It's not even a state issue if you get right down to it. It's an economic issue drive by supply and demand with the cost constraints of a given business.
Trump and the Dept. of Education
- Thread starter Loyal Coug1
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While you are right, if one is pre-disposed to pleading with daddy govt to solve any issue, State government is where he should pitch his tent.
Your argument hinges on a narrow definition of "suppress" and ignores the broader systemic effects of Republican policies, which demonstrably tilt the playing field toward employers and erode workers’ ability to secure fair wages—all wages, not just the minimum.Technical difficulties.
The operative term was "suppress wages." Still haven't seen anything that shows me Republicans want to suppress wages, as in press downward because that is what suppress means. Or suppress teaching wages since this thread is about the DOE. The NBC news article includes that California rejecting the minimum wage increase was the first time that occurred since 1996. Since minimum wage is somehow driving this discussion, whoever those Republicans were suck at their jobs.
Real wages declined almost the entirety of Obama and Biden's presidencies. That was something that actually happened. It wasn't talk. Despite some folks sensitivity to words, I think you need to focus on what politicians do or don't do, rather than what they say because many on both sides of aisle say all kinds of shite. Here's a "do" that I would not call suppression (again, not sure why minimum wage is taking center stage in this discussion):
Republicans unveil two minimum wage bills in response to Democrats' push
Senators Mitt Romney and Tom Cotton set $10-an-hour target while Josh Hawley promotes tax credit schemewww.theguardian.com
Also, please help me reconcile some basic Republican/conservative philosophy to the so-called suppression of wages. Monopsony is where a BUYER dominates the market and can do something like set a wage. Republicans' basic philosophy is free markets, competition, etc. In theory that undermines creating or encouraging monopsony, where wages could really be suppressed. More competition for your services in theory leads to higher wages.
Back to the actual point of this thread. The US has a decentralized funding model for education, with the DOE popping up in 1979. Other developed countries have a centralized system of funding and regulating education (or at least much more centralized than the US). The DOE has not been working. Those impoverished districts have not been improving. Test scores are not improving. Adding a federal agency has done what? I see no reason to continue doing the same thing but expecting a different result. I'd be fine with centralizing the funding and specifically and education in general too (doubt that would go over well, but it least it wouldn't be repeating a failing effort).
You're cherry-picking real wage data from the Obama and Biden presidencies to imply Republican policies don’t suppress wages. Real wages stagnating or declining isn’t proof of Republican virtue, it’s evidence of a broken system where neither party has fully countered the structural advantages employers enjoy, advantages Republicans actively reinforce.
Look at the data: from 1979 to 2023, worker productivity grew 81%, yet hourly compensation for nonsupervisory workers rose just 29% https://www.epi.org/productivity-pay-gap/. The gap? It’s funneled to the top via corporate profits and executive pay. Republicans aren’t “pressing wages down” with a magical lever, they rigging the game so employers don’t have to raise wages, even as productivity soars. That’s suppression by design.
Your claim that Republicans suck at suppressing wages because some states reject minimum wage hikes (like California in 2023) misses the point. Minimum wage is just one lever; Republican policies suppress wages across the board. Take their obsession with right-to-work. States with these laws (I think there's 26) were all Republican-dominated at enactment. Wages in these states are lower on average than in non-right-to-work states, even controlling for other factors. Why? Because these laws kneecap unions, the single biggest counterweight to employer wage-setting power. Less union power means less bargaining leverage for workers, period. That’s not a free market; it’s a market rigged for bosses.
Romney, Cotton, and Hawley’s minimum wage bills are a weak counterexample. Romney and Cotton’s $10-an-hour proposal by 2025 was a joke; it was still below a living wage in most states, and was phased in so slowly it wouldn’t even keep up with inflation. Hawley’s tax credit scheme? A convoluted workaround that doesn’t mandate higher pay, just shifts the burden to taxpayers. These were PR stunts, not serious wage boosts. Meanwhile, Republicans block actual wage hikes like the $15 federal minimum wage shot down by Senate Republicans in 2021. Actions speak louder than their half-baked proposals.
The U.S. isn’t a pure free market and never has been. Employers wield outsized power through concentrated market control, lobbying, and lax enforcement of labor laws. Republicans cheer this dynamic by opposing antitrust enforcement (look at their resistance to Lina Khan’s FTC agenda) and gutting labor protections. Project 2025 explicitly calls for scrapping the Davis-Bacon Act which I mentioned earlier. That’s not competition, it’s handing employers a blank check to lowball workers.
Your monopsony rebuttal assumes perfect competition, which doesn’t exist. Employers collude (e.g., no-poach agreements in tech, fast food) or exploit workers’ limited mobility (rural areas, visa restrictions). Republicans don’t fight this, they enable it.
The rational conclusion? Republican policies, right-to-work, anti-union laws, deregulation, consistently empower businesses to hoard profits at workers’ expense. They don’t “suppress” wages with a sledgehammer; they do it by strangling workers’ leverage, letting employers set wages unilaterally. That’s not a free market, it’s corporate feudalism. If they wanted workers to thrive, they’d back unions, enforce antitrust, and fund labor agencies. They don’t. They want businesses fat and workers lean. Prove me wrong with data, not platitudes.
Part of the issue is the extremely spoiled youth who believe that daily $8 iced coffee energy drinks are a "right".
Not going to dig it up, but a poll revealed that Gen Z would rather have their overpriced drinks ("for their mental health) than do without but have a mortgage. I will admit that home ownership has never been more expensive than right now, but I'm over the "we neeed $20/hr min wage so we can afford $8 pints, craft food truck food, and a couple of coffees every day. Oh, AND we need a house" garbage. Fcking spoiled as fck assholes, most of them. And again, its Gen X's fault, but still.
Be like dirty uncle loyal and have some PBR to prefunk before you go have a couple of pops at the bar. Brew coffee at home. Squirrel some of that cash away, even.
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Why do I keep getting dragged into this shit? That said, yeah I NEVER buy that fruffie coffee. No thanks. I drink Folgers which I make at home. Probably 10-15 cents per cup. And I don't drink PBR - haven't had that since my HS days I think.
Nothing here about education.
And edit to add- Examples of suppress would include the Biden White House suppressing news stories of his cognitive decline, suppressing a virus to the point of it being undetectable, and a suppressor on firearm that would reduce noise and recoil.
I didn’t chose Krusty’s words for him.
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Or AI, tariffs on US goods or robotics, either.
Don’t see him acknowledge Trump won 60% of the Teamster vote either.
Don’t see him acknowledge Trump won 60% of the Teamster vote either.
Well, that's true. My bad. I mistook the convo to be about overall education spending in the uSA
That is an argument for sure. Higher wages lead to more spending power which drives any economy, particularly ours.
But, it also increases demand which raises prices and the cost of living.
I am on the side that higher wages are an overall benefit to a local economy that overrides the the inevitable higher costs. I base that on the increasing living standard we've seen throughout all these years of minimum wage increases. The economy has never tanked because of it.
Also, a search of our states that have kept the minimum federal wage as their minimum wage shows that 18 of 20 states that do so are republican controlled with Pennsylvania and wisconsin being split party control.
It also comes frim my anecdotal experience of hearing right-wingers complaining about how much teachers make as well as how much auto workers made during the auto bailout after the great recession. Taihtsat
I don’t think I see a direct attack on the fast food industry, at least not I. The next 4 years. It’s too big, too powerful, too much money, and the boss likes it. He’ll nibble around the edges on food additives that nobody can pronounce, work on fluoride in drinking water, and try to convince us that cod liver oil is effective against measles…and that the vaccine kills more people than measles or polio.
But he doesn’t have the political power to go after McDonalds, coke, frito-lay, and the other conglomerates that are the real root of American obesity.
I love how the MAGA crowd dodges things when they don't like the answers. You do understand that it's still Republicans, regardless of what state that they are in, who actively seek to suppress the wages of the lower class? You do understand that it's Republicans who actively work to put more money in the pockets of the wealthy while doing so?
The Democratic Party is a hot f#cking mess and I'll never be part of their group, but at least they aren't hypocrites who go into churches on Sunday and then go into Capitol buildings on Monday and act like they've never heard of Christian principles.....except when those principles align with their agenda.
Vitriolic diatribe.
A simple “Wow, I guess you’re right! Thanks for the tip! In the future, I’ll direct my uncontrollable rage where it belongs, toward people who are in power to directly impact this issue that’s important to me”
Would have been more appropriate.
"Rage".
You guys project so much. Your "rage" at the notion that brown people and trans people might be getting out of the gutter is deluding you into empowering Musk and Trump to destroy our country. When judges step in and say, "This doesn't appear to be constitutional", you immediately tear up the Constitution and piss on it because it's impeding the MAGA attack on "OTHERS".
Before you talk too much about rage, I would suggest watching your right wing media horsesh!t and see how often those people are yelling angrily. I think you'll find that "Rage" and "Culture Wars" applies to the MAGA world a lot more than it does to others.
There you go off again.
It’s hard when you lose control. Job, Wife, Daughter all seemingly turning against you?
Maybe you should take a break. Get a helping hand. Reach out to HR. Your issues won’t magically disappear by raging against me.
It’s hard when you lose control. Job, Wife, Daughter all seemingly turning against you?
Maybe you should take a break. Get a helping hand. Reach out to HR. Your issues won’t magically disappear by raging against me.
Seriously? I find democrats, particularly young progressive liberals, to be the most hypocritical, hateful people I've ever met.
Your comment is misguided at best...
"From April 9-July 3, nearly 300 Teamsters local unions nationwide conducted first-of-their-kind Presidential town halls, soliciting endorsement preferences from members via straw polls. The in-person voting was held prior to Biden’s withdrawal from the race. The Teamsters’ polling data shows members backed Biden 44.3 percent to Trump’s 36.3 percent."
The Teamster's had already voted to endorse Biden prior to his withdrawal. Members may have preferred Trump to Harris, but that says more about Harris and a candidate and her historically doomed campaign timeline that it does about Teamster's members preferring Trump's policies. And at the end of the day, these were just polls and there's no way for certain to know how members voted in the actual election.
Methinks one knows their argument is weak when they're relying on semantics as a bulletproof vest.
Suppress: to restrain from a usual course or action; to inhibit the growth or development of https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/suppress
You either don't want to connect the dots on how broad policies suppressing wages affect the education profession, or you're just chagrined that the evidence regarding Republican policy choices that suppress wages is so overwhelming.
States like Texas and North Carolina are both right-to-work states with Republican-led legislatures and consistently rank near the bottom for teacher pay.
: to press down Examples of use previously provided. The English language is not my doing.
You're aware that minimum wage is floor, not a ceiling. And I'm still unclear on why minimum wage is at center stage given that Google says 1 million Americans make minimum wage out of 163 million people in the workforce, or .61 percent, and as far as I know none of those 1 million are teachers.
No one is willing to explain why education spending must track inflation, or what countries educational spending has tracked or exceeded inflation.
NEA's breakdown of average teaching salaries and "minimum living wage" doesn't fit your narrative. Seems like the common thread is certain states have some exceptionally high cost of living that skews the average, not politics. Those lefties must have stealthily take over Texas, and the Rs conquered Hawaii. Obviously.
Educator Pay Data 2024 | NEA
NEA's 2024 review quantifies teacher salary, education support professional pay, and student spending in every state.
www.nea.org
