Minimum Wage, Maximum Concerns

Remember back  when mobile phones were roughly the size of a rugby ball and having one installed in your car carried a price tag of roughly $2,000,not to mention the status that accompanied it?

It’s sort of ironic now that having a land line is viewed as more of a luxury item than even the most sophisticated smartphone, but think about how many other goods and services have come as far down in price over the past decade as those rooted in technology?

Not many.

Phones, tablets, printers/scanners, flat-screen TVs… I could go on ad nauseum.

Which brings me to our discussion de jour ­- the proposed hike in the minimum wage? 

Now, I’m not going to take sides on what has become a national flashpoint, as both opponents and proponents of the measure calling to elevate it from its present level of $7.25 to $9 have made cogent arguments.

And this is from someone whose first job paid the then-minimum wage of $1.85. That for the privilege of showing people to their seats and sweeping up popcorn and candy as a theater usher.

Having covered the restaurant industry in another life, where this issue often took center stage, I can tell you how the service industries on the whole view it. But what about those businesses with, for example, 10 or fewer employees?

For a small business owner in a service business that’s roughly an additional $140 per day. Not to mention taxes and benefits. So in order to remain profitable, an owner would in all likelihood have to either cut hours or lay off employees.

So how do they fill the void?

They need to replace the role if not the body. One solution could conceivably be technology. With prices dropping continuously, smart tablets could replace counter people or order takers. We’ve seen it in the banking industry as ATMs now handle nearly every basic task a live teller can perform. Along those lines, I have not spoken to a bank teller or officer in over six months.

And now, you can purchase tablets for as little as $400. And owners are probably aware they don’t require health benefits or vacation time.

At the outset of this column, I spoke about ironies. One of the cruelest would be that legislation enacted to help the American worker ultimately resulted in pricing them out of jobs.