Posted on by Californiacontrarian

Increase … Decrease … 1987

Does an increase in the minimum wage lead to a decrease in the number of jobs? (Is the Pope a Catholic?) Apparently our new President didn’t read the following from a NYT article back in 1987. Increasing the minimum wage is on his liberal agenda.

The following is from the New York Times in 1987. (The underlining for emphasis is mine):

“No wonder, but still a mistake. Anyone working in America surely deserves a better living standard than can be managed on $3.35 an hour. But there’s a virtual consensus among economists that the minimum wage is an idea whose time has passed. Raising the minimum wage by a substantial amount would price working poor people out of the job market. A far better way to help them would be to subsidize their wages or – better yet – help them acquire the skills needed to earn more on their own.

An increase in the minimum wage to, say, $4.35 would restore the purchasing power of bottom-tier wages. It would also permit a minimum-wage breadwinner to earn almost enough to keep a family of three above the official poverty line. There are catches, however. It would increase employers’ incentives to evade the law, expanding the underground economy. More important, it would increase unemployment: Raise the legal minimum price of labor above the productivity of the least skilled workers and fewer will be hired.

If a higher minimum means fewer jobs, why does it remain on the agenda of some liberals?”

Again this was from 1987.

From Townhall:

“Flashforward to 2021 and we know which side has won and what it has done for these workers. It’s screwed them—royally. They tried this in Seattle, and it’s ruined the restaurant business. Even USA Today was saying let’s pump the brakes on these minimum wage increases to $15/hour because studies and its application show that it hurts workers, cuts their hours, and kills their employment. It injects steroids into the automation timelines which eliminates a host of these minimum wage jobs as well.”

To add emphasis to this automation point, now Walmart is enlisting the help of robots to keep up with the surge of online orders. On 1/27/21 Walmart said that it will build warehouses adjacent to, or within selected stores where self-driving robots with fetch groceries and have them ready for customer pickup within an hour or less. How many of these robot run warehouses will be built? Walmart is mum on that at present. How many human jobs will be replaced with robots. Biden and his lib advisers are mum on that at present.

I thought that the recent surge of online shopping would naturally lead to more jobs. It will lead to more jobs . . . more robot jobs, as these robots will not have to be paid an increasing minimum wage, and as best I can tell robots do not require benefits – just a little oil now and then. 

Note: Rival Amazon already uses robot technology in its warehouses.

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BTW: The non partisan congressional budget office says raising minimum wage to $15 will kill over 4 million jobs.

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