Nice review of Spurlock's "minimum wage" show discussed here a few weeks back:
30 Days -- Minimum Wage
This show is apparently being broadcast once again on FX tonight at 11:05 central. I've TIVO'd as much as I had time for, and on the basis of what I've seen I'd recommend it.
What's up on the screen is a simple, hard truth: it is possible for two healthy young Americans (a) to virtually immediately find living quarters and work in an unfamiliar city (b) at or around minimum wage, and (c) to live on same with certain hardships for 30 days thereafter.
Spurlock (Super Size Me) and his producers designed the show as propaganda for minimum wage hikes, socialized child care, and expanded social insurance. The realities of the situation dilute the purity of the intended message in interesting ways.
First and foremost all those minimum wage jobs are scarcer than the producers apparently thought. All the easily-found jobs pay more than minimum wage. Spurlock signs on with a temp agency at $7/hr; his companion Jamieson dickers her wage down to minimum so as to not cheat the show's premise. (Spurlock quits when he finds deductions bring his take home down to a measly $4.26. This is important. We return to the puzzle of his deductions shortly.)
Second, the artifice of moving the action to Columbus Ohio -- a city with which the Spurlock and Jamieson aren't familiar -- seems to mask a certain level of dishonesty. The purpose of the move, says the show's script, is frankly political. Ohio's voting patterns shifted the presidential election to Bush, and Ohio remains a swing state. How bad things are for the working poor in Ohio may, presumably, decide the next election. But this simplistic political background serves to misdirect the viewer's attention. In real life arrival at a new city and finding a minimum wage job is unusual, typically a one-time event. This artificial situation all-too-conveniently gives the filmmakers plausible deniability of certain facts on the ground. Were their accidental discoveries (in fairly short order) of local charity-based food, furniture, and medical providers possibilities they anticipated but hoped they might avoid?
Yet more-serious questions arise in connection with the all important medical issues. Jamieson wakes up with urinary tract pain and announces she has a bladder infection. After some time and difficulty she obtains and fills a $26 prescription. Real world people, when they wake up and find it hurts when they pee, worry like crazy they've got a serious illness. They don't simply announce to the world they have a bladder infection unless they've had it before -- unless the condition is chronic, in other words. Did Jamieson initiate filming knowing a chronic infection would worsten at one point or another during the shoot?
And there are of course Spurlock's varying medical issues. Many temp agencies provide health insurance -- with, normally, some degree of worker participation and payroll deduction. Spurlock's 39% temp agency payroll deduction can't have been just basic social security, medicare, and so on. Was he getting health benefits with the temp agency job? Did he dump his $7/hr job because he knew the benefits would interfere with the predetermined story of health care and the working poor?
For whatever reason he moves "up" the ladder and easily finds higher-paying work landscaping. And then his wrist immediately starts hurting, allowing the script to once again show the horrors of the American health care system as seen by the working poor.
But two important words are left out: "worker's compensation." The first thing you're asked in any emergency room is whether the injury is work-related. (I know not only because I'm an educated economist but also because I've been there myself a few times.)
One can only conclude it interfered with the script's political message so it was omitted, but the simple fact is even in his second, no-benefits job, Spurlock's wrist injury was fully covered by his employer's worker's compensation policy.
So what can we say about the documentary? You should watch it. You may find it enjoyable despite its flaws.
For my part, I was distracted by Roger Ebert's basic dictum that if it makes you feel the real events upon which it is based would have been more interesting, a movie can only be judged a failure.
For all the nobility of their message Spurlock and Jamieson seem to learn nothing new about minimum wage Columbus Ohio. It is far from unusual for real-world low wage earners to speculate on the worth of what they do. You don't have to be a Ph.D -- or a New York TV personality -- to wonder whether you're making a difference, much less whether your paycheck measures that difference. But for our filmmaking adventurers Spurlock and Jamieson the whole daytime world of work exists only so they can mug at the videocam as they show off the paltry sums on their paychecks. What did they actually do during the work hours? For whom? And really -- is it certain it was worth more than they were paid?
UPDATE: Reviews can be found here and here and here and here.
As I look these reviews over I wonder whether the entire US literary class is so out of touch with normal life that EconoPundit is the only one to notice the relevance of worker's compensation? Do the people who composed these reviews even know worker's compensation exists?
UPDATE: Bruce Bartlett sends this:
Can I assume that there was no mention of the earned income tax credit, food stamps or any other government benefits to which someone living only on the minimum wage might [be] entitled? If so, it is typical of much of the left's attacks on inequality -- they simply ignore much of what we already do as a society to improve it.
UPDATE II: Lesley, a new reader of EconoPundit, sends the following thoughts on economics and biology:
As a two-time college drop-out who worked low skilled, low paying jobs for several years to eventually gain the skills and experience for decent paying work which I love, I'm always interested when people like Spurlock or Barbara Ehrenreich make claims about what can or can't be done on low or minimum wages. The first year I supported myself (1994, at age 18) my gross income was less than $8000.00, with no credit cards and no car, and the only times I ever went hungry were when I decided to buy a novel or CD instead of dinner. I lived "paycheck to paycheck" only because I blew money on stupid crap like collectible card games. I missed Murdock's show, but I'll have to be sure to catch it if it airs again. There's no way you lose 39% of a $7/hour paycheck on just taxes and FICA. He must have taken every single benefit they offered.
I do have one nit to pick, though, where I think you jumped to an unwarranted conclusion:
"Real world people, when they wake up and find it hurts when they pee, worry like crazy they've got a serious illness. They don't simply announce to the world they have a bladder infection unless they've had it before -- unless the condition is chronic, in other words."
Perhaps this is the case for real world men, however bladder infections are much more common in women than in men. For instance, if you ask around, I think you'll find that most women know that drinking cranberry juice is a good way to prevent or help cure bladder infections. A Google search for "bladder infections" and "cranberry juice" produces more than 10,000 hits. For a young, healthy woman, the most likely cause of painful urination is an STD (which a woman in a long term monogamous relationship probably won't consider) a yeast infection (but when that's the case there's usually no doubt), or a bladder infection, none of which is particularly serious if treated promptly. Perhaps men would worry like crazy, but I believe a lot of women would make the assumption of a bladder infection even if they had never had one. If Jamieson did have a problem with chronic bladder infections, she would very likely be drinking cranberry juice daily on a doctor's recommendation, something which may or may not be possible to confirm by watching the television show. Certainly it's possible that she was dishonestly manipulating the circumstances, but I don't think that conclusion is warranted based solely on her assuming she had a bladder infection.
I've been fascinated by economics ever since I first read several of Thomas Sowell's books 8 years ago, and I was pleased to discover your site today to add to my daily reading. Thanks!
EconoPundit responds: Mentioning the words "your site" and "Thomas Sowell" in the same sentence makes my morning! Thanks, and welcome.
UPDATE III: Reader Bruce Stram has been brooding about the NYT series, and sends in these thoughts:
[Social critics] dramatize income inequality and tax burdens with inaccurate, incomplete and/or highly selective results...One of the worst offenses is [lumping] the payroll tax with income tax to...boost the impression of unfair tax burden. [Also ignored is that] payroll tax payments create [a progressive] entitlement [that is] never [completely] offset against the tax burden.
Logically [critics] might be expected to favor simply ending the program. But...they are typically those who most vehemently favor [it, insisting instead that it] be kept in its present form.
[T]he only sensible interpretation [is] that [these social critics] want to make [Social Security] more progressive -- [but] they...never say this directly. Rather they...argue for more [even more] progressive payroll taxes without adjusting the entitlement. Maybe they just assume...more progressive is so [much to be] preferred that they may remain silent. Yet the balanced nature of the payin-payout features of [Social Security] are widely believed to be a key to its widespread support...
Even more egregious is that no one even mentions Medicare. This...seemingly evenhanded program...is in fact wildly progressive. Payroll payments are about 40% of [Social Security,] but there is no cap. [Higher] earnings always pay proportionately more[, yet] everyone gets the same Medicare benefits. [The rich] end up paying...far more [than they]...receive. [T]his [extremely progressive] characteristic is never...factored into [critics'] tax incidence calculations. [S]ince these and [Social Security] are...larger than incomes taxes for lower [incomes], we have a wildly progressive program in overall effect being used to bolster claims of regressive taxation.
The point is...never take...the NYT...at face value [on this issue].
UPDATE IV: More (on the TV show) here.
UPDATE V: More here as well.
Link posted by Steve Antler : 8:04 AM
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