Posted on 05/22/2014 6:46:46 AM PDT by SeekAndFind
The standard argument really, the only argument against raising the minimum wage is that it will lead to job loss. The argument is beloved by die-hard opponents of raising the wage because it provides them with a veneer, however flimsy, of concern about the welfare of the working poor.
Economic studies have repeatedly shown that argument to be spurious. Now the latest survey of 350,000 small businesses from Paychex, a payroll provider company, and IHS, a business analysis firm, provides strong indications that the exact opposite may be true.
In April, the Paychex/IHS survey, which looks at employment in small businesses, found that the state with the highest percentage of annual job growth was Washington the state with the highest minimum wage in the nation, $9.32 an hour. The metropolitan area with the highest percentage of annual job growth was San Francisco the city with the highest minimum wage in the nation, at $10.74.
This suggests that the relationship between a high minimum wage and job creation neednt be inverse. If anything, it suggests that relationship is direct.
To be sure, the Bay Area economy is booming, but minimum-wage opponents would nonetheless have us believe that mandating the payment of close to $11 an hour must cause job loss at least in fast-food joints and Chinatowns kitchens. San Francisco shouldnt be creating more small-business jobs than any other city. Its theoretically impossible.
(Excerpt) Read more at washingtonpost.com ...
They don’t count jobs lost, because you can’t. All they say is that the remaining jobs pay more on average. Duh.
Because for high cost areas like SF and Seattle the market wage for low skill labor is above the minimum wage. Also, how many of the those Chinatown kitchen jobs are under the table .
Why not raise it to $100/hr and we would all be rich...lol.
Lets make it $100. Prosperity is just around the corner.
It’s clear from this column that Mr. Meyerson has never made a payroll. His bio at http://www.haroldmeyerson.com/ confirms it.
Economic studies have repeatedly shown that argument to be spurious.
There are a number of “economists” that went to ivy league schools and thus did not learn anything about economics.
Expenses > Revenue = No Jobs
Expenses < Revenue = Jobs
Oh....Harold.
What a great opening paragraph. Dismissive, arrogant, misleading, questioning of motives, setting up a straw man. This is the type of article written to make Libs feel good about themselves. Its bile dressed up as intellectualism.
Harold, you ignorant slut.
Meyerson only points out the infamous Kruger study of NJ/PA fast food places as the basis of his “repeatedly” claim. The others studies he cites are not peer review papers.
They also don’t count the jobs that were NEVER created to begin with. For them it is a great advantage.
The plain fact is that GOVERNMENT cannot “create” private sector jobs. All any government can, and is charged with doing, is to “create” an atmosphere than encourages business to exist, to grow, to hire, and to plan for the future.
This can be easily understood by studying the governments of states that see ever shrinking economies and those that have created that atmosphere which encourages. These are the states that are magnets for business.
As for small business, the greatest job “creator”, countless thousands are keeping a lid on their own growth.
Let any business hire just ONE too many workers, and they become the target-of-the-day for a division of government regulators and bureaucrats.
That cart is doing a great job of pushing the horse. The practical minimum wage is much higher in those cities, much as during some boom times fast food restaurants would advertise on their signs pay above minimum wage. If it takes $10 per hour to get a minimum skill employee to apply, then a legal minimum wage of $9.50 will have no effect either positive or negative.
I am dubious about this statistic.
Energy-related states like North Dakota and Texas can't FIND enough workers right now.
Studies of a macroeconomic nature fail to incorporate extraneous data that could easily skew the results, and might also be subject to the fallacy of confusing causation with commonality.
Looking at the minimum wage from a microeconomic viewpoint allows one to bring in values that are sometimes referred to as common sense.
To wit: A man owns a sandwich shop. He makes a dollar profit on each sandwich he sells. A worker can produce nine sandwiches per hour. The owner pays him eight dollars an hour, and clears a buck an hour on his production. If the minimum wage goes to ten dollars an hour, the worker must be laid off.
Another: It’s a pain in the neck to mow my lawn. It takes me four hours to do the job. The kid next door offers to do it for 30 dollars. I agree. He’s making $7.50 an hour. What if the minimum wage were enforced at the rate of $15 an hour, as it is at SeaTac Airport in Washington State? Would it be worth it to me to pay the boy $60? What if it were raised to $25 an hour, as they tried to do in Switzerland? Is it worth $100? At some point, depending upon my financial situation and my degree of laziness, I will say, “Forget about it! I’ll mow the lawn myself!”
One might ask the author, why not a minimum wage of $1000/hr or $1M?
THIS is the “boost” that comes from hiking the minimum wage.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mfKbaX4jE9U
..And the only objection to Gas Chambers is that they killed Jews.
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