Text your FFA submissions to (785) 289-8351 or at kansan.com
The moment I try to text faxing and my phone changes it to facing ... Too old school for you iPhone??
I wonder how many thousands of times I've written my name in my lifetime.
FFA OF THE DAY
I failed my class the way you fall in love. Slowly, then all at once.
Knees, who needs knees?
My boyfriend cares more about basketball than he does about me... Even in the offseason.
onlyatKU
If driving was a metaphor for life
I would be stopped at a stop sign
waiting for it to turn green.
Why is it called a kit
College is fun bc one second you think you have your life together and the next you're having a breakdown and questioning all life choices.
I love everything about baseball season.
Give me caramel apple pops and I'll show you my heart. <3 <3 <3
When teacher evaluations gets you out of class 20 minutes early.
$700 a month for rent? Maybe you shouldn't live in a mansion.
I pay <$300.
To the girl in Watson: Thanks again for the salad! I hadn't eaten lunch, and you helped me make it through the day.
I've never missed my mom's cooking so much! So glad she's in town for the weekend. #mommalove
The heat and finals are making me sweat.
Wahoo Kentucky Derby! American Pharaoh for the win!
Can we just go ahead and round my 56 percent to an A?
Grey's Anatomy makes me depressed. The true fans know what I'm talking about. :{
I'm not freaking out about finals at all...nope...not at all.
When your a/c breaks over the weekend and maintenance can't fix it till Monday. #dyingofheat #halp #dehydrated
Today is the first time in a VERY LONG TIME that I've finished a paper a day early.
PAGE 4
Long distance relationships suck.
MONDAY, MAY 4, 2015
it's already May! WHAT? I mean what??! Seriously! Hallelujah!
State Rep. Daphne Campbell, D-Miami, chants slogans during a protest in support of a $15 per hour minimum wage and access to health care, to mark International Workers Day, Friday, May 1. 2015, in the Little Haiti neighborhood of Miami.
LYNNE SLADKY/ASSOCIATED PRESS
Minimum wage laws hurt minority groups
The majority of Americans support raising the minimum
wage, according to a Gallup Poll. However, this increase may not have the results many expect. Even if this change is intended to help the poor, policies must be judged by their results rather than their intentions. From my point of view, raising the minimum wage would strip underprivileged groups of opportunities to improve their status in society. Being a white male, I come from an extreme
position of privilege, so I could be wrong. Nevertheless, when one follows the economic logic and data, a disturbing truth about the minimum wage is revealed.
Payday is one of the best days of the week, and it's worth digging into the economics behind it. Wages mostly correspond with the productivity individuals add to a firm. This is why a doctor is paid more than a fast-food worker. However, it is important that one does not associate their worth in society with wages. After all, a convincing argument can be made that a garbage collector is more valuable to civilization than a neurosurgeon. Still, most wages follow this productivity-matching rule.
Unfortunately, racism and poverty marginalize underprivileged groups into lower productivity. Poor
schooling for minority students leads to the Achievement Gap, which may cause the lower initial productivity of minorities, as compared to whites. This is through no fault of the minorities' actions, and it is an absolute scandal that it occurs. When circumstances are so dire, on-the-job experience is one of the best ways to boost productivity and earn higher wages.
This is where the effects of the minimum wage come in. Most firms will not hire individuals whose productivity falls beneath the base wage. So if a minority individual's productivity is worth $5 an hour due to systematic issues of privilege, and the minimum wage is $7.25 an hour, the individual will not be hired because the value they would add to the firm would be less than their wage. A privileged white person would likely not
have their initial productivity fall beneath the base wage and would thus be hired. However, the underprivileged would remain unemployed and be denied the opportunity to earn experience that would lead to higher future pay.
The claim that minimum wage laws hurt underprivileged groups is backed by empirical evidence. In 1948, the unemployment rate of white and black youth was roughly the same. Following a large increase in the minimum wage, the unemployment rate of black youth more than doubled, while the rate rose only a couple points for whites. More recently, the increase of the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour led to a spike in black youth unemployment, while white youth unemployment rates remained comparatively stable. Increases in the minimum wage may price underprivileged
groups with lower marginal productivity out of the market, depriving them of opportunity to improve their wages. In effect, minimum wage laws may be some of the most racist laws we have on our books.
So what is to be done? A large majority of people support the minimum wage, so politicians are not willing to abolish it. In my opinion, the wage should not be raised. Inflation will erode the value of the wage until a point is reached where underprivileged groups are priced back into the market and can earn higher wages. Until then, we should examine the minimum wage's effects. What may sound like a good idea may in fact be damaging to groups that already have a hard enough life as is.
John Olson is a sophomore from Wichita studying economics
Schools should do more for under-fed kids
Victoria Calderon
@WriterVictoriaC
Millions of children go hungry every day with families unable to provide meals for them consistently. There is a stigma against people who are too poor to afford food — a stigma that causes individuals to feel too ashamed to let anyone know about their hunger or to ask for help. This isn't just going on in some developing country; this is going on in the United States, where every one in five children goes hungry.
The National Center for Education Statistics reports
that in the 2010-11 school year, 48.1 percent of public school students across the nation were on free or reduced lunch, a number that has been growing steadily since 2000. Free or reduced lunches are available to kids from low-income families that have been deemed unable to afford school meals otherwise. USA Today reports that one in five households across the country with kids are considered "food insecure, which means people in the household are at risk of going hungry or missing meals or don't know where their next meal is coming from." These kids are only guaranteed meals when they are in school, which far too often translates to some children getting one meager plate of food a day. When so many students face food insecurity, schools should take on a greater responsibility by making more meals or more
Currently, Wichita is only considering applying for the program: Topeka and Kansas City are among the
servings per meal available to them.
A few school districts in Kansas have found a solution to this disturbing problem through the Community Eligibility Provision program, which is a part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture. The program "gives schools in high-poverty areas the option of serving the meals to all students, regardless of their families' economic situation" via reimbursement, according to the Topeka Capital-Journal. This program would allow qualifying schools to serve free breakfast and lunch, eliminating some of the food insecurity faced by these students, as they would have two guaranteed meals per day instead of just one.
"WHEN SO MANY STUDENTS FACE FOOD INSECURITY, SCHOOLS SHOULD TAKE ON A GREATER RESPONSIBILITY BY MAKING MORE MEALS OR MORE SERVINGS PER MEAL AVAILABLE TO THEM."
few districts in Kansas that have become involved in the program.
Wichita was able to apply in 2014 as well as for this school year, but school officials decried the deadline for the application and "logistical concerns" as the reasons why they did not apply, the Topeka Capital-Journal reported.
While other school districts are setting a good example for the rest of Kansas and the nation, Wichita and other school districts with this need
have to stop hesitating and put the well-being of these kids above their "logistical concerns." With so many kids unsure of where their next meal is coming from, public schools need to become a place of certainty when it comes to their students' health and nutrition.
Victoria Calderon is a sophomore from Liberal studying English and political science
YOUR JOB IS TO DISCOVER WHAT'S RIGHT!
www.panasonic.com
TURNS OUT THEY RE BOTH RIGHT.
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