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A comment on Is the four-day workweek finally within our grasp?. Parent comment

Re:Is the four-day workweek finally within our grasp? by toomuchtodo on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @01:34PM (#29407345)
They'd simply cut wages when the labor supply shock recedes and labor is in surplus again. Businesses do not pay the minimum wage out of the goodness of their hearts; on the contrary, it communicates "we'd pay you less if we could, the law simply doesn't allow us to."
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Re:Is the four-day workweek finally within our grasp? by mlyle on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @01:39PM (#29407424)
Sure.

But note also that there are people one might be willing to gamble on employing at $12/hour but that don't offer a positive return at capital at $15/hour.

I think minimum wage laws are important, but that reducing the supply of labor will do more to push up the wages of the lowest earners.

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Re:Is the four-day workweek finally within our grasp? by medvezhenok on Wednesday December 01, 2021 @03:00PM (#29408434)
Then pass UBI instead and drop the minimum wage laws (there's no need for them if UBI were a thing). Problem solved.

Right now the problem is in the power dynamic between companies and employees - the dynamic is very unbalanced in the companies favor. In "Bullshit Jobs" Graeber compares the current system to a Dom-Sub relationship with no safeword for the "fake-competitive" industries that are not unionized.

UBI is the safeword.

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