https://twitter.com/dappergander/status/1509923718738419726?s=21&t=5VKt3PWWevMvsRH4DYEzVw
https://twitter.com/dappergander/status/1509924447989473323?s=21&t=5VKt3PWWevMvsRH4DYEzVw
https://twitter.com/dappergander/status/1509945399599108096?s=21&t=5VKt3PWWevMvsRH4DYEzVw
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It’s because Job Killer Joe is the (fake) President, duh.
I’d say about 20% of people at the poker table still think free money from Joe is causing a labor shortage. I hear about it once or twice per session.
Well what do you expect from a Radical Socialist!?!?
just tell them you do your best to take some of their free money and return it to the fed.
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Gail Collins: Bret, let’s relax and talk about long-term goals that we totally do not share. For instance, how would you feel about raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour?
Bret Stephens: Why not raise the standard of living for everyone by making the minimum wage $100? Just kidding. I think the correct figure is $0.
Well don’t surprise us or anything Bret
Bret: I’m taking my $0 cue from a famous Times editorial from 1987, which made the case that “those at greatest risk from a higher minimum wage would be young, poor workers, who already face formidable barriers to getting and keeping jobs.” The editorial may be old, but the economic logic is right. Raising the minimum wage is a well-intentioned idea that won’t help its intended beneficiaries. It will hurt them by giving companies like McDonald’s additional incentives to move toward even more automation.
Tell me why I’m wrong.
Gail: Well, I could quote an editorial from 2020 that said raising the minimum wage “ought to be a priority of economic policymakers.”
And you know, I was once the Times Opinion editor, and the editorial page does evolve in its outlook. Back when the Civil Rights Act passed in the 1960s, our editorial writers made fun of the idea of applying it to gender employment discrimination, theorizing that federal enforcers “may find it would have been better if Congress had just abolished sex itself” and warning it could lead to male bunnies at the Playboy Clubs.
Bret: I’m sure we agree that The Times has been wrong about many things in the past — and might even be wrong about a thing or two in the present. I’m still not seeing how the economics have changed since the 1980s.
I mean really don’t surprise us Bret.
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Then he goes on to say that back in the fall of 2020 it would’ve been wise to cancel student debt, but not now because of low unemployment. Are there any good analyses someone can point me to that show a good breakdown of all these new jobs across industries and salary levels? I sometimes get the feeling that everyone sees help wanted signs at CVS and restaurants all over and think the same thing is happening for high paying jobs requiring degrees. Like is right now just a really, really good time to get a $15/hour job? Get 3 or 4 of those to pay off that anchor of student debt around your necks, you bum students.
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The median American gets $0 in Social Security checks. Maybe we should stop sending those out.
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He is very smart.
Median person doesn’t have cancer. Why we spend all that money researching a cure? Hmmmm…?
median person didn’t have covid. why bother?
I’m playing devils advocate here. These examples aren’t great.
The median American will make it to SS age and be eligible for SS.
Cancer is incredibly common over the course of one’s life. Everyone’s personal lifetime risk of cancer is somewhere between 30% and 50% depending on the source you look at. And it’s not something that you can really choose to avoid. So everyone has a personal stake in that.
The whole “median person doesn’t have student loans” argument is not susceptible to these criticisms.
Edit: Didn’t see the COVID analogy until I posted, but obviously that is similarly flawed.
The „even median person <30“ Argument seems to be similar. I am pretty sure the number of people aged 0-17 is close to zero. yet many of them will acquire it in the future.
Also Student loan forgiveness does not only affect people who hold those loans, but also their dependents - sometimes even their other relatives.
Once again, Devil’s advocate here.
I don’t know about the accuracy of the statistic. I was just assuming it to be true. But if the stat itself is distorted, then that’s a valid criticism. What is the student loan situation of the median 18+ person? Between those who don’t go to college, those who can afford it easily, and those who get scholarships, it seems plausible that the median person is unaffected. Moreover, unlike those other things (cancer, covid, aging), there is a much larger choice element to taking on student loan debt.
This is a much better critique. See, it’s not that hard.
First Google result:
Sixty-two percent of the class of 2019 graduated with student debt, according to the most recent data available from The Institute for College Access & Success, a nonprofit organization that works to improve higher education access and affordability. Among these graduates, the average student loan debt was $28,950.
https://www.nerdwallet.com/article/loans/student-loans/student-loan-debt