I’m not saying anything about what anyone deserves.
I happen to know a general contractor who is incredibly charitable and willing to hire just about anyone who can swing a hammer. He mentioned that one year, he hired so many people that the per-employee costs and taxes ate all of the company’s profit. He had to live on savings that year. Obviously that isn’t sustainable, even if many independent coffee shops and bookstores try it.
Companies that pay more for labor than the value they get from that labor go out of business the same as companies that sell items at a loss and try to make it up on volume.
I think there’s a disconnect between the phrase “what someone deserves” and “what someone is worth [to a company].” Yes, because you are human, you have intrinsic value and can even claim you deserve certain things. Whether there’s some cosmic guarantee that you will get what you deserve is beside my point.
But your value to a company as their employee can be given a measurable number. It probably has more to do with my age than with the job itself, but I actually enjoyed the minimum wage jobs that I took when I was younger. Even today, when I see a “help wanted” sign at the kind of place I would have worked as a teenager or young adult, I reminisce about those jobs. But I never apply, because my value to them has a hard limit: they aren’t going to pay me more than the market price to keep the store clean, count back change, and provide good customer service. I’m not significantly better at those jobs than the average teenager. My knowledge of C++, C#, web services, databases, UI design, etc. has no value to them, although it has value to many other companies. I would never expect them to pay me more than my value to them.
I’m happy that Amazon has changed its pay scales. But this change will involve laying off people who are profitable at, say, $8/hour or $10/hour but not $15/hour. That’s how the world works. Today, those employees can find other jobs at $8/hour or $10/hour. They may even get a raise. But if minimum wage is increased to $15/hour, they could find themselves priced out of the market.
Who cares? If markets are allowed to compete freely, unskilled labor rates trend towards zero. Most of the people currently working at $7.50 probably would be paid even less if the law didn't forbid it now.
We live in a capitalist society where people are expected to work for a living. Saying that someone doesn't deserve to be paid a living wage is the same as saying they don't deserve to live.