i don't know many teenagers who've tried to get a job in years. They are too busy playing video games and their parents aren't even trying to make them look for work. So where all this about young people is coming from I can't even begin to guess.

An increase in the minimum wage is meant to offset rising costs and the increase was set in motion over two years ago at the rate they set... thus, it began under the Bush Administration.

However, I think you guys are missing the big picture. While you are hammering the minimum wage... we have got to have the increase and this was set in motion years ago so it isn't a surprise as they had the amount set and the scheduled date for doing it around three years ago.

Ok... big issue here.

Minimum wage is necessary. Sorry to burst your bubble but it is. However, there is indeed a huge difference between a small business and a large business. Without all those people earning minimum wage at the large businesses, most small businesses could not survive because you lose the large % of your customers.

Most of what I've seen you guys discuss is small business. Granted, it's difficult to pay someone $17,000.00 a year for minimum wage and pay three or four people that kind of money when you yourself barely make enough to scrape by. but that's not how big business operates.

Let's look at the idea of advancement. In the 80's, there was a big issue about all these college grads not finding jobs. So under attack from all sides, the government created incentives to hire college grad's which meant people who earned advancement through experience got shafted. However... they weren't the only one's. I used to work for Dell and they hired so many grads that they had virtually no one in management with any practical experience. They thought only about money so they slashed the budget for development resulting in inferior products. They also developed deceptive sales practices and spent a lot of money on ad's to market these shoddy computers. Then they created the rules for doing the tech support after the sale when they didn't even know how to open them up or what was inside a computer. End result... Michael Dell finally had to take back over the company and rebuild from top to bottom. Most of his experienced people moved on to other jobs and it was very difficult to promote from within to find experience because morale was so low nobody cared about the company or advancement.

A lot of companies have done this and ownership has always had issue with properly promoting from within because owners or CEO's often themselves have no idea what products they make or how they are made. Big business also means big money which even for the minimum wage... most of these companies turn billions of dollars in profit every year.

Ownership is entitled to big bucks because they take all the risks and provide opportunities. However, without labor they make nothing and thus it must be a partnership where the workers have a certain guarantee of shared profits. This is not a nation which allows slavery and workers fought long and hard to get a fair piece of the profits their labor helped to create.

But again... this is big business. Small business operates in an entirely different manner. A company like Wal Mart is the enemy of small business. They are 100% profit and consumer oriented. They have buying power and competing against them is difficult when you pay ten times the cost for the same items they sell. IF you are able to compete a little, they slash their prices. Wal Mart is not alone in this as others are doing the same. If it weren't for these big chain operations, you would have more sales and more money to pay employee's. Wal Mart exploits cheap foreign labor. There are many US companies closing here and opening up factories overseas but they are making billions in profit when they do it. The reason they are doing it isn't minimum wage... they are almost always stock owned and they always tell you the truth if you listen... they are making billions in profit but the stock holders want more and the only way to get this since they can't cut overhead anymore is to eliminate the costs of labor. They start laying off, then firing people all the while they're making billions in profit... then they close their doors and go overseas.

Then the small business owner pays the price moreso than anyone with stores like Wal Mart competing against you.

The way small business could fight back is by working together. Several small business owners get together, lease out a deserted shopping mall, put a new face on the building and open shop. With todays technology, each shop owner could keep up with every sale individually or pool their resources together with an equal share of profit. Most small businesses would never take this approach because everyone wants to be their own boss and trust is difficult to give. But let's say someone did this. They then go to a neighboring community, organize several business leaders together and do the same thing with the original parent franchise taking a piece of the profit from each franchise they put together like this. As you add more small business enterprises together... you gain greater buying power and you offer greater diversity than Wal Mart. The original investors also offer what they sell expanding what areas they're own small business interests may be to other franchises. The idea is to pull small business owners together where the small business owners themselves take the place of stock holders in time.

Just one possible solution or idea.

Small business needs new ideas, new ways to move towards the future and to expand. The minimum wage is not the enemy here... it's big business vs small business. They can afford minimum wage and small business has more difficulty with it because you are essentially facing unfair competition. The governments not doing it's job for small business in "preserving the general welfare" because by preserving the interests of big business, they deprive entrepreneurship allowing people on the assembly lines with ability and know how to create their own business and seek prosperity.

Instead of attacking the minimum wage... maybe attack the government saying to allow a small business with less than twenty employees to have those employee's come from the Welfare dept. People in need of aid would receive the equivalent of half their wages from the government in Food Stamps or whatever because they're already on these programs... but to remain on these programs, they have to work at least part time for a small business where you would pay the remaining half of their wages... if the minimum wage is $7.15 an hour... you would pay $3.63 an hour. these would be part time workers in many cases but it kills two birds with one stone and if they get sick of working like that... get a full time job then.

New ideas for a changing country.

Not perfect I know but at least I see the bigger picture and I'm looking for answers. We must preserve the minimum wage to prevent exploitation but that does not mean there aren't other answers we can pursue to get around the problems it creates for small business.