> Also why is McDonalds an example of an exploitative company?

Because we (in UK) are paying in-work benefits to help people who work there survive. So the taxpayer is subsidising the labour costs of this business. If we didn't, there wouldn't be enough people willing to work at McDonalds.

We should only pay benefits to people who are unemployed, a job has to cover costs of sustaining employees. The same pronpem is faced by british farmers - they can't exploit romanian students with schemes where they pay them below minimum wage by charging £50/day for libing on the farm in a tent. And there arent enough british folks who want to break their back for minimum wage.

You aren’t subsidizing McDonalds labor cost. If McDonalds paid them more, they would be paying more than the revenue that’s attributable to them, and creating a net loss by hiring them and they simply wouldn’t do it.

As a society we have decided that people deserve a livable wage. That is a good thing. Minimum wage laws are a distorting way to accomplish this because they put a cost that should be borne by society (no-skill workers should have a livable wage) and force it on industries that employ workers with no skills. Subsidizing the income through government transfers is frankly a more equitable means of achieving that goal.

That being said, in such a regime however minimum wage laws are necessary, not because McDonalds is exploring the workers, but because they are likely to exploit the government.

> If McDonalds paid them more, they would be paying more than the revenue that’s attributable to them, and creating a net loss by hiring them and they simply wouldn’t do it.

That only happens when McDonalds is paying exactly as much as the value they get back. Which is doubtful. If forced to pay more or shut down, your average McDonalds would prefer to pay more. They wouldn't be losing money.