Wage Quotes
Unfortunately, the real minimum wage is always zero, regardless of the laws, and that is the wage that many workers receive in the wake of the creation or escalation of a government-mandated minimum wage, because they lose their jobs or fail to find jobs when they enter the labor force. Making it illegal to pay less than a given amount does not make a worker’s productivity worth that amount—and, if it is not, that worker is unlikely to be employed.
Thomas Sowell
In my craft or sullen art. Exercised in the still night. When only the moon rages. And the lovers lie abed. With all their griefs in their arms, I labour by singing light. Not for ambition or bread. Or the strut and trade of charms. On the ivory stages. But for the common wages. Of their most secret heart. Not for the proud man apart. From the raging moon I write. On these spindrift pages. Nor for the towering dead. With their nightingales and psalms. But for the lovers, their arms. Round the...
Dylan Thomas
The immediate occasion of this practice was the lowness of wages, which at that time would not allow them to indulge in ale or spirits, and wages rising, it may be thought that this practice would cease; but as I do not readily believe that any man having once tasted the divine luxuries of opium will afterwards descend to the gross and mortal enjoyments of alcohol, I take it for granted, That those eat now who never ate before; And those who always ate, now eat the more.
Thomas de Quincey
In regards to the price of commodities, the rise of wages operates as simple interest does, the rise of profit operates like compound interest. Our merchants and masters complain much of the bad effects of high wages in raising the price and lessening the sale of goods. They say nothing concerning the bad effects of high profits. They are silent with regard to the pernicious effects of their own gains. They complain only of those of other people.
Adam Smith