Saturday 16 January 2021

Visitor Logs Story

Part of the incoming Biden arrival changes include the rule that all White House visitor logs will be available....whenever someone asks.

Why?

Well....VTC type meetings are more or less the norm, so there's no need for anyone to be standing or visiting in the White House.  So the logs....frankly....are a juvenile type game to continue playing.  

Journalists all hyped up and positive about the open logs?  They really haven't thought through the whole routine yet.   

This Biden $15 An Hour Minimum Wage Chatter

 What started yesterday is this talk from the Biden-camp that in the first month or two....he'll have a package to send to the House.....to redraw the minimum wage in the US.....to $15 (currently at 7.25 on the national scale).

The likely path?  A lot was left out of this story.  I suspect you'd see a $2 rise in 2021, with a second rise in 2022, and the final rise by the end of 2023.  

So you take the Burger King whopper XL menu and throw it up on the board.  $9.49 for the burger, fries and Coke.

You can go and figure that with the $15 standard....the menu has to go up to $11.99.  But you aren't really finished, because there's the sales tax increase (9.5-percent there in Nashville).   So between 25 to 30 cents will be added onto the bill....making it fairly close to $12.30.  

Taking your spouse, and two kids out?  Even if the kids go for the regular men items....the man-hour cost went up, and the local sales tax with it.....it's near $45.  Would you pay that?

In most locations....sticker-shock would occur.   I would imagine around one-third of customers would start to consider their options.  

But why just limit your vision with fast-food?  Over at your Piggly-Wiggly....probably one-third of the 'help' are making absolute minimum-wage as a start-up job.  The folks with five years?  They are probably up around $10 to $12.  You would probably notice with sales tax included....your weekly $100 cost at the grocery is going by spring of 2022 to around $112.  

Will people just accept the trend and higher cost?  Or will they step back and limit their purchases for a year or two....trying to rectify this in their mind?