Man, 2000 years on and Jesus *still* can’t catch a break from The Man. They arrested him shortly after he was walking on water.
Of course, it’s easy to walk on water if it’s frozen ice ;). Anyhow, Philly Jesus showed up in Philadelphia a year ago. He used to be a drug addict then he got Jesus. Pretty literally, it seems. Since then he’s been somewhat of a tourist attraction in Love Park, sometimes showing up in odd places (hmm, note how the thug who assaulted the ranger in that video runs after Jesus steps into the picture?). But clearly he pissed off a cop, which of course is a crime as far as cops are concerned even if there’s nothing in any law book that says it’s a crime.
Okay, so that’s that. Now, meanwhile. Minimum wage. Righties are fond of saying that hiking the minimum wage will cause an $8.00 Big Mac. But McDonald’s doesn’t set the price of a Big Mac. The market does. They would love to charge $8.00 for a Big Mack, but if McDonald’s charges more for a Big Mac, they lose sales and make less money. Of course they have to charge enough to stay in business too, but they’re an insanely profitable business — the actual cost of the ingredients in a Big Mac are around 50 cents in the quantities that McDonalds buys them, before they mark up the prices to sell to their franchisees.
Which is why a Big Mac in the United States, with its $7.25 minimum wage, costs an average of $4.80 according to The Economist’s Big Mac Index… while a Big Mac in Australia, with its minimum wage of $16.88 averages… $4.81. *NOT* $8.00. Because the market simply would not buy a Big Mac at $8.00. They might buy a Five Guys burger for that price, but Five Guys burgers are so much better than any Big Mac that was ever made that we’re comparing apples and oranges here.
But wait, says dishonest Fox News hack John Stossel, the cost of that is high unemployment for youth in Australia — 16.5%! (No linky, I’m not sending traffic to that dishonest hack’s web page). Okay, so I go to the US Bureau of Labor Statistics and find that the equivalent US measure for unemployment as of October for ages 16 to 19 years was… 18.6%. Which is, err, higher. Not to mention that in the US, the average person receiving minimum wage is 35 years old and 88% of those making minimum wage are 20 or older.
So: you say a minimum wage hike to $15 would cause an $8 Big Mac? Australia, bitches! Just sayin’.
– Badtux the Snarky Penguin
The minimum wage in Canada varies from $10-$11/hour (it is set by each province). The price of a bigmac is $5.25. “Made from 100% Canadian Beef”
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And universal health care in Canada, so that $10-11 an hour goes a hell of a lot further.
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Average minimum wage earner is 35? My earnings over my career will look like a Bell curve, won’t they? I was expecting a gradual ramp up, with a few jumps upwards, until stopping at retirement… Bell curve–I’m on my way down already, and no retirement for me.
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Problem is, even in Australia, a Big Mac tastes like a Big Mac.* Which, to me, means the taste of heat-wilted iceberg lettuce. Srsly. Next time you eat one (assuming you do things like that) think of “hott lettuce” when you contemplate the BM’s taste profile and you’ll see what I mean.
* I would never pay money for one of those suckers, but one time a patient in the psych ward where I was working had some Macca’s food in the unit refrigerator. She was discharged and the bag got left behind. I ate the still-untouched items inside. The BM was cold and at least a day old, but no crappier tasting than those muthas usually are.
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