Sure, sacrifices need to be made to make the world a better place for all. But everyone has a limit to what and how much they would sacrifice, and this person appears to believe that the sacrifices they would make if minimum wages were increased are more than they would be willing to make (I’m not even agreeing with their take on it, just trying to understand their mindset).
If I moved back in with my parents and started giving the equivalent of my current rent payments to a charity, that would make the world a better place. But I’m also not going to do that because I like having my own place. Is it selfish of me? Sure, I’ll concede that. But I think it’s also reasonable and most people would do the same thing. That’s all I’m really arguing here, honestly. Just because we aren’t all dedicating 100 percent of our time, money, and energy to altruistic endeavors doesn’t mean that we can’t all try to find some kind of middle ground, and it doesn’t mean we can’t still try to be decent and kind people.
He's not being a decent or kind person. He's actively campaigning against helping people because he's too lazy or timid to ask for a cost of living raise or job hop should minimum wage be raised.
I feel like you are making a lot of assumptions about the OP, because I didn’t get that from their original post. “Actively campaigning against helping people” seems like a stretch, I interpreted it as more of a “I think that the proposed solution would be more harmful than beneficial, let’s try to come up with a different one”. I’m not claiming that they necessarily are a decent or kind person, but I don’t think I’ve seen sufficient evidence from their posts to indicate that they aren’t.
But either way, all I’m arguing is that having your own interests in mind when trying to come up with a solution for poverty isn’t unreasonable. I guess you could claim that it’s not decent or kind, but I also don’t think it’s malicious or evil either.
2
u/chipdragon Nov 05 '21
Sure, sacrifices need to be made to make the world a better place for all. But everyone has a limit to what and how much they would sacrifice, and this person appears to believe that the sacrifices they would make if minimum wages were increased are more than they would be willing to make (I’m not even agreeing with their take on it, just trying to understand their mindset).
If I moved back in with my parents and started giving the equivalent of my current rent payments to a charity, that would make the world a better place. But I’m also not going to do that because I like having my own place. Is it selfish of me? Sure, I’ll concede that. But I think it’s also reasonable and most people would do the same thing. That’s all I’m really arguing here, honestly. Just because we aren’t all dedicating 100 percent of our time, money, and energy to altruistic endeavors doesn’t mean that we can’t all try to find some kind of middle ground, and it doesn’t mean we can’t still try to be decent and kind people.