According to the law of supply and demand, when a good goes up in price the demand for that item will decrease. In the labor market, labor is a economic good, when the price for labor goes up the demand will decrease. When setting a price floor, in which the price cannot dip below that rate, there will be a surplus of that good if the price floor is above the equilibrium price. The equilibrium price for low skilled labor in many areas is above the federal minimum wage, but in the areas that this is not true there have been large amounts of unemployment following dramatic increases in the minimum wage (Soergel). When a higher minimum wage is enacted the number of available jobs for low skilled workers will decrease. The amount of money spent
Lauren: According to Robert Reich, a former Labor Secretary, he states, “With a higher minimum wage, moreover, we'd all end up paying less for Medicaid, food stamps and other assistance the working poor now need in order to have a minimally decent standard of living.” Raising
Almost all articles, for or against the raise, agree that as long as the poverty line is not adjusted, then state and federal services that low-income workers were previously using would decrease. This means that the money that is no longer being distributed in food stamps or other services can be returned to Washington, D.C. and be redistributed. Economists say that raising the Federal minimum wage to $9 will restore the dollar to its real value (The President’s Plan). And indexing the minimum wage would ensure that working families keep up with inflation.
The topic of minimum wage is one that can lead to heated debates from both sides of the aisle over how much a person should be getting in payment versus how much work they do, or how hard they work to earn the payment. Countless people today are not getting paid the amount they should be based off of the work that they are putting in to their job. There are arguments leaning towards the raising of minimum wage, and there are arguments leaning against the raising of the minimum wage, however one of the arguments I find persuasive. There are some arguments that lean towards the raising of the minimum wage. The first argument presented involves job creation in the United States.
The wage rate would be so high employers would not be able to afford all the money they have to pay out to the workers, so they have to cut off some people. Contrasting that thought, a quote that states “increasing the minimum wage may also spur businesses to operate more efficiently and employees to work harder.”. This quote is stating that if there were less employees than the employees are going to work harder as it is technically more economically efficient that way .Yes, this is true, but they will “ have” to work harder to keep up with the same amount of output as before because 5 is more than 3 as hard as that is to picture. This also places a larger responsibility on the remaining few because now if there is a weak link then the ship is really going to sink. Plus, in the bigger picture people are losing their jobs from
First, one main reason that the minimum wage should be raised is because the economy will prosper. “Economic Policy Institute stated that a minimum wage increase from the current rate of $7.25 an hour to $10.10 would inject $22.1 billion net into the economy and create about 85,000 new jobs over a three-year phase-in period” (ProCon). This quote shows that the economy will flourish from the increase of the minimum wage and that unemployment will decrease. Another quote that shows how raising the minimum wage will affect employment is “To the extent that through these contour effects it affords as much as 70 percent of the workforce greater purchasing power, it effectively increases aggregate demand for goods and services, which should ultimately lead to the creation of more jobs” (Challenger 19). Bryan Covert supports raising the minimum wage by
If you have minimum skills, Minimum education, show minimum Motivation, and provide a minimum contribution to the workplace you are going to earn a minimum wage. There are many more opportunity if the federal government did not intervene. The abolishment of the minimum wage can help the economy and add a surplus of jobs. The federal minimum is an outdated concept during a time where corruption and no labor laws were a common theme.
With increasing minimum wage the government would receive more money from employees tax cuts and employees usually have lower wealth than other individuals in the economic marketplace. Tax liability increases can quickly erode the wealth of an individual living on minimum wage. Employees will also face higher payroll taxes, such as Social Security or Medicare, which can also reduce their immediate income. Also Governments increasing minimum wage levels often create a distortion in free market economies. Free market economies are usually driven by the economic theory of supply and demand.
There are often many stereotypes about who is actually making minimum wage. Many will come up with stereotypical demographics to feed their agenda. According to the Minimum wage report, the majority of Pennsylvania minimum or below wage earners are 16-25 year old, white women. These women more often than not are un-married, and or non-high school graduates. 10 percent of workers making minimum wage in Pennsylvania are single parents, and another 10 percent have one or more children.
The Economic Policy Institute estimates that an increase of $2.85 in the minimum wage could bring in an additional $6,000 a year, but opponents argue that making employees more expensive for companies to hire could increase the unemployment rate which is already 6.7 percent of Americans. Also, according to the article “Should the Minimum Wage Be Raised” raising the prices of certain products could reduce the demand for them, so if we raise the price of workers the demand for them would go down and that could lead to workers getting fired, getting their hours cut, or cause businesses to higher fewer of them in the
When the minimum wage increases, business owners will have reduced profit, sales will fall off, and prices will raise. Eventually, the owner will not get any profit because the store will get $10 off sales but the worker demands $15 and the worker will have to be fired. A high minimum wage sounds like a great idea in the free market, but it seems like a joke. Customers will not agree to pay more on a product just because the business has to pay the worker more and they will lose a profit they really cannot afford to
Although you can back up whether you think workers should be payed more or not, the minimum wages of fast food workers should not go up. If the minimum wages increased, taxes would increase as well and the people who earned higher paying jobs by getting a great college degree and deserve getting payed a pretty decent amount would be taken away money through taxes to give to people with an unskilled job that anyone can get, anyone. Now that doesn’t make any sense! Unemployment rates would also go up because if the minimum wages per hour double, then the company would have to fire half of their employees and lots of workers would lose their jobs. So, it would actually hurt the economy by raising the wages then it would do good.
In conclusion, a federal minimum wage increase will significantly improve the standard of living of low-wage workers. To meet their basic needs, workers must be given a living wage. It is not only morally correct to do so, but also beneficiary to both ends. The increase in wages allows for a more supportable income, but it also stimulates the economy.
The government sets minimum wage as a price floor. At minimum wage the quantity of labour demanded is QD and the quantity supplied is QS. The minimum wage increase stimulates consumer spending due to increased disposable income, consequently boosting the Australian economy. The minimum wage has negative effects on the economy, such as increased unemployment as businesses adjust their workforce, by reducing hires and limiting hours of work to manage the increased labour costs. The inflationary pressures caused by an increase in minimum wage are a source of cost-push inflation and the wage-price spiral.
(Mankiw, 2008) But it is bad for those employees who get laid off (i.e. become unemployed) because the employers now find it expensive to hire them due to the minimum wage legislation. (Besanko, David, Dranove, & Shanley, 2000) Thus, minimum wage leads to a rise in inequality. This would be explained using a hypothetical example.
Many argue that an increase in minimum wage will help guide low skilled workers out of poverty and assist them into having a better career. That is not necessarily true, Many economists can agree that minimum wage jobs such as cashiers, host or a hostess are not jobs that meant to support a family. If anything by raising the minimum wage, it will put more people in poverty than guide them out of poverty. A raise in minimum wage will cause loss of jobs, an increase in the inflation rate, increase in