Yeah, I know you are not a Bush defender, but I do think you are allowing theoretical analysis of a larger issue, interfere with a very practica; analysis of an immediate issue.
Whether contractors can get humongous contracts and stretch the work further by underpaying (and that is exacty what we are talking about when discussing less than min wage) employees, such that they can employ more hands, will not in any way shape or form reflect on nor answer the issue of "does minimum wage help or hinder things."
It could be that you have not worked in an area of gov't contracting. I have. This is practical and temporary and immediate and about the gov't trying to get something done, the other issue is about macroscale economics and what role the gov't should have in trying to guide it.
suspending the The Davis-Bacon Act which allows the contractors to pay lower wages, reducing costs and allowing the contractors to employ more workers to get the job done. As Bush said this "will result in greater assistance to these devastated communities and will permit the employment of thousands of additional individuals." Thus, those that have lost their jobs to the disaster have a greater chance of getting employed by the contractors until such time that they can find other employment.
This is the crux of the argument that must be addressed. And look at this carefully...
1) Allowing contractors to pay lower wages will reduce costs and therefore employ more workers.
2) Allowing for employment of more workers will result in greater assistance, and...
3) employ those within the region who have lost jobs because of the disaster, until they can find other employment.
I am sort of taken back if anyone cannot spot the logical flaws within this argument at all three points. And indeed there is a fourth unstated point which is not being addressed. But here we go...
1) Gov't contractors work by fixing overhead to employee salaries. Giving a contractor 1 billion dollars and telling them that they may now pay employees 1 cent an hour instead of 15 dollars, does not in any way guarantee that they will actually buy more employees. They may simply hire the same number at lower cost and take a greater cut of the overhead.
And exactly how will anyone know the difference? Are we having them bid on contracts with plan specs and manpower required and how many more they can use and so finish the job sooner if they can pay less?
The nature of contracting with the gov't is to extend work as long as possible, at the highest rate (for owners and upper management) as much as possible. The specific orgs who just got the contract have already been shown to be doing that very thing in Iraq. Why would this be different?
If the goal was to employ as many people as possible, the actual route would have been to sign an executive order removing overhead charges and capping profit to any contractor awarded a contract, with perhaps additional profit allowed (and must be shared by employees) with work finished in a certain time frame.
2) Allowing more hands to be employed does not mean greater assistance at all. Again, we can go back to what I just said above with overhead. Contractors would love to hire more people who they can take a massive chunk of overhead cost on their salary.
The only guarantee of greater assistance is a plan which shows how people will be used in an efficient and coordinated way to get the work done. More people standing around, or simply being on the payroll does nothing. For example if they only have ten trucks, and their work requires trucks, wtf good is an extra 1000 employees?
3) This last point is especially galling to me. If the intention is to help those who have lost homes and employment within that region, paying them less than they could have earned before is the most scandalous piece of price gouging I have ever seen. Yeah, pay Halliburton execs the same, but pay the people who desparately need extra money to get over what has just happened, much much much less.
This also raises the question of WHO will now be enticed to doing this dangerous, back breaking, shit work. The only people likely to run out and get paid less than they could at any other job, will be poor, unskilled people unlikely to find other employment. So it will be price-gouging of the most vulnerable. In fact I am finding very little difference between that and slavery.
4) From the last point, comes the next point... getting the job done right. Underpaying a workforce is hardly going to encourage anyone, even those desparate enough to work exhausting labor which they could get paid more for by moving 100 miles in any direction, to work fast nor work well.
The infrastructue needs to be rebuilt BETTER than it was previously. Paying a person less is unlikely to get it back to the way it was before, much less better than the way it was before.
Please do not allow a business man give you a snake-oil speech, which was exactly what Bush did. Let rich contractors pay EMPLOYEES less, and everything will be BETTER!
I am not sure whether gov'ts should be regulating wages or not in the private sector. But I know damn well that this is another issue, and the goal is not to get more done faster.
holmes
"...what a fool believes he sees, no wise man has the power to reason away.."(D. Bros)
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