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Could raising the minimum wage prevent thousands of suicides?
CBS "News" ^ | January 10, 2020 | By Aimee Picchi

Posted on 01/10/2020 6:33:23 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer

* Fewer suicides occur when minimum wages are higher during periods of elevated unemployment, according to a new study.

* Every $1 increase in the minimum wage is associated with a 6% reduction in suicide for high school grads.

* Boosting the minimum wage by $1 could have saved 27,550 lives from 1990 to 2015, the study says.

Raising the federal minimum wage, which hasn't increased in more than a decade, might accomplish far more than simply offering U.S. workers a boost in pay. New research suggests that lifting the baseline wage could also stop thousands of Americans from killing themselves.

The study found that a higher minimum wage made the biggest difference in periods of high unemployment. Every $1 increase in the baseline wage could have saved more than 27,000 lives from 1990 to 2015, the authors estimated.

The research comes at a time when so-called "deaths of despair" are rising, with Princeton economists finding rising mortality rates for less educated white Americans. Their theory: Life for many lower-skilled workers has become a literal dead end, with chronic unemployment, poverty-level wages and a lack of opportunities leading to higher rates of alcoholism, drug abuse and suicide.

"Life expectancy of the richest 20% of Americans has increased over the last three decades, while life expectancy of the middle 60% has changed little, and has decreased for the poorest 20%," wrote the Emory University authors, who specialize in epidemiology and behavioral health. "Minimum wage increases may be one intervention to reduce income-based disparities in life expectancy, including from suicide."

Economists have also examined whether a higher minimum wage could reduce deaths of despair.

(Excerpt) Read more at cbsnews.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: 2020election; 2ndamendment; abortion; aimeepicchi; banglist; boycotts; canada; cbs; dnctalkingpoint; dnctalkingpoints; election2020; genderdysphoria; globalwarminghoax; greennewdeal; homosexualagenda; incometaxes; infanticide; mediawingofthednc; medicareforall; mexico; minimumwage; nafta; nra; obamacare; partisanmediashills; presstitutes; quack; sanctions; secondamendment; seebs; smearmachine; tariffs; taxcutsandjobsact; taxreform; tcja; trade; usmca
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1 posted on 01/10/2020 6:33:23 AM PST by Oldeconomybuyer
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

No


2 posted on 01/10/2020 6:34:53 AM PST by hadaclueonce ( This time I am Deplorable)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

How many lives could be saved if the Minimum Wage were raised to $100 an hour?


3 posted on 01/10/2020 6:36:35 AM PST by Cowboy Bob ("Other People's Money" = The life blood of Liberalism)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

What kind of crap is this? More made-up non-facts.


4 posted on 01/10/2020 6:37:09 AM PST by Agatsu77
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Lowering taxes form our oppressive government would increase jobs more.


5 posted on 01/10/2020 6:37:12 AM PST by mountainlion (Live well for those that did not make it back.)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Banning Television would save more lives.


6 posted on 01/10/2020 6:38:23 AM PST by eyeamok
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
Give me a raise, or I'll do it!


7 posted on 01/10/2020 6:39:00 AM PST by Telepathic Intruder
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Minimum wage is $0.00. They never seem to understand that you can’t pay people more than they produce. Artificially raising wages will either cause the goods and services prices to increase or the company let’s people go or close entirely. They have learned nothing from their past endeavors.


8 posted on 01/10/2020 6:40:34 AM PST by Dutch Boy
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Fact free statistics are about what is left to the glowBullists.


9 posted on 01/10/2020 6:40:54 AM PST by Steamburg (Other people's money is the only language a politician respects; starve the bastards)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Sheeeyit. 27,550 lives are ended on a weekly basis (give or take) thanks to abortion.


10 posted on 01/10/2020 6:41:43 AM PST by Texas Eagle (If it wasn't for double-standards, Liberals would have no standards at all -- Texas Eagle)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

No but it might cause thousands as people are denied the chance to get an entry level job.

It basic supply and demand equation. Artificially raise the cost of the supply with price controls, you reduce the demand for the item. In this case, unskilled labor.


11 posted on 01/10/2020 6:42:00 AM PST by MNJohnnie (They would have abandon leftism to achieve sanity. Freeper Olog-hai)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

There are only two beings who know whether a suicide has been prevented or not: the individual, and God.

No amount of research could ever quantify “prevented suicides”. This is because researchers cannot possibly “know” for a fact that a real incident was really prevented.


12 posted on 01/10/2020 6:42:19 AM PST by Migraine
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
Fewer suicides occur when minimum wages are higher

That's because automated kiosks can't kill themselves.

13 posted on 01/10/2020 6:42:33 AM PST by ElkGroveDan (My tagline is in the shop.)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

How much was that Grant worth? And who instructed them to come up with this answer.....which makes no sense at all.


14 posted on 01/10/2020 6:43:37 AM PST by Sacajaweau
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
Raising minimum wage will put many thousands out-of-work with no alternatives. (And, these jobs could be off-shored, with little prospect of return.)

I would predict more suicides (and homicides) and, of course, homelessness.

Dems know this, and persist in deceiving those among the lower scale earners on its voter plantation.

15 posted on 01/10/2020 6:43:39 AM PST by Seaplaner
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

No. Next question?


16 posted on 01/10/2020 6:43:51 AM PST by NEMDF
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

Social statistics... ha, ha, ha.

Who paid the researchers, I’d like to know.


17 posted on 01/10/2020 6:43:58 AM PST by Pearls Before Swine
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To: Oldeconomybuyer
Every $1 increase in the minimum wage is associated with a 6% reduction in suicide for high school grads.

association is not the same as cause

18 posted on 01/10/2020 6:44:18 AM PST by mjp ((pro-{God, reality, reason, egoism, individualism, natural rights, limited government, capitalism}))
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

LOL. This is beyond parody. People are being driven to suicide by the evil Republicans not raising the minimum wage!! What about preventing suicide by opening up the job market to unskilled people by getting rid of the minimum wage?


19 posted on 01/10/2020 6:44:19 AM PST by Opinionated Blowhard (When the people find that they can vote themselves money, that will herald the end of the republic.)
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To: Oldeconomybuyer

I saw a version of this on local TV. It doesn’t seem they included the people who get hours cut or laid off completely in the report.

That’s very deceptive.


20 posted on 01/10/2020 6:44:28 AM PST by budj (Combat vet, 2nd of three generations.)
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