Economic Research: The Effects of Minimum Wages on Employment
The federal minimum wage began during the Depression in 1939 at the rate of $0.25 an hour. Minimum wage is the lowest wage permitted by law or by a special agreement. Over the past century minimum wage has drastically changed. The minimum raising wage means fewer jobs for the low-skilled workers, there are much better alternatives to help poor families, and worker mobility is limited.
Raising the minimum wage causes job loss. “In general evidence suggested that it is appropriate to weigh the cost of potential losses from higher minimum wage against the benefit of wage increases of workers.” According to the article, FRBSF Economic Letter Researchers offer conflicting evidence on whether or not raising the minimum wage means fewer jobs for these workers. Some recent studies even suggest overall employment could be harmed. The higher wage and the new input mix implies higher prices, in turn reducing product and labor demand.
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“Higher minimum wages make it more difficult for disadvantaged adults to find jobs. This hurt their finances. However, for those living below poverty line who keep their job, the raise provides little net benefit. Much or all of what they gain in higher pay gets clawed back as reduced benefits. According to Testimony Jobs and labors, “These benefits phase out at different rates as income rises low-income workers must also payroll (15 percent) and income tax (10-15 percent) on each additional dollar of income. Medicaid operates with a cliff: when workers’ income exceeds a certain threshold, they lose all benefits. Most minimum wages jobs are entry-level positions filled by limited education and experience. This article The Heritage Foundation shows that almost three-fifths of minimum wage workers have no more than a high school education. They work for the minimum wage because they currently lack the productivity to command higher
Imagine a world where you are working overtime, seven days a week, yet your kids are starving. You can’t get the education you need because you don’t have the time and money to afford it, and you can’t change jobs because this is the only one you can get. Unfortunately, this is the reality for millions of Americans living today. The federal minimum wage is too low to help families, and actually mathematically speaking, too low to survive on. The quality of life for minimum wage families is terribly low, and that is unacceptable. As humans, we should be looking after others and helping the poverty come out of their continuous cycle. Raising the minimum wage would not only help families be able to afford a better quality of life, but help them to afford healthy food, get an adequate education, and invest in the necessary health care they need.
Currently, in the United States, the federal minimum wage has been $7.25 for the past six years; however, in 1938 when it first became a law, it was only $0.25. In the United States the federal minimum wage has been raised 22 times since 1938 by a significant amount due to changes in the economy. Minimum wage was created to help America in poverty and consumer power purchasing, but studies have shown that minimum wage increases do not reduce poverty. By increasing the minimum wage, it “will lift some families out of poverty, while other low-skilled workers may lose their jobs, which reduces their income and drops their families into poverty” (Wilson 4). When increasing minimum wage low-skilled, workers living in poor families,
Minimum wage is a difficult number to decide on because it affects different income earning citizens in different ways. According to Principles of Microeconomics, by N. Gregory Mankiw, minimum wage is a law that establishes the lowest price for labor that and employer may pay (Mankiw 6-1b). Currently, the minimum wage in the United States is $7.25 per hour. For many years politicians and citizens have argued on what should be the minimum wage that would benefit the economy and society in general. A minimum wage was first established in 1938 to increase the standard of living of lower class workers. To discuss what is better for the country and its citizens, people have to understand what is a minimum wage and what are its effects.
The minimum wage today has a lot of issues; some people say it is not enough to live comfortably. Many agree that there needs to be an increase in minimum wages and by doing that it can help with our issues of poverty. Statistics show that a worker who is full time and earning minimum wage makes only $15,080 a year, which is under the federal poverty line for a family of two. (Gitis, 2013) The problem with that is $15,080 is not a sufficient amount that a person can live and grow on. “A family of two can consist of a mother and son or daughter, father and son or ...
The United States hasn't always had a minimum wage. Before the minimum wage was introduced during the Great Depression of the 1930s, there was no national minimum wage, or indeed any legislation to protect workers from exploitation. Due to this lack of regulation, tens of thousands of workers were routinely subjugated in sweatshops and factories, forced to work in horrible conditions, and for only pennies a week. Early attempts by labor unions to create a mandatory minimum wage were ruled unconstitutional by the U.S. Supreme Court on the grounds that they “restricted the worker's right to set the price for his own labor.” This allowed employers to continue abusing their workers through the Great Depression of the 1930s, when the incredible demand for jobs caused wages to drop even further to an all-time low.
Congress created minimum wage with the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. The first minimum wage was only 25 centers per hour. Through history the minimum wage has increased a little at a time, umping a couple cents each time. The last time the United States changed the minimum wage was in 2007 which was a large jump from $5.15 per hour to $7.25 per hour. This jump of $2.10 was a large increase. Through the years it is evident that the minimum wage is constantly changing. “. It has averaged $6.60 an hour in purchasing power in 2013 dollars. But it has ranged from a low of $3.09 an hour in late 1948 to a high of $8.67 an hour in 1968(Sherk, J. (2013, June 25).
Having minimum wage causes many people to become jobless all so a certain amount of people could live comfortably. Cooper believes that today’s workers are “stuck in jobs that pay so little they struggle to afford basic necessities.” Yes, some people may have trouble affording basic necessities, but at least they have some money that will help them out even if it’s just a little. A low paying job can make a difference between having nothing to eat at all or three small meals every day. If minimum wage increases, than the lives of many people would become even more difficult, and unbearable. A job that pays a little money is better than no job at all.
There are three branches of the United States government. Legislative branch, judicial branch, and executive branch. No one branch has absolute power over the other. This paper will briefly discuss the role each role plays in, “Minimum Wage”. This paper will help you to get a better understanding on how the three branches work together. To start off, the legislative branch makes rules, the executive branch enforces these rules, and the judicial branch is the system by which these rules are evaluated. To take action to raise the minimum wage you would have to go through the legislative branch of the government. The senate and the House of Representatives is the main government agency that runs this branch. The minimum wage in the Unites States
The minimum wage being too low has been a public issue in America for generations. Basically, the debate includes two different opinions. Firstly, people who want to raise the minimum wage, and second, people who would rather is stay the same. The overwhelming majority of liberals are on the side that favors a raise. Additionally, a somewhat smaller proportion of conservatives favor the change as well, but for different reasons. The liberal opinion on raising the minimum wage is based on the idea that putting more money in the people’s pockets, will stimulate the economy, and decrease poverty. The problem that conservatives and liberals alike have with this, is that a few direct consequences are proven to apply when raising wages. Some proposed consequences include unemployment, inflation, and unfairness to higher educated people. Another main point is that raising the minimum wage is thought to helps small business by increasing worker satisfaction. This issue of minimum wage has become increasingly popular and important in current times, as president Obama has proposed the idea of raising the minimum wage of contract workers to 10.10$ per hour (about a 30% increase from the current 7.25$ per hour minimum wage). A large number of people consider this wage hike unnecessary due to the fact that today’s value of minimum is higher than it has ever been since the 80’s, and because the wage hike comes at too high of a cost. All things considered, the issue of raising minimum wage is not a battle of political parties and their agendas, its really a debate between everyone.
With the current minimum wages throughout the states, employees are unable to provide safe and comfortable housing for their families. An example of this would be in the state of California. As of January 2, 2018, the minimum wage for employees in California was $10.50 an hour (Division of Labor). These rates equally correlate with the increasing average price of housing in California. Today, the average home in California is priced at nearly two and a half times more than the average national home price of $180,000 (Taylor 3). There is no feasible way for employees to afford safe and comfortable living conditions with the income that they are generating from the current minimum wage. With people being unable to afford such high housing costs,
In theory when an increase in minimum wage increases the cost of low-wage workers firms should want to hire less workers, however in reality this basic theory might be wrong according to Plumer B. (2013) While some studies found a link between higher minimum wage and higher unemployment level many others such as a recent paper from U.C. Berkeley that exploited differences across state borders did not find a link between higher minimum wage and higher unemployment.
The minimum wage the initial amount most will be paid for their work. Whether or not that is the wage a worker receives is always a huge concern for most people. No one should have to decide between keeping the lights on, clothes on their back, or food on the table. A living wage is the least an employer can provide for their employee. Most people expect to be able to afford to survive and living paycheck to paycheck is not an easy way to survive. However, the minimum wage was never established for people to live on.
Not only does the minimum wage increase affect large corporations, small and local businesses in Ontario will also be impacted by this change. When it pertains to determining which small businesses are affected by the recent spike, it mainly depends on the industry that these businesses belong to. Industries such as retail, restaurants, and hospitality tend to pay their workers minimum wage (QuickBooks Canada Team, 2018). On the other hand, to be competitive, Businesses in many other industries such as healthcare, marketing, manufacturing, tech, and numerous others already offer their workers more than the minimum wage (QuickBooks Canada Team, 2018). Thus, for these particular industries, the spike wouldn't impact the cost and profitability
Of the people who would be affected by an increase in minimum wage, approximately ¼ of those are classified as poor. While this would be great news in the fight to lessen poverty, it is offset by the fact that those same exact people are the ones who would be the ones experiencing the negatives job effects, nearly half of those losing their jobs would be poor people. Not only that, but it was found that only roughly 30% of the earning gains from the increase would actually go to those who were poor, the other 70% of course being those in the upper classes. 4.
Advocates of a higher minimum wage insist that a raise would significantly decrease the unemployment rate in the United States and improve the quality of life. However, there are conflicting opinions on this. Higher minimum wage would mean higher labor costs for business owners, thus making it more difficult for employers to maintain the amount of workers they have, let alone add new employees. Raising the minimum wage does not increase the value of the worker's labor; it increases the cost of the worker's labor. As a general rule, the more something costs, the less it people will buy.