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Well I think for one there is a power imbalance between employees and employers that seems primed for abuse without some regulatory minimum. Also is the goal t

• AnthonyMouse 3y ago
  > Well I think for one there is a power imbalance between employees and employers that seems primed for abuse without some regulatory minimum. If some employer is currently paying e.g. $10/hour when the minimum wage is $7.25/hour, why would that change if the minimum wage were $5/hour or $0? If anything they might have to pay more, because the employee might prefer a job paying $5/hour to one that pays $10/hour but incurs $6/hour worth of commuting expense and then the original employer would have to pay $11/hour to retain them. > Also is the goal to maximize the number in the workflow, or get people out of poverty? These are not unrelated goals. Generally people who can't find work end up in poverty. > The minimum wage has shown to decrease employment but also lift the people employed out of poverty You don't need a study for this, it's exactly what you would expect to happen. If you raise the minimum wage to $10, some jobs that pay $9 are still sustainable at $10, so those pay $10, some aren't, so those people lose their jobs. The proportionality of each one is going to depend on current economic conditions and not be a universal constant. But the part where you cause people to lose their jobs is bad -- in some cases it will exceed the entire benefit of the remaining people getting paid more, but either way what it's competing with isn't placebo, it's alternative policies to get people out of poverty. Why would you do the one that causes people to lose their jobs when there are several alternatives that don't?