Thoughts on a living wage

We've been hearing a lot lately about raising the minimum wage from the $7.25 per hour it currently is to a higher number - I read quite a bit about a new number of $15 per hour. I don't know what the minimum wage should be, but I do have some thoughts.

I'm not talking about the nuts and bolts of how much, and how to implement.  I'm just talking about the issue conceptually.

I believe that employers should be required to pay a "living wage". A living wage is defined (here, by me) as the amount of money that a person requires to feed, house and clothe him/her self.

The minimum wage of $7.25 per hour has not been changed since July 24, 2009. The minimum wage is not currently indexed for inflation.  This means that the $7.25 per hour earned in 2009 will not buy as much as the $7.25 earned in 2013. Using an inflation calculator found here , we find that it would cost $21.73 to purchase an item that it cost $20.00 to buy in 2009 - an increase of 8.6% - but the minimum wage has not increased at all during that time, meaning a minimum wage earner can buy 8.6% less than he/she could have in 2009.

Recently, Walmart has come under fire for not paying a sizable chunk of its employees a living wage.  Here is one perspective (shared by me):  By paying its employees less than a living wage, Walmart increases its bottom line profit (measured at $3.7 billion during the third QUARTER of 2013

  (http://www.usatoday.com/story/money/business/2013/11/14/walmart-third-quarter-2013-earnings/3524329/)

- that's not an annual profit, just the profit in the third quarter.

According to an opinion piece in Bloomberg.com  

(http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2013-12-18/always-low-wages-wal-mart-s-other-choices.html), 

"Wal-Mart's low wages have led to full-time employees seeking public assistance. These are not the 47 percent, lazy, unmotivated bums. Rather, these are people working physical, often difficult jobs. They receive $2.66 billion in government help each year (including $1 billion in healthcare assistance). That works out to about $5,815 per worker. And about $420,000 per store."

Do you know who pays for this assistance? Taxpaying citizens do.  This leads me to the inescapable conclusion that I, by virtue of paying taxes, am helping to increase the bottom line profit of Walmart. I don't want to do that.

I hear the argument that raising the minimum wage will cause mass layoffs.  I reject that argument, and ask anyone who cares, to provide me with a reputable source to back that claim up - show me where this has occurred in our history. I remember in 2009, 2007 and 2006 hearing the same claims, but don't remember any layoffs. Heck, I remember back in 1997, when the minimum wage increased from $4.75 to $5.15, the dire layoff predictions that were made.  We seem to have come out alright.

Another argument made is that people should be paid according to the value they bring to the company - I would argue that employees earning less than a living wage bring more value to Walmart (I'm going to pick on them again) than the amount of money they are paid.

There is another argument that it takes low wages to compete against low cost foreign goods made in countries with no minimum wage, and that Americans will look for the lowest price available - I'd say there is a good bit of truth to that statement (I wonder if people would be willing to pay a bit more if they made enough money to provide for the basics?).

And I absolutely reject the notion that low paid workers need to just work hard, take advantage of education and pull themselves up by their bootstraps.  Sure, that would be great, and that is what folks with that ability should do - that's what I did (as an average looking white male of acceptable cultural and religious preferences).  But, you know what?  Not everyone has those capabilities (to rise above a less than living wage).  These are the people I'm talking about.  Not the "Welfare Queens".  Not the drug abusers. Not the cheats.  Not the lazy people.  I'm talking about the segment of our society that is doomed to be poor.  They will always be with us, as Jesus pointed out (while making a totally different point from mine).  These folks should be paid enough to live on.

That's all I'm saying.

How to be successful...

....well, in the long term, you must be capable.

But how do you become capable?  Through hard work, right? Hard work at what, though? Hard work at the opportunity given you, I think.

So, I guess that you have to have the opportunity to become capable, then.

How do you get opportunity?  It can be beneficial to have a family with connections, to get you in the door at the right schools, the right jobs.

What if your family doesn't have connections, though?  What if your Mom or Dad didn't go to the right schools, or don't have an occupation that allows them to know decision makers?

What if you happen to be the wrong race or creed? WHAT IF you are a first generation American whose family emigrated to a small town in the US from Pakistan to make its life better.  What if you quietly practice the religion of your ancestors, and that religion is not the dominant one in your town?

What if you are gay?

What if you are a woman trying to break into a male dominated field?

I didn't come from a wealthy family, full of connections, but I did have an ace in the hole:

I'm an average looking, straight white male of fairly standard height, weight and intelligence.

That advantage opened several doors for me, and gave me the opportunity to show those in power what I was, and would be, capable of. I've taken those opportunities when given, and have tried to make the best of them.

I think it is pretty easy for those of us who've had certain opportunities handed to us, to sit back and criticize those who aren't successful as lazy (and sure there are those folks out there), but  I think that is a little simplistic.

I'm pretty thankful to have my particular advantage.  I wonder what would have happened if I didn't have it.

My first solo flight

Here's a little story:

Many years ago,  I learned to fly an airplane. I learned in a Cessna 150 (N-11959 was its tail number - guess what? I just looked it up and it is still in service: My training plane).

This little story is about my first solo flight.  By the way, I never got my license, but did use my student pilot license to get into more than one nightclub (although, both me not getting my license and the use of my student license are different stories).

My instructors name was Brad, and we flew out of tiny little Hardwick Field (KHDI). Brad was a pretty big fellow - over two hundred pounds, and I was a scrawny kid of about 145 - yeah, I know, things change. His weight becomes significant a little later. Brad was pretty funny. He would sometimes pretend to be asleep while I was flying, I guess trying to see how I would react? Or maybe he was asleep, I dunno.

Moving along to the day that I was to solo. My parents were there - my sister and brother were there, and I believe that a couple of my buddies were there also. The plan was pretty simple.  I would take off, hang a left, hang another left (these are technical pilot terms, by the way), fly parallel to the runway (at 1,700 feet above sea level, or about 900 feet in the air) until past it, hang a third left, then a fourth, which would line me up on my final approach, and land.

Here is where Brad's weight comes into play:  The Cessna 150 is a very small, light airplane:

Brad and my plane

So, I took off, made my first left, and as I made my second turn - the one that turns me parallel to the runway - I noticed that my altitude was a little bit high. By the time I was about halfway past the runway, I was 400 feet too high. The plane wasn't responding the way I was used to! I made my third turn, but wasn't having much luck getting the plane any lower. It finally dawned on me that the lack of Brad's weight was having a significant effect on the plane's altitude.

I made my fourth turn and was on final approach, still a couple of hundred feet too high, I was systematically cutting the throttle, lowering flaps, 10 degrees, 20, then 30, descending more rapidly, and at a steeper angle than I should have, I guess.  I say that because as I passed over the beginning of the very short runway, struggling to get the plane down before I ran out of room, I noticed my family and friends standing (with horrified looks on their faces) behind Brad who was frantically waving his arms, trying to tell me to abort the landing and go around again.

Well, heck, I didn't.  I did manage to land fairly smoothly, did a couple of touch and go's (where you touch down, then immediately take off again), and then finally parked the plane to the awaiting glory that was my first successful solo flight.  What I got, however, was a stern lecture from Brad.

I imagine the landing probably looked like this:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lY1DugyplSk

The tradition after a person has his or her first solo, is to have their shirt tail cut off - at KHDI, the shirt tail would be displayed on the airport's bulletin board for a time. Mine was so completely soaked with sweat, that I think it was a pretty gross job.  I still have the rest of my shirt though.

Thoughts on bullying - Baylor students please read

Two cases of bullying:

@Baylor_Confess

A couple of nights ago, I noticed a new Twitter account called @Baylor_Confess, where people associated with The Baylor School would...confess things.  It started out pretty funny - a lot of it was totally inappropriate (although in the funny, inappropriate way that many parents and administrators don't like - but, whatever). Then it turned into a forum where students started making personal attacks on other students - all while hiding under the anonymous cloak of invisibility.

A better type of cloak of invisibility, IMO

Some pretty mean, nasty things were said said about individually named students. Those comments were hurtful. Again, this was all done anonymously.  There wasn't anything funny about those comments. I hope the posters feel badly about making the comments, and I'm glad that all of the tweets were deleted. Baylor is too good of a school, and the kids at Baylor are better humans than that (BTW, It also gives ammunition to people eager to judge Baylor according to their preconceived, false notions of the school).

There's really no need to have an East Tennessee version of Mean Girls.

Richie Incognito and Jonathan Martin

Richie Incognito, of the Miami Dolphins, seems to be a monumental asshole. He is trying to defend his bullying actions against Jonathan Martin, saying that it is all part of the football culture, and that he and Jonathan were tight bro's (apparently, Mr. Martin doesn't agree).  I can understand that a football locker room is a testosterone driven place, full of a lot of big, aggressive men.  I also understand that young players are hazed until they pay their dues.  But hazing is a lot different from leaving a voice-mail for a teammate, calling him a "half nigger" and texting: "I'm going to shit down your throat".

What really gets me about all of this, though, is the number of football players coming out in support of Incognito.  I mean, I'm not surprised that some dumbass fans are:

Dumbass picture #1

Dumbass picture #2

But to me, all the talk of the "brotherhood of football players", and then the willingness to approve of the things that Mr. Incognito did and said (he admits to them, so I don't have to add a stupid "allegedly"), don't go together. I don't understand why the teammates would side with Incognito.

Way too much meanness in the world.

Here's a scam:

(this should go on my business page: IanHarpercpa.com, but I'm having an issue with it, and wanted to get this out today)

This morning, I walked into my office to find a message from a client.  She had been contacted by a Michael Johnson (purportedly) of the IRS.  He had left a callback number: 951-223-6693.

So, I called (already suspecting it was a scam - I'll tell you why in a second).  Mr. Johnson answered immediately (hahahaha; no hold! No "your call is very important to us, please wait an hour" hahahaha).  Mr. Johnson started telling me that my client is under investigation, and asked "do you have an attorney, does your client have an attorney?"

I asked Mr. Johnson what his ID# was, and he immediately rattled off a string of numbers, not in the correct format or correct amount of numbers that I'm used to hearing when I speak with IRS representatives.  I asked Mr. Johnson about the format of his ID#, and of course, he immediately hung up.

What I didn't have time to ask Mr. Johnson was:

Why am I dialing a toll line in Riverside, California?  (The IRS always uses toll-free callback numbers.) - this is how I knew immediately that this deal was not on the up and up.

Why has my client not received any official correspondence?  (I've never seen a case that didn't start with either reams of official mail correspondence, or an ID flashing IRS agent showing up, in person, to a taxpayers office or home.)

Why did you not immediately verify my CAF number?  (CAF stands for Centralized Authorization File, a database that holds practitioner's information and authorizations to discuss tax matters about the taxpayer in question.)

The guy did some other things wrong that I won't get into right now.

The point of this post:  People are always trying to scam you. Be careful!!

If you are not absolutely sure that you are talking with a legitimate IRS representative, either give me a call ((423-479-3007), thank you very much), or hang up and call the IRS yourself. (800-829-1040 is the general number, but they can send you to the right department or at least tell you if there is an issue with your account.)

Also, the IRS does not correspond with you via email.  They just don't.  If you get an email from them, delete it. (it probably has a zip file attached to it that will corrupt your data or steal your personal info.)

Again, give me a call if I can help.

Washington, D.C. Clown Circus

(This is mainly venting.  I'm not sure you will be able to find an overall point.  Grammatical errors, yes.  Point, doubtful)

One effect of the government shutdown (that affects me), is the closure of most of the IRS offices.  A client of mine currently under audit is going to have to wait, as the IRS has said that all audits are suspended during the shutdown.  My solution to that issue, of course, would be that the IRS agree to what my client asserts, and close the case (When You Wish Upon A Star...).  I won't hold my breath.

I see Speaker Boehner turning orange with indignation that the President won't negotiate over the Affordable Care Act.  

I see Harry Reid sounding like he is close to tears over the Republican tactics.  

(This morning, over on Twitter, I read what I thought was a pretty good description of this embarrassing mess: 

 https://twitter.com/DrSherryPagoto/status/385057019549327360 )

Meanwhile, I read comments from people who are almost hysterical in their vilification of The Affordable Care Act. Do those people know what is in it? I've yet to hear a rational argument against it - I'm open to hearing one, I just haven't heard one yet. 

I also haven't heard a single alternative plan that would keep me from having to spend almost $19,000 per year before I would see a penny back off of my crappy insurance plan (12 monthly premiums of $891.73 plus $8,000 for my deductible - and my family and I are healthy).  My particular issue is that I'm in a 4 person risk pool.  If I were in a risk pool of, say, 280 million people, I believe that my premiums would be reduced.  As it is, it is a real struggle to provide this horrible insurance policy for me and my employees.

Again, I'm all for a right side of the aisle solution to what ails us, healthcare cost-wise, but I HAVEN'T HEARD ONE. Like most of us, I'm not keen on our government being involved in my healthcare, Obama-led or otherwise, but you guys on the right haven't done anything but whine and call people names - this is not productive.

The Representatives in my area (Southeast Tennessee), come across as obstructionist pissants, offering nothing positive, just automatic disagreements with whatever the President says - reminds me of this Monty Python skit: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kQFKtI6gn9Y. Actually this skit reminds me of Congress as a whole these days. 

Sen. Bob Corker, who disagrees with the Affordable Care Act, seems to be different in that he is realistic, and is not going to hold his breath until his face turns blue, in order to get his way.  He's also being portrayed as some sort of traitor to the right. Ridiculous!

I keep reading comments along the likes of "throw the bums out", but I see a couple of problems with that approach - first, you have to have some overlap in people leaving and people staying, else who would know how turn on the lights.  Secondly, who would replace those who are thrown out - don't get me wrong, I believe that the majority of these knuckleheads are doing a poor job in Washington. It seems to me though, that what needs to happen is that the whole process of who is picked to run in the primaries needs to be changed.  The only say I have in a state or national election is on the primary level, and then again in the general election. By that time, it is too late to have a real say. The problem is that we really don't get to pick who is going to run in the primaries in the first place.  This is where we (We The People) need to become involved, and is where, I believe, that we fail in our civic duty.  We don't educate ourselves as to the issues. Instead, after the candidate has been picked through backroom deals, we are encouraged, through large dollar advertising campaigns, to choose the lesser of two evils, and to insult and name call his/her opponent.

Like I said, this was a vent session for me.  Thanks for reading, Mom and Dad. 

Please. Everyone. Chill

Reading today about the hysterical (and typical) name calling reaction to (what I see as) a perfectly polite letter from the Starbucks CEO requesting that patrons not bring guns into Starbucks stores. See below:

http://www.businessinsider.com/starbucks-ceo-howard-schultz-writes-letter-asking-customers-to-no-longer-bring-firearms-into-the-stores-2013-9

It reminds me of the hysterical (and typical) name calling reaction to Chick-Fil-A president Dan Cathey's statements about his beliefs regarding same sex marriage. Again, see below:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/07/17/dan-cathy-chick-fil-a-president-anti-gay_n_1680984.html

I'm happy to live in the USA, where we do have the right to bear arms.

I'm happy to live in the USA, where more and more states are getting out of peoples bedrooms, and are getting out of the business of regulating that aspect of peoples personal lives.

I'm not a "Libtard" and I'm not a "Tea-Bagger".  I'm not any of those vile names that folks on either fringe call people who disagree with them.  I'm actually in the majority.  We're kind of the silent majority - maybe you've heard the term (talking to, and pointing at people on the fringes right now).

If you don't like what the Starbucks guy said, don't go there.

If you don't like what the Chick-Fil-A guy said, don't go there.

I get it - you hate President Obama, leading you to call him the worst names imaginable, mostly spouting irrational untruths.

I also get that the other fringe hated President Bush, leading them to mercilessly poke fun at him, calling him the worst names possible, and yes, spouting a bunch of untruths.

Seems to me that it is getting worse, I can only imagine the kind of crap that will be said about the next President, regardless of his or her true character.

Stop it, you bunch of silly children.  You are embarrassing the rest of us, and you are embarrassing yourselves.