Fourteen

Today the minimum wage in Ontario is $14/hour which means the masses of people in Ontario are earning about $80 more dollars a week than they were earning last week.  That amounts to about $4000 in a year.  For places like Walmart this is a crippling wage increase with 91,000 employees.  For a total of about 360 million dollars more than last year.  It should be noted however that the quarterly profit of Walmart Canada is +3 billion dollars so, over 12 billion dollars.  And that would be assuming that all the Walmart employees live in Ontario, which they don't.  

Another milestone is going to be passed today January 2nd, the wealthiest employees in Canada will have earned the equivalent of a minimum wage earner earns in year of working.  And that includes the wage increase.  So.  It looks like the gap between the poorest and the wealthiest is still increasing.

South of the boarder, in America the Great, the legislators have passed a tax cut that will give everyone a tax cut and a service cut.  Americans will all get more money in their pocket and they will be able to use that money to pay for more the services that have been cut.  Well pay for some of those services, because, let's face it, the government always does things cheaper than what the private sector can do them for, in the long run.  Services start out cheaper, but then they creep up.  Besides, let's be honest, the American wealthy are getting more money back than the poor.  I mean the poor get some pocket money and the wealthy get even more back.  Like if it were a 1% tax reduction an American working stiff would get back $300 and if it were like in Canada, which it is not, the top level employee would get back $45,000.  It's not like that though it is much worse.  For the wealthiest people it would be tens of millions of dollars. Maybe much more.  I mean Walmart Canada earns more than $12 billion in profit each year and that is after wages and taxes, so all that money goes into someone's pocket.  

You know how Trickle Down Economics works?  You give wealthy people more money and they invest that extra money in offshore bank accounts.  That's how it works. 

You know how Trickle Up Economics works?  You give the poor people more money and they spend it, because poor people can't save money, because poor people always have expenses like food and rent and in Canada, heat and electricity.  You know the basics of life.  Giving money to the poor means lower end businesses earn more money, because poor people like to stretch their money.  They will buy more fast food because they think fast food is a luxury.  And that means at low end food dispensers will need to hire more people.  More people employed means more money into the economy and more money for Walmart employers and then the money will go into offshore bank accounts and never be seen from again.  But the difference is that there will be less of it and more people will have handled the money first and more people will be happier and the gap between the wealthy and the poor will be a little closer.

You know if the minimum wage went up to $20/hour you would have more people buying mid level stuff and more money spent in low level things and more  wealth staying in the community and the wealth would be not going into Walmart and their profits dropping from 12billion to 4 billion a year.

Guaranteed minimum income same deal.  Less poor more middle class.  Healthier, better educated workers, better work force.  Lower gap between wealthy and poor.  Less money sitting in offshore bank accounts.  Higher tax income, lower taxes maybe, or maybe more programs like universal dentistry and drug coverage added to healthcare.  Freer education.  Happier people.