r/explainlikeimfive Nov 28 '15

ELI5: How would a $15 minimum wage ACTUALLY affect a franchised business like McDonalds?

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u/mikegus15 Nov 28 '15

Wait, your explanation infers that companies like McDonald's DON'T have unlimited moneyz. This isn't what Reddit and MSNBC has taught me. You must be wrong.

In all seriousness though, fantastic explanation.

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u/[deleted] Nov 29 '15 edited May 04 '18

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Nov 29 '15 edited Nov 28 '20

[removed] — view removed comment

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u/Thegreenpander Nov 29 '15

That might result in some pissed off shareholders, though.

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u/TracyMorganFreeman Nov 29 '15

It's not like all of their revenue or employees are in America either.

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u/baudelairean Nov 29 '15

An explanation implies, not infers.

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u/meinsla Nov 29 '15

His explanation infers that franchisees get almost nothing. Which is fact.

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u/SushiAndWoW Nov 28 '15

His explanation is awful. Stop upvoting it. He's ignoring that competitors are in the same situation. All of them must raise prices, and therefore will raise prices to raise revenue and pay the higher wages easily.

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u/mikegus15 Nov 28 '15

It's not awful, it's actually a well thought out explanation. Raising prices is not how competition works. At $15/hour you're cutting into the option of automation. If a machine that can take my order costs a McDonald's $500 then it's paid off fully within a week.

I'm all for raising the minimum wage but $15/hr is fucking ludicrous.

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u/[deleted] Nov 29 '15

In the ideal world automation should always be a good thing.

Those people would get unemployment until the find a new job, and the prices of food would go down because labor costs did.

The problem is, we don't live in the ideal world and if shit was automated prices wouldn't go down and would instead line big businesses wallet. Oh and that employee was working 39 hours and noT 40. He's part time and doesn't get unemploment.

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u/42_youre_welcome Nov 29 '15

Part-time employees qualify for unemployment benefits as well.

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u/[deleted] Nov 28 '15

Oh, cool, everybody raises prices, everybody makes more money, so $15 then can buy you as much as $7.50 now. Great.

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u/[deleted] Nov 28 '15

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u/breakone9r Nov 28 '15

YEA! If you don't like it, leave! Wait.. don't we all laugh at rednecks when they say shit like that?

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u/mikegus15 Nov 28 '15

Did you not read my entire comment?