I've volunteered at lots of homeless shelters. What amazes me is when I recognize the clerk who works full-time for minimum wage at the local store. In high rent areas, a person can't meet their own food and shelter needs by working full-time at minimum wage. Does that seem right?

Peter Schiff then states that obviously people on minimum wage should not be having families until they are financially stable. (BTW, are you even pro-choice, Peter?) On minimum wage, if you can't pay for food and rent, can you afford condoms at 50 cents each? Can you afford a medical appointment for other birth control? No.

For a first hand look at life on minimum wage, I recommend Barbara Ehrenreich's book "Nickled and Dimed: On (not) getting by in America". This highly qualified individual does under cover reporting and writes about her experiences living on minimum wage for a year.

From personal experience, I worked harder at McDonalds's as a teenager where "if you have time to lean, you have time to clean" then I did designing software for Wall Street.

Everyone deserves a living wage –at least $14/hour.

Why should taxpayers be subsidizing the cost of health care instead of the employer?

Any job without health care insurance is not worth having is it?

On a related note, I fully understand that many companies were overstaffed anyway and hopefully those who really made a difference were retained.

Lastly, isn't it less expensive to have someone work OT than hiring another person? Do more with less, sure but make sure you are setting realistic goals!

Most owners base their earnings on a percentage of cost, and at any point, they experience losses only if the increases reduce sales. Workers in in between jobs come out as the biggest losers, as the cost increases hit them before their wages increase. They must have a wage increase of the same percentage to maintain the same standard.

There is nothing in a minimum wage increase to reduce the gap between the highest and lowest paid. It only occurs if ownership is willing to settle for less profit. Many are not.

You seem like a man of compassion.
If more employers had your attitude it would help us all. But I still think that by expanding the minimum wage we add hardship to the whole economy — if we can't afford things now, how can we afford them if products and services are much higher. If minimum wage goes up probably your employee's rents will go up, also. So why not keep the minimum wage where it is for now, and employers like you CAN pay more. Of course, minimum wage is really just one of the "weeds" of our society. The root of the problem is within the heart of man, selfishness and greed, no?

A perfect society does not exist in America at the moment, and there is painfully little capitalism allowed by our current government. Under such circumstances, Labor Unions are a tolerable necessary evil. And, the combination of a Labor Union, and a Big Business is not necessarily a totally lost cause.

It's a question of proportion…. The big money-center banks are in the process of robbing the wealth of all the little people, and not-so-little people who are unaware of what is transpiring. Paying 20-30% more for what is typically 'higher-quality labor' does not put American Manufacturers at so much of a disadvantage as the many other government mandated restraints on them.

I'm not taking it too much out – of – context when I quote the Biblical Admonition, "The worker is worthy of his Wages".

Too many have never come up through the ranks. It used to be a mark of pride for the owner or president of a company to make his kids work in the company starting at the bottom – to not only learn the business from the bottom up, but to learn what it takes to actually do those jobs.

It also used to be a BAD THING when a company laid off workers. Everyone knew it meant that there were going to be FEWER people able to SPEND money. A company's stock went DOWN as a consequence. This was before the corporate machine convinced our so-called leaders to allow them to outsource our manufacturing base to cheap foreign labor at the expense of our national security and economic health. Of course, that was before most people thought they could live on credit forever. Now we have virtually no industrial base that brings $ in. Now we have a service based country and can't pay the nation's bills! Surprise, surprise!

I've been working since I was 16. I learned early on how to budget AND say no to myself when I could get by without buying that new toy in the window. I'm financially in good shape as a result. Unfortunately, now we're all screwed because of a refusal by far too many to share some of the wealth, not to mention the excessive greed that allowed Madoff to make his killing.

We need people who ask the tough questions and make sure we get good solid logical answers. That's called discipline and due diligence. What we have been lacking in the public and private sectors is exactly that. Too many who tried to simply do their jobs were told not to upset the apple cart. Maybe now that so many haves – have lost so very much, our society will start remember that greed is NOT good. Far too many people think they are entitled to far too much.

As for protectionism, traineeinvestor, the U.S. has probably been the only truly free market. You have obviously failed to notice that every other country in the world is and has been practicing protectionism at the expense of the U.S. for the last 20+ years. Can you say NAFTA? I can still hear that sucking sound. Don't you hear it, especially now? When too large a majority of your own people can't make what is considered a living wage, then YOUR SOCIETY IS IN IT DEEP. It's up to the thoughtful, civilized adults in any society to teach the kids to share. Where are the adults?

Just how much do you have to make that you actually begrudge anyone $7.25 an hour? Could you live on that even for a month? I'd have a lot of trouble doing it and I believe in living life reasonably.

I'm not being politically correct here. I'm being a rational adult who understands that we sink or swim together. When your neighbors make a good living – your property values go up. When your neighbors can't make a decent living – property values go down. Do you really want to move out of the neighborhood? Try living in China. Stop expecting all of the perks of living in an established civilized country without paying the price.

In an envronment where jobs are scarce and unemployment rising, making it more expensive to hire employees is, as you say, an demonstration of "maximum stupidity".

Next up….let's have more protectionism, higher taxes and …. oh, wait….those are being implemented already. Lenin would be giving these clowns a standing ovation.