Seattle Restaurant Closings

[acesfull86]

I think it Pro Freedom.
It affords people with low paying jobs the opportunity (freedom ) to advance their lives.
We are a nation that defines freedom by bank account.

The business owner still has the freedom to be in business or not. We as a society have set guidelines on how he treats / pays people .

If we as "society" decide to set the guideline that businesses must pay a minimum of $10/hr, where does that leave the people who's value added skills are currently only in the $9.99/hr and below category? You're not "affording" those people with low paying jobs the "opportunity to advance their lives." You're doing the opposite by removing their opportunities.

 

[Julio3000]

free-dom

[free-duh m]

noun

1. the state of being free or at liberty rather than in confinement or under physical restraint:

"He won his freedom after a retrial."

2. exemption from external control, interference, regulation, etc.

3. the power to determine action without restraint.

4. political or national independence.

5. personal liberty, as opposed to bondage or slavery

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Two consenting adult parties come to a mutually agreeable wage. The government steps in and says that wage is too low, breaking the deal. How the &%$# is that not "anti-freedom?" How is that even part of the debate?

My problem with that formulation is that it posits any government involvement in the market as being "anti-freedom," even if there are pretty obvious societal benefits. Those benefits themselves could be seen as expanding freedom . . . like, I dunno, the freedom to avoid being burned to death in a locked sweatshop with no emergency equipment or fire exits.

I mean, in certain labor market conditions, there's no shortage of people who are willing to contract to work in dangerous and exploitative conditions. Should the ability to make those contracts completely sacrosanct?