As I said up above, Iâm not taking a normative position on this issue, as I think itâs beyond the scope of this message board.
I donât necessary support keeping people in poverty or support getting people out of poverty. I take no such positions, either way.
Iâm just pointing out that merely raising minimum wages for the fast food sector will have unintended consequences for the rest of the dining (and diner) industry. If you canât believe, or wonât accept, that, thatâs ok.
Are you sure about that? Because it sounds like youâre trying to convince people that raising the minimum wage is bad for everyone. Unless I missed the part where you sympathize with low-wage workers.
Americans donât want to accept that for years we have had cheap food and cheap dining out because of a combination of government subsidies and low wages. Food in most European countries is more expensive, both in grocery stores and in restaurants (or certainly was when we were there). We have gotten used to this just as we have gotten used to cheap Chinese goods because their labor costs are low. Itâs a shock to discover that there is no such thing as a free lunch.
While I agree with your initial sentence, I started a whole discussion about how I thought dining out in Germany was cheaper than it is stateside. It went relatively well
The 20%+ gratuity expected here seems to be the main reason for the difference.
Definitely not - restaurants and buying groceries is so much cheaper in Europe. Even in a relatively expensive country like Germany, every time I visit family there it is astonishing how expensive everything is in the US
Of course there are exceptions such as Sweden, Norway and Switzerland.
My relatives in Zurich canât afford to go on vacation in their own country.
I think the dollar goes a lot further in Austria (well Tyrol at least - I havenât been to Salzburg or Vienna in 25 years), Greece, Germany, France, Portugal and Spain than it goes in Toronto, in my experience. I really miss visiting. Portugal and Czech Republic are especially cheap relative to Canada.
some large caution is required when comparing the costs of things via an âexchange rateâ
the DEM went from 4:1 USD to >2:1, then converted to Euro 1:1 and the Euro was 1.2:1 USD at that time.
the best âcomparisonâ is when one is earning the local currency . . . when I took an overseas assignment to Germany, I took a âpay cutâ per the exchange rate - but my DEM salary was generous and we had no issues making ends meet and funding extensive travel / experiencesâŚ
perhaps to put a bow on it, the Big Mac Index compiled by the Economist can be a useful data set when considering macro-economic conditions across various geographies.
the latest data shows a big mac is essentially the same price in the âaverage Euroâ zone country, the UK, and Canada.
in Switzerland itâs 44% more expensive, and in Argentina itâs 33% cheaper.
My bad.
