Right now Walmart operates at roughly a 3% profit margin.  That's hardly a profiteering glutton.  I have a close family friend that used to be involved as as a human resource manager for walmart.  one of interesting things about their business model is that they have one of the most liberal promotion policies around.  They are very clear about the fact that you can come in as a cashier making 7.25 and as you learn and grow in your knowledge and performance you can become the manager of a profit center or greater.  

 

Now, let me tell you the sad part.  When he would do interviews for managerial promotions he had a hallmark question that he asked everyone "what have you done outside work in the last six months to improve your skill set"  He never really got a satisfactory answer to that question.  

 

When you have a situation where individuals are given an open door to advance and for whatever reason don't invest in themselves, i don't think we as a society should use the power of government to artificially raise wages just so we can pay higher prices.  

 

Also, just because a company is publicly traded doesn't mean its just going gang busters.  My wife works in photography.  Here company is going through constant restructuring because in the last few years they have been breaking even or posting losses.  In this are forcing that kind of increase could cause them to fire people or shutter their doors.  I'm self employed, the contributions they make to the health insurance that we use doesn't count to her hourly wage so if the cost of keeping her at a higher hourly rate meant they scrapped her health care coverage is that really a win for us?  

 

The infinite amount of details about any one given economic decision is why historically Central Economic Planning and wage/price controls DON'T WORK!

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