Free Republic

Should the nation’s minimum wage be raised, as Democrats from President Obama on down are insisting? “Well, jobs are a great thing,” Microsoft founder and philanthropist Bill Gates told MSNBC’s “Morning Joe” on Tuesday. “So you have to be a bit careful: If you raise the minimum wage, you’re encouraging labor substitution, and you’re going to go buy machines and automate things—or cause jobs to appear outside of that jurisdiction. “And so within certain limits, you know, it does cause job destruction. If you really start pushing it, then you’re just making a huge tradeoff.” …

President Obama's United States Department of Agriculture has delayed shale gas drilling in Ohio for up to six months by cancelling a mineral lease auction for Wayne National Forest (WNF). The move was taken in deference to environmentalists, on the pretext of studying the effects of hydraulic fracturing. "Conditions have changed since the 2006 Forest Plan was developed," announced WNF Supervisor Anne Carey on Tuesday. "The technology used in the Utica & Marcellus Shale formations need to be studied to see if potential effects to the surface are significantly different than those identified in the Forest Plan." The study will...

The proportion between the real recompence of labour in different countries, it must be remembered, is naturally regulated, not by their actual wealth or poverty, but by their advancing, stationary, or declining condition." Adam Smith, The Wealth of Nations, p. 218 ___________________________ With unemployment seemingly stuck in the 9% range, editorial pages are overrun these days with opinion pieces by well-meaning commentators eager to promote their ideas on how to "create jobs". Sadly, they're almost to an article a total waste of the reader's time. From the left we read that jobs will created if governments will just spend more....

House passed the minimum wage bill 230-180.. The bill would increase the minimum wage to $7.25 over the next three years. Republican 196-21 Democrat 34-158-1 Will post voting lists as soon as possible. Bill was HR 5970 if you want to look it up.