More inflation is on the way. Ok, you may not see it in the government’s economic stats, but that’s because the government under the leftists is constantly manipulating the definition of their economic statistics. But you’ll feel it in the price of everything.
California
First, there is California’s new $20 an hour minimum wage. Wow. Yeah, sure, those who manage to keep their jobs will get a nice bump in pay, but businesses will have to implement one of two strategies to survive the massive increase in their labor cost. Either a.) they’ll have to increase their prices or b.) they’ll have to lay off workers. I suspect, like everything in life, they’ll do a lot of both to survive.
If you’re a restaurant with 25 employees earning a “tipped minimum wage,” as they call it, which under federal rules is $2.13 per hour, your labor cost is fairly low, but your tipped employees are probably earning at least $100 a shift on average on tips, so for a 4-hour shift that’s $25/hour. (Obviously everything varies…) But that means tipped employees are earning $27.13 per hour in this example. I suspect that a lot of restaurants in California will implement mandatory tips but keep the tips for the restaurant to survive. That would mean the employees will earn less, or $20/hour in this example, instead of the $27/hour.
Keep in mind that the extra cost out of pocket for this restaurant is almost $1 million per year! In Wisconsin, I can tell you that most restaurants are lucky to earn gross revenues of around $1 million. If that is the case in California (even if the sales are double that), no restaurant can afford an increase in labor cost that equals 50% or 100% of gross revenue. They’ll quickly be out of business.
The alternative is that restaurants will lay off tipped workers and go with less staff. That will accelerate as more restaurants buy robots to act as servers or go to self-service. I know from one restaurant chain owner in Minnesota that after that state significantly increased the minimum wage for tipped workers he stopped expanding his chain in Minnesota and instead came across the border and started expanding in Wisconsin. The government bureaucrats and politicians will never see what businesses they lost out on due to their ineptitude, and they won’t see the damage they did to the economy until after they have long since moved on to a higher post.
While restaurants suffer, and after that initial surge of euphoria, California will suffer more inflation from the wage increase. But after things settle down, the workers who get laid off won’t enjoy any of the benefits. They’ll be unemployed.
Shorter Work Week
That commie, Bernie Shady Sanders, is promoting a 4-day work week – for the same pay as the current 5-day work week. Ahh, Bernie, that’s called shrinkflation, i.e., the product (in this case, the work produced) shrinks by 20% while the price (the wage) remains the same. Don’t let Bernie fool you – that’s the same as a 20% inflation increase. Yes, a 20% increase. What do you think will happen? As people earn the same wage for less work, they’ll also spend more, increasing pressure and causing a rise in prices again.
Universities of Wisconsin
Who’s the idiot that came up with that name change? Never mind the massive cost to change all the signs, letterhead, and all the marketing stuff. And at a time when customers are rejecting the satellite universities, now they want to raise the price! That’s $500 more at Eau-Claire, $873 at Milwaukee, and $746 at Madison, reportedly. Note that they raised the price more at the smaller, in-less-demand universities. If they had half a brain, they would lower tuition at the satellite universities and raise it more at UW-Madison, where demand is overwhelming. That’s what any common sense business person would do. But hey, what do I know? Some satellite universities are thinking of raising their own fees even more! Meanwhile, their headcount continues to decline. Hmm, you’d think they would get the message. Customers don’t see the value anymore. I mean, if you want four years of socialistic brainwashing, you can tour Russia in a gap of four years and get the same education.
The universities’s (arrg, that’s annoying to say) excuse for another big fee increase is, yep, you guessed it, ‘inflation’! So their team-Biden caused inflation, and then the academics that support him use the inflation excuse to raise prices for a product that is in less and less demand (at least outside of Madison). They should be lowering prices to help hard working Wisconsin families be able to cope with Biden’s high prices.
New York Tolls
Wow. If you’re a worker (and I’m not talking about the big shots on Wall Street) driving into NY city each day, the new toll will be $15! Each way. That’s $30 per day if you drive in/out during the regular commuting times. That’s $7500 per year in tolls !! Holy crap! No one but the very wealthy can afford that kind of increase. And yes, in a classic leftist approach, the increase will hit the lowest and middle-income earners the most. In fact, it will make it unaffordable to commute into NY, but I case that’s the idea. To force them to take the subway, a bus, or a water taxi.
Waunakee Schools Upcoming Referendum
Now, the Waunakee school district wants to raise your overall tax rate through two referendums over the next two years by a whopping 10%! (By my calculations.) The district wants to raise its tax rate by almost 1 whole mill, which, when the total tax rate is about 20 mills (it varies year to year), taking into account the other taxing jurisdictions, is about 10%. When you consider that the school district mill rate is about half of the total mill rate you are charged, that really translates to a 20% increase! Another holy crap.
And they want that for operations, not for a capital project like a new school. More and more school districts are misusing referendums to cover increasing operating spending. Now don’t get me wrong, Waunakee schools are ranked I think #1 or #2 in the county and I think around #5 in the state, and they have many brand new buildings, and a superintendent that knows what he is doing. But I just don’t understand the idea that they want to increase taxes for lower and middle-income residents right after those same assessments just increased by huge amounts. At their proposed increase, it would mean $500 to $1000 in more taxes for a typical $500,000 to $1 million home in the district. A pretty big increase.
Crypto
I’m getting a few bucks out of the ATM at Kwik Trip, and next to me is another ATM, but one in which you can use your hard-earned real cash to buy fake cryptocurrency. When you can buy fake currency at an ATM, I think it’s time not to be investing in cryptocurrency. Does anyone have any tulips for sale? 😉)
Wisconsin Right Now is a news organization focused on covering the news from a conservative point of view, in particular on politics and policy issues through analysis and opinions, and is protected by the First Amendment of the United States Constitution.
On October 18 and November 23, 2023 Donald Trump tweeted out on Trump’s Truth Social account T. Wall’s October 6th column on Trump’s property valuations. T. Wall holds a degree from the UW in economics and an M.S. in real estate analysis and valuation and is a real estate developer. Disclaimer: The opinions of the writer are not necessarily those of this publication or the left!
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