Gov. John Bel Edwards should never play poker or negotiate. He has demonstrated beyond all doubt that he is unable to bluff or mediate.
In fact, he has just shown a weakness in representing the interests of workers in Louisiana by opting out on the $300 per week unemployment benefits (about $1200 per month) in favor of accepting an whopping increase of $28 per month on their behalf.
I’m certain the Repugnantcans will love him for that. Below is a little illustration of how Amazon’s Jeff Bezos and Facebook’s Mark Zuckerberg have fared over the last 12 years compared to minimum wage workers in America:
Repugnantcans have bitching for some time now that restaurants and other low-wage businesses have been experiencing trouble hiring workers who prefer to stay home and collect unemployment rather than earn a living.
It’s a valid argument on the surface of it but if you choose to dive just a bit deeper, you can see some rationale to the reluctance of workers to subject themselves to the abuses of rude customers and impatient managers. At a whopping $7.25 an hour, a worker would make $290 per week for a 40-hour week. That’s before paying for child care and gasoline to and from work.
And how many $7.25-an-hour employees work a full 40-hour week? Not many. They’re virtually all part-time workers with no health care insurance, no vacation pay, no sick pay.
By opting out, Gov. Edwards will force unemployed Louisianans back to their status as recipients of the lowest unemployment benefits in the nation.
Let’s hear it for the Louisiana Association of Business and Industry (LABI), to whom it now appears that Edwards has sold out.
This isn’t some pitiful advocacy for socialism; it’s just a plea to do the right thing by Louisiana’s minimum wage workers. If Edwards had been any kind of bargainer at all, he would’ve insisted on a significant increase in the minimum wage as a trade-out for dropping the $300 per week federal unemployment benefits.
Opponents howl that increasing the minimum wage is inflationary. Well, so is the cost of lumber, used trucks, and just about anything else for which the costs have skyrocketed in recent months. Lumber has increased by an average of 200 percent but the minimum wage is still locked in at $7.25 per hour in Louisiana – right where it’s been since 2008 – that’s 13 years for Repugnantcan legislators who don’t seem to be able to understand that you can’t support a family on $7.25 an hour.
Give John Bel Edwards credit where it’s due. He handled the Covid pandemic magnificently and kept Louisiana’s infection rate at a manageable level. And while the state’s vaccination rate remains far too low, he can’t be blamed for citizens’ ignorance and stupidity.
But he dropped the ball in protecting the interests of minimum wage workers in Louisiana and he owns that blunder.
Louisiana Voice 
The rich get richer and the poor get poorer….the beat goes on.
You failed to mention that Mark, Jeff, Elon, Bill Gates paid no income tax at all (according to “leaked” tax returns). That is unacceptable. They should pay 20-30% like everyone else. I do not believe in class warfare as it will accomplish zip, but the super rich should pay something. Even the poor should have to pay something, even if only $100/year. Everybody should have some “skin in the game” and perhaps we would not see this excessive deficit spending on largely non-essential government services.
As for the minimum wage, it means nothing. Supply and demand determines what one is worth in a free market. Example; I just got back from Destin where every place I went was short staffed because their people would not come to work (high unemployment benefits was cited).If you pay people not to work, they will not do so, and frankly, I cannot blame them.
Wendy’s in Lafayette only offers drive through service because they cannot get workers, even at $10/hour (Mickey D’s and Burger King are in same boat). And what does the pay of a CEO have to do with minimum wage or any workers anyway ? That is a private matter between stockholders and those people. This is nothing more than a diversion from the real issue ie. undereducated or unskilled people wanting better paying jobs without having any skills to sell. I had to work my way through school. I am pretty certain you worked your way up to a higher position.
Employers will pay whatever is necessary to get workers, but the state (us taxpayers) should not pay people who can work, not to do so. Kind of like telling the world if you enter our country illegally, there will be no consequences, only free benefits; you see the result. Our border is overrun and at crisis.
Minimum wage is NOT designed for a career but people starting out in life. The core issue is education, improved skills and self-reliance.
Your response to this article is right on target! Thank you.
A swap of $300 per week for $28 per week (or per month, there are two different reports) hardly seems like a fair trade, unless you represent LABI and other Big Business. How very republican of JBE for going along with that to placate the business lobby. I guess the smart business owners haven’t figured out that a worker shortage might actually be caused by jobs that pay starvation wages, offer zero benefits, and have a poor work environment. Add a lack of affordable childcare to the mix and working for minimum wage makes no sense. It will be interesting to see how many of those jobs remain unfilled going forward.
I don’t understand why business owners complain about not finding employees. If the businesses offered a wage that workers wanted, they’d find employees. Prices for the services provided might go up. If a business fails because it cannot make money selling enough because the price goes up too much after paying workers what they demand, then the product wasn’t really wanted or needed. If people want a product enough, they will pay the asking rate. If people stop buying a product because it isn’t cheap enough, then that’s on the lack of demand for the cheap product.
My thoughts exactly, Jaded. If giving those workers a raise requires the employer to raise the price of the service or product, that’s okay with me. Just as you said, the consumer, if they want the service or product, will pay the increase cost. How many of us have refused to pay the price of a service or product that was, lets say, 50 cents cheaper last week? We want it, we will complain, but we will pay.
Spot on, Jaded and Clifford55.
As a perfect example, Starbucks Coffee is not cheap to begin with. Last fall the chain, which pays employees above minimum wage in every market, gave all employees at least a 10 percent raise. All employees are offered benefits including health insurance. A year or so before that, the chain announced a modest increase in the cost of their coffee to help cover insurance for employees. There was no appreciable drop in sales. Most people who can afford a $4.00 cup of coffee can afford a little more to ensure that the baristas making their cup are happy and appreciated.
As Clifford said, people want the product, they might complain, but they pay for it. You get what you pay for.
A decently-compensated employee will take better care of a business’s customer than one who is resentful over poor pay and no benefits. Maybe I should mention that to the manager of a sandwich shop after someone made of mess of our sandwiches just yesterday. In stark contrast to the burger place a block away where the staff goes the extra mile to make the food exactly as ordered by some picky customers. No one minds paying a little bit more for good service and products. Prices of everything go up every so often to accommodate market rates. Hear that, business owners?