More handpicked essays just for you.
The effects of raising the minimum wage
The effects of raising the minimum wage
Effects of minimum wage on the economy
Don’t take our word for it - see why 10 million students trust us with their essay needs.
There is never enough money in the world. Some people get greedy and just want it for things that make them happy. Others do not have enough and cannot live a happy, healthy life because of the lack of money. One solution to this problem would be to raise minimum wage. Another solution is to set a yearly raise for all workers rather than one big jump from $7.25 to $10.10. This has been debated for sometime with no outcome. The pros and cons of this debate butt heads with facts, opinions, and reason. One says it will increase employment, another says it will not change employment, and the last says it will decrease employment. Along with changing or not changing employment, raising minimum wage would pull people out of poverty and help others …show more content…
For example, if one state raises their minimum wage and it were higher than its neighboring state, more people would want to move to get higher pay. Employment would go up in the state with the new minimum wage, but it will also plummet in the now workless state. A solution to this problem would be to make every state equal. Rather than raising the minimum wage in one state, raise the federal minimum wage. The pay will be the same in every state and the effects of the raise will be similar in every …show more content…
Raising minimum wage by almost three dollars in one fell swoop would be a drastic change for any business. By raising someone’s wage a little each year to accommodate for the rise in merchandise costs, it could help employers and employees. Employees would have more money to help accommodate for their needs. Businesses will have time to budget and give their employees what they desire. Lastly, low-skilled workers could gain experience, skills, and money at a steady pace. The cost of living goes up each year. Merchandise begins to get a little more expensive. This is all to accommodate for the change in economy. America is in debt and they are doing what needs to be done to pull the country out of debt. Businesses also do not want to be in debt. If the change in minimum wage is as much as three more dollars, they could go into debt themselves unless they let some staff go. By having some time to budget and prepare for the raise it could save jobs and a big mess of
“Franklin Roosevelt’s 1937 impassioned speech calling on Congress to help the one-third of Americans who were “ill-housed, ill-clad, and ill-nourished” heralded in the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 and with it a national minimum wage. Echoes of that speech are still heard today. Senator Edward Kennedy (1989: S14707), in his criticism of the most recent increases in the minimum wage, declared:
Well, raising the minimum wage has both the pros and cons. Still, the fact that increasing the minimum wage nationwide would increase millions of workers’ earnings is deniable. I suppose that’s why some people advocate raising the minimum wage will grow the economy for everyone. In 2014, the president of the United States, Obama, called on the current Congress to raise the national minimum wage, which proves that Obama actually supports raising the minimum wage. ‘February 2014 Congressional Budget Office Report The Effects of a Minimum-Wage Increase on Employment and Family Income is the latest attempt to do so, in this response to Members of Congress with respect to an increase in the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 per hour.’
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.
Although raising the minimum wage won’t eliminate poverty as poverty can never be eliminated. It could help with lowering the poverty rate. The “inactive” unemployed Americans lack motivation, because they can’t support themselves with the money earned. It simply is not enough. As the cost of living rises, minimum wage stays stagnant. This is not balanced at all. If minimum wage back in 1968 was doable, raising it now could not kill the economy. Increasing the minimum wage could be an incentive for workers to finally seek jobs again; prompting growth in the economy and lower down poverty levels in many ways. The quality of a job is just as important when creating quantity of jobs. What lacks in the U.S right now is the incentives to make Americans want to do better. Raising the minimum wage could stimulate the desire to work and get around, possibly pursuing more education to climb the ladder to get higher in the economic
There have been many arguments going on whether minimum wage should be increased. This action has its pros and cons. It can benefit many families as living cost has gone up, price for education is rising, and college students are in huge debts. Minimum wage has been around for ages. Minimum wage employment was a temporary condition for people to earn little payment until they moved on to a better paying job. These jobs helped build résumés, experiences, and skills for a better career. As years went on that idea began to demolish into a job that many families can get to survive and pay for their expenses. It has become the easy way for people to get easy pay.
Obviously minimum wage has increased significantly since 1968 where it was at $1.60 but, how much has it really increased in connection with inflation and rising prices of things such as food, gas, land and etc? That is what's really lost in the whole conversation of increasing minimum wage to give people more money doesn't necessarily mean you can buy more. Senator Tom Harkin made a great statement regarding inflation senator Harkin said "today, tens of millions of hardworking Americans who are earning at or near the minimum wage can’t even aspire to live a middle-class life or achieve the American Dream. Instead, they are falling further and further behind" (Harkin). This is because of inflation, although minimum wage has increased from $1.60 in 1968 to $ 7.25 in 2013 we actually have less buying power. What that means is that $1.60 in 1968 would get us more food than $7.25 would in 2013. People are tricked into thinking that small incremental increases are good because we are making more, guess what we're actually making less. If we kept that $1.60 wage today and indexed it to account for inflation minimum wage should be at $10.56 in 2013.
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.
Over the years the cost of living has been on the rise. Therefore, it is only right for minimum wage to increase as the cost of living increases. Many states and even some individual cities have taken the first steps toward raising the minimum wage. States like Washington and cities like San Francisco have already raised their minimum wage above the federal minimum wage. This is a very good start as it is becoming harder and harder for Americans to start and take care of their families. We need more states and cities to follow their lead some more Americans can feel more financially stable. This will make a better America for us all.
The minimum wage must be raised because the cost of living has gone up considerably. Education is essential if one wishes to work, and the cost of education has increased drastically in the past twenty years. Companies should be requied to pay workers what they deserve, and that is more than minimum wage is now. With our new technology and the technology in the future work is harder and more complicated. A minimum wage increase would raise the wages of many workers and increase benefits to those disadvantaged workers.
One way raising minimum wage will be beneficial is that it could lift many Americans out of poverty. Raising the minimum wage in Illinois, would help the families of more than 1.1 million workers who work to meet their children’s basic needs and “reduce the adverse effects of poverty on a child’s well-being” (Fiscal Policy Center). Studies have shown that raising the minimum wage would help 1 in 5 Illinois families who are in poverty. By raising the minimum wage in Illinois, it would help workers with families spend money on food, housing, gas, and other needs without going into poverty. Along with puling Americans out of poverty, raising the minimum wage could also stimulate economic growth. Raising the minimum wage, is stimulating economic growth by worsening the income inequality and substantially reducing the employee turnover for the business. Increasing a person’s income would raise their yearly earnings by $3,640 and “Improve the economic security and reduce the economies poverty rate” (Fiscal Policy Center). Low-wage workers spend most of what they earn on their basic needs, which is quickly spent and does not leave the worker with much money left to spend on other needs. This boost in the minimum wage will stimulate the economy and help create opportunities for more people, by hiring more workers to keep up with the
Minimum wage has been around for ages. Minimum wage employment was a temporary condition for people earning little payment until they moved on to a better paying job. These jobs helped build résumés, experiences, and skills for a better career. It has become the easiest way for people to receive easy pay. As years went on that idea began to demolish into a job that many families can get to survive and pay for their expenses. There have been many arguments going on, "Should minimum wage be raised or should it be lowered or eliminated altogether?" This action has its pros and cons. It can benefit many families as living cost has gone up, price for education is rising, and college students are in huge debts. It may increase poverty, but those
Raising the minimum will end up hurting Americans more than helping them. The people that are for raising minimum wage are people who believe that increasing minimum wage can help those people who are unskilled and need an income they can live on. Yet, raising minimum wage would do the opposite and make employers have to fire people who earn minimum wage, because they can't afford the higher wages. People need to realize that increasing the minimum wage would hurt people more than help them. In the end increasing minimum wage would result in some people being let go, for the reason, businesses can't afford paying them minimum wage anymore.
By raising the minimum wage, it would stimulate the economy in many ways. It would “increase the purchasing power of many workers whose wages would also go up” according to the article Raising the minimum wage: Guide to Critical Analysis. Another way that it would help the economy is that it would decrease the amount of people that would need government welfar...
In the 2014 State of the Union address, President Obama called on Congress to raise the national minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour, and soon after signed an Executive Order to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 for the individuals working on new federal service contracts. An increase in the minimum wage has been a topic of discussion for many years now, and it looks like this year will finally see the first increase of minimum wage in 10 years. Not everyone agrees that there should be an increase, but many states have already raised their minimum wage rates because of the federal government’s inaction. Iowa raised the state’s wage, and it will rise again in 2016. Clearly there are benefits to a higher minimum wage; the current minimum wage in the United States should be raised because it helps the economy by increasing employment, and it is now at the lowest value it has been in more than 50 years, causing hardship for earners of minimum wage.
However, there are those who see it completely the opposite way. Stating that by raising the minimum wage the economy would be better. More people would be able to support themselves; therefore lowering the percentage of poor people and raising the middle-class numbers. It is also argued that this change would not increase the number of unemployment, instead it could potentially raise employment by creating more jobs. Holly Sklar states in her research article, “Research by Fiscal Policy Institute and others showed that states that raised their minimum wages above the federal level experienced better employment and small business trends than states that did not.”