life. But that is the illusion that our govt. is trying to create. And in the end...the only "winners" will be politicians and bureaucrats.

There will still be the same exact percentages of poor people, slack people, rich people, successful people, and "average" people when the dust clears.

Just like we've had 50 years of the "War On Poverty" and trillions of dollars spent...and ended up with MORE people in poverty. :(

In my state (California), the minimum wage was voted some time back to increase to $9 this year. I guess it is $7.25 elsewhere, which is also not far off from your $9 number.

I guess I think that wealth inequality is when you have huge corporations getting corporate welfare from the US taxpayers, while paying almost no taxes themselves, and spending their money offshore so there is not even any trickle down . . . while inflation (extra huge for items like houses and cars and school) and factors like absurd gas prices drive up the cost of basics including food and make a living wage very hard, not just for people at the bottom, but for people in the middle. That's before we even get into that a person who makes $250k probably gives roughly half to the government, but someone making $250 mill almost certainly does not.

I agree strongly that wealth inequality needs to be addressed. But I think opportunity (including access to affordable capital) and education and fairer tax laws (and maybe public works) are the answer. Not arbitrarily raising the bottom end to something impossible.

A guy who owns a Subway franchise probably makes $55k a year. That is a mid-level income person, not a one percenter.

The thread is about whether CEOs are special or worth more in any way than burger flippers. I am sticking to the OP topic.

How do you figure that 12 years of grade school and junior high and high school + 4 years of college equals 17 years?

Do you seriously disagree that an attribute less than 12% of the population possesses is maybe not average? Do you seriously believe all MBAs are CEOs, so any stat applicable to MBAs is also applicable to CEOs?

[QUOTE=Robbie;20096808]The bigger question is why the hell do you care so much? You claim to be Libertarian however this is classic Republican. Preaching something that is counter intuitive to your success.

The $1 menu would have to be changed to the $1.17 menu to cover it. You pounding down Spicy McChickens all day?

These employees make more money and they need less public assistance. They also have expanded purchasing power. This means a healthier economy. Poor people are usually poor for a reason. They make an extra $5k in a year and they're not putting it into a mutual fund. They are feeding their family, buying a new XBox, maybe going on a small vacation, hitting up Olive Garden and might even buy a porn membership.

:1orglaugh

You've got to relax. You've completely distorted my original post just so you can keep this up. I specifically reposted that comment, which stated they are average graduates, and that's statistically true. That's not special.

I don't figure 12 yeadr of grade school, junior high and high school + 4 years equals 17 years. I figure kindergarten, grade school, junior high and high school + 4 years = 17 years and double-checking my number crunching I can see, yup, that = 17 years.

And yet again, as I mentioned previously, no, not all MBAs are CEOs. I don't feel like going back and finding my post where I said that, I'm getting pretty tired of having to go back to my posts in this very thread and requote them for you.

I agree deeply with your values and philosophy.

I think the consequences of a $15 minimum wage would be even more dire however. The USA already has a decreasing middle class. I believe this sort of measure would decrease the number of people in both your average and successful categories. The most recent Census summary puts the median household income at $53,046. A $15 minimum wage would put a 2 income totally unskilled household at $60k.

Apart from the immediate impacts of inflation, off-shoring, and unemployment, I think what you are saying about the $14.75 guy getting nothing for his effort is HUGE. If middle income America and bottom America get the same financial feedback, a lot of incentive to attempt to take care of oneself goes out the window. That is enormous discouragement. How much would it suck to be the $14.75 guy with student loans, while someone with zero skills is mandated to earn the same amount?

If anybody has any evidence, links, support, smoke signals, news flashes anything that shows CEOs are above average as a group, I'd enjoy reading that.

Hey Amelia...I want to fuck your new girl Razor Candi

Just thought I'd throw that out there. lol

I don't personally know any of the big industry CEO's personally. But I can only assume that since the CEO job is the top of the ladder...that they are indeed above "average" by definition of being a CEO. :)

I'm relaxed. I'm just apparently also decent at 8th grade math.

If we are counting kindergarten, then CEOs with MBAs have 19 years of school.

How is it remotely statistically true that all people with some of the top-paying jobs on the planet are likely to be average graduates? What linear algebra allowed you to arrive at that obviously false conclusion?

Boy, you've got it out for me huh! nice. :winkwink:

on what planet is an MBA program 6 years? Heck you can get those cheesy online MBAs on the fast track in 18 months and never even step foot in a classroom or meet a prof face to face.

:thumbsup I'll let you know if she ventures out of Transylvania. (She really does live there.)

Where can I email you a pass? Maybe you can think of some creative ways to promote her :)

http://www.blueblood.com/news/wp-con...14-600x896.jpg

http://www.blueblood.com/news/wp-con...54-600x896.jpg

http://www.blueblood.com/news/wp-con...24-600x896.jpg

http://www.blueblood.com/news/wp-con...26-600x899.jpg

http://www.blueblood.com/news/wp-con...eo-600x363.jpg

Uhm, 17 + 2 = 19.

2 < 6

Just pointing out you're not sticking to the topic. I haven't mentioned 1 single time what my view is on executive pay, only that MBA grads are on average, average anti-social psychopaths.

The last part is OK, no biggie, but how dare I think most MBAs graduate with an average grade.

You must be close to an MBA grad in some way eh?

I knew you would bite on that. Not sure why you have it out for me, but hey, get it out of your system. :)

The parent corporation, Subway, would have to improve the terms of the deal or else the franchisee would probably terminate the agreement. This would be competition actually working upwards for a change rather than downwards.

I get your and Robbie's objections over the current workers making say $14.75 but more than likely it will put tremendous pressure on their employers to also raise their wages as well. $17-$20 an hour would be highly likely for them. As usual the employers would probably try to delay it but eventually conditions would likely force their hand as otherwise they could go to other employers or an easier job which pays the same.

I really don't support a $15 minimum wage though. I like $9 as a minimum and would consider $10-$12 as reasonable. But likewise I do not think a $15 minimum wage would be catastrophic either. I think it would lead to some outsourcing and some price increases but it would also have an almost immediate effect or reversing some income and wealth inequality. I'm not sure it's the best way to do it but philosophically I like the idea of reducing income and wealth inequality through work as opposed to government handouts.

Yeah, some of my best friends are MBAs.

Obviously, most MBAs graduate with average grades for an MBA.

The point is that CEOs, whether or not they have MBAs, are not average.

As the topic of the thread is kind of about whether CEOs are more special than burger flippers, I'm on topic.

Please feel free to share your view on executive compensation.

Just checking: Do you and I agree that 17 + 2 = 19, so 19 - 2 does not equal 6?

That girl is smoking hot Amelia! I love that look.

Hey are you guys gonna be in New Orleans?

Dude, you don't even have a sig. I have no idea who you are. Why would I have it out for you?

If I take the time to give you the tools to learn what an average is or the correct answer to 19 - 2, is that really having it out for you? :1orglaugh

I wouldn't disagree that you could take subset of CEOs of big corps and find they are indeed above average in probably more than 1 way. I'm still not sure what AmeliaG was referring to when she claimed they are above average. that's why I inquired.

Nevertheless, while that subset is a tiny fraction of CEOs, I'm not against it being an accurate portrayal, I even mentioned in my 1st post to grapesoda that "I *think* he paints an overly rosy picture of CEOs and while I may be wrong..........."

But I can't seem to find anything that supports the idea that someone with a business card that has CEO on it is more special than the next guy.

Fuck anyone who works in a fast food place past the age of 25

Nah, I make sure now not to visit the South in the summertime, if I can help it. I love nice California sunshine and I'm fine with a dry heat, but I wilt like a vampire when it is is hot and humid. I think the first time I visited NOLA was in like July. Oops.

I also knew you would bring up the no sig thing. no biggie. Again, I posted 19 because I knew you would continue on your tangent, you've completely distorted my original comment and not only continue to do so, but can't even see when someone is having a bit of fun with you.

:)

Well, you can tell them that you set straight dyna mo, the gfyer with no sig re: MBAs being special. :)

And the reason you have no sig, even though you know how people will react to that is what?

I need to work on my sense of humor until I can see how hilarious it is when someone does basic addition and subtraction incorrectly. How could I not see you were telling a joke there?
I mean 17 + 6 = 19 = :1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh:1orglaugh That one-liner could only be deliberate for lulz.

But, thanks, I've been using teh intahrwebs for long enough to know that when someone says I should have known they were joking all along that they are acknowledging they were mistaken.

FTR, here's my view on executive pay. It's out of whack and that's because corporate responsibility is out of whack. The SC ruled that a corp is effectively a person, basically due to it being run and operated by people. The courts have also ruled that a corp, by law, has to operate in the best interests of its' shareholders, i.e. the corp needs to make money, the bottom line. It's the CEOs job to do that, nothing else matters. the community does not matter, humans do not matter, plants do not matter, trees do not matter, that corp must, while acting within the law, operate to make more and more profits.

CEO pay is directly tied to profits, I think that is where the problem lies, the pay needs to be tied to incentives other than the stockholders solely.

This graphic highlights how fundamental the relationship is between executive pay and bottom line, if you run a business there are 2 ways to increase the bottom-line, sell more and/or slash costs

http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/...2.57.08-PM.png

Again, what on earth did I do to you? :Oh crap

All I can remember with our dealings here, AmeliaG, is my bumping your photo threads my positive comments re: your photography, in fact, I've even made conscious note to let one or 2 drop down a ways just so I could bump it all the way back up for you.

fill me in on why you've decided to take issue with my view on CEOs like this.









.

Why does anyone here even care what a minimum-wage worker makes?

I remember times when we argued over black credit cards and high-end sports cars. Now people are bitching about making $10 an hour at McDonalds.

To rise as high as CEO, you have to be a superb player of the politics in your corporate system. So that would mean they are above average.