Minimum Wage: Exploitation through a Subsistent Wage

Minimum Wage ontogeny through a Subsistent WageThe Raising of the Minimum Wage Exploitation through a Subsistent WageI. IntroductionFor many years in the United States the borderline net income has not aligned with the cost of living. Low net income workers typically earn the minimum net profit and cannot sustain themselves due to the constant rise of housing, food, and health care. The bourgeoisie manipulates the proletariat through exploitation with a subsistent wage that rarely increases. In this essay, I aim to demonstrate that the selected cause a class negate to keep the bourgeoisie in power to hold up a hegemony over the number oneer class.II. The Elite PerspectiveIn a New York Times clause titled, Higher Minimum Wage May digest Losers, Noam Scheiber highlights that many cities and states are considering raising the minimum wage, but some economists and business owners warn that a raise may be problematic for business owners and flow low wage workers. At the annual American Economic Association, Economics professor John Horton Of New York University delivered an essay concerning an experiment he did regarding raising the minimum wage. Using an online platform, employees post jobs anonymously. Workers then submit an hourly wage competing for them. Scheiber statesMr. Horton, working with the platform, was able to impose a minimum wage random on one-quarter of active 160,000 jobs posted over roughly a month and a half in 2013. If a worker proposed an hourly wage that was below the minimum, the platforms software asked him or her to raise the bid until it cleared the threshold. (cite)At prima facie, the experiment demonstrated that when the minimum wage increased there was little if no decline in hiring. However, the hours a worker spent on a job fell for the jobs that were lower wage before the study. In addition, Horton claimed that employers were hiring more productive works to make up for the lost earnings from the ad in effect(p)ed higher w age. Consequently, the lower wage workers were less productive, according to Horton, and thus lost their jobs. He concluded that raising the minimum wage could cost low-skilled workers their jobs, as employers replace them with higher productive individual(a)s. Additionally, some economists claim that the more productive workers that do not entertain the jobs from the low skilled workers exit also need a pay raise, which may cause more economic issues. Furthermore, others such as Zane Tankel, chief executive of Applebees restaurant infers that higher takings will accelerate automation, which will offset costs and leave may workers jobless.1III. A Sociological CritiqueHortons data is tailored to benefit the bourgeoisie and highlights how the individuals in elite position help maintain a hegemony over the lower class. Consequently, the proletariat is given a subsistent wage and is exploited for their cut into. Marx claimed that the worker is given just enough pay to survive and h ave a family and children so that when the worker falters, the children can take over the subsistent wage.2 Hortons experiment highlights how the worker is exploited with a subsistent wage. In addition, his data demonstrates that low wage workers will lose their jobs to the high output workers. This conflict between the two workers causes what Marx termed alienation. Marx defined it asthe breakdown of, the separation, from, the natural interconnection between people and their productive activities, the products they produce, the fellow workers with whom they produce those things, and with what they are potentially capable of becoming.3This alienation keeps individuals from achieving their full potential and keeps them in a subservient state.Scheibers article contains a comment from Applebees executive who states that forced higher wages will accelerate automation, thus more employees will lose their jobs. The inference that workers will be replaced faster by automation demonstrates that the bourgeoisie does not value the labor that the proletariat loses for a meager wage. Marxist theory states that all value comes from the labor and is therefore traceable, in capitalism, to the proletariat.4 The bourgeoisie does not recognize this value and further exploitation of the surplus value that is extracted from the worker. Scheibers article demonstrates that Horton neglects the conflict between classes and actually helps the elite in a bias fashion.IV. SolutionOne may contemplate if the worker and capitalist comprehend the magnitude of the conflict between them. Marx would assume that, both(prenominal) the proletariat and the capitalists bourgeoisie have an inaccurate sense of themselves, their relationship to one another, and the way in which capitalism operates.5 While this may be true that the average individual or business owner is unaware of this conflict and holds erroneous instinct, it is unlikely that Professor Horton is ignorant of these conflicts. Whil e some are aware and have false consciousness, it is crucial that the majority of both capitalists and workers become aware or have class consciousness-the ability of a class, in particular the proletariat, to overcome false consciousness and attain an accurate understanding of the capitalist system.6 Additionally, once this consciousness is achieved, then the workers must engage in what Marx termed praxis, or the idea that people, especially the proletariat, must take concrete action in order to overcome capitalism. This solution of praxis is extreme and workers can most likely keep some form of capitalism but demand a proper wage. The consciousness compounded with praxis can even out the conflict between the classes and articles concerning the debate over low wages would be nonexistent.V. ConclusionThe article Higher Minimum Wage May Have Losers, highlights the conflict that individuals such as Horton create between the workers and capitalists. The conflict between the two creates what Marx claimed to be a loss of human potential through exploitation, alienation of surplus value, and the fact that workers work and live under a subsistent wage. The solution is class consciousness and praxis that results in change.Bibliography1 Cite article2 Pg 263 Pg 244 265 276 28