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Minimum wage is a distortion of pricing for human work - somewhat analogous to rent price control. Although you could argue it helps some people, it hurts othe

Minimum wage is a distortion of pricing for human work - somewhat analogous to rent price control. Although you could argue it helps some people, it hurts others such as people who aren't currently working. They may be prepared to work for $6/hr but are prevented from doing so. Similarly an employer may have work that brings in value of $6/hr but are prevented from hiring people to do so. Or maybe they have work that brings in $10/hr and can't hire two people for it. This is a completely separate discussion than what people need to get by, or what they should be provided. It is far more straightforward to just provide/pay them directly from the government, than pretend that isn't happening and there is no cost by distorting markets and making customers pay anyway, as well as reducing competition.

7952 13y ago
It is quite hard to think of any jobs in western economies that are only intended to bring in $6/hr revenue. Automation increasingly means that people are used as quality checkers primarily who also do some kind of manual work. You could use a robot but you would still need a pair of eyes to check things. Certain tasks can't be automated but that tends to be in higher value products. You could argue that minimum wage forces companies to be more efficient and focus on high profit activities.
- rogerbinns 13y ago
  There is an employment market - we don't need to think of the jobs. There will be good old fashioned supply and demand as people and companies find what meets their needs. Seeing exactly what companies do in reaction to not being able to hire based on supply and demand is quite difficult to measure. For example it can hit the poorer people because companies can't economically provide products for them, hence causing the poorer people to have to spend more on alternatives. Sometimes surveys find that minimum wage increases made no difference, but that then turns out to be survivorship bias - you can't survey companies that went out of business or left to go elsewhere. The real problem is that market distortions are used to sweep under the rug a social policy, and to pretend that it doesn't cost people anything when it certainly does, and the poor/unemployed the most. If in favour of the social policy then just do it directly.

7952 13y ago

It is quite hard to think of any jobs in western economies that are only intended to bring in $6/hr revenue. Automation increasingly means that people are used as quality checkers primarily who also do some kind of manual work. You could use a robot but you would still need a pair of eyes to check things. Certain tasks can't be automated but that tends to be in higher value products. You could argue that minimum wage forces companies to be more efficient and focus on high profit activities.

rogerbinns 13y ago
There is an employment market - we don't need to think of the jobs. There will be good old fashioned supply and demand as people and companies find what meets their needs. Seeing exactly what companies do in reaction to not being able to hire based on supply and demand is quite difficult to measure. For example it can hit the poorer people because companies can't economically provide products for them, hence causing the poorer people to have to spend more on alternatives. Sometimes surveys find that minimum wage increases made no difference, but that then turns out to be survivorship bias - you can't survey companies that went out of business or left to go elsewhere. The real problem is that market distortions are used to sweep under the rug a social policy, and to pretend that it doesn't cost people anything when it certainly does, and the poor/unemployed the most. If in favour of the social policy then just do it directly.