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But there's no evidence I'm aware of suggesting that minimum wages were the cause of deindustrialization in the US. I suspect most of those factory jobs were fa
by cool_dude85 5y ago
But there's no evidence I'm aware of suggesting that minimum wages were the cause of deindustrialization in the US. I suspect most of those factory jobs were far above the minimum wage.
And people often wave the automation threat around - but why hasn't it happened yet? In concrete studies of minimum wage increases that actually occurred, we do not find job losses.
- seanmcdirmid 5y agoMinimum wage in the USA has always been paltry, and increasingly irrelevant over time: very few work for it now. Labor costs rise because people at the low end get better options, not because of a gov mandated increase. But this is just the government being conservative, actual significant increases that affect more than one percent of the population will have an affect.
- rossdavidh 5y agoMinimum wage is, sure, not the cause of deindustrialization. Rather, it's what people tend to advocate as a cure for a large underclass stuck in poverty, but it's not addressing the core issue. We have a larger underclass stuck in poverty, because the kinds of jobs that historically allowed them a way out of it were sent to places with even poorer people, and the change that allowed that was a change in government policy (tariffs, etc.). So a minimum wage, like a blood transfusion, might help out for a bit, but it's not addressing the underlying issue, which was a (major, sustained) change in government policy.