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Raising Minimum Wage

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While the rich keep on getting richer, the poor keep on getting poorer. According to the United States Census Bureau, in 2014 there were 46.7 million people in poverty. One of the easiest solutions people think of to help alleviate poverty seems as simple as raising the minimum wage. Many people are calling for the minimum wage, or “living wage”, to be raised to $15.00 an hour. Raising the minimum wage will result in higher pay that will increase a person’s income, and possibly allow them to rise above the poverty threshold. However, raising the minimum wage may also result in unemployment and a person falling deeper into poverty. Currently the minimum wage in the United States is $7.25 per hour. However, many states choose to pay their employees …show more content…

Some businesses, in order to pay employees more, will cut many workers jobs in order to keep up with costs. The business would therefore be paying its minimum wage workers higher, but according to David Neumark Chancellor’s Professor of Economics at the University of California Irvine, there is also a possibility for job loss among the minimum wage workers. Since workers have varying skill levels, this will lead companies to hire more highly skilled workers and less low skilled workers (Neumark, 2015). James Sherk, a senior policy analysist in Labor Economics adds that paying more for low skilled positions decreases the availability for these types of jobs. Many people will want to start working a minimum wage job in order to get paid the high minimum wage. Therefore, since less of these positions would be available, people would be missing out on building basic working skills that they learn at low position jobs, and that allow them to move up the ladder to better paying jobs (Sherk, 2013). The Congressional Budget Office discusses how consumers may also see an increase in prices of goods and services. Higher wages increase the costs to employers, and the employers pass off some of these costs on consumers by raising their prices. Since the prices will increase, the demand for these products will go down, and the employer will consequently hire fewer workers …show more content…

The Congressional Budget Office declares that “the effective federal marginal tax rate on earnings for low- and moderate-income workers is 32 percent, on average; that is, the combination of increased taxes and decreased benefits equals, on average, about one-third of such a worker’s added earnings” (United States, 2014). They also go on to say that for the people who are not in one of the two lowest federal income tax brackets, there would be an increase in payroll taxes and income taxes. The office then goes on to explain that the amount of benefits generally falls as income rises. This applies to cash and near-cash spending programs, premium assistance tax credits, and cost-sharing subsidies for health insurance. For example, eligibility for Medicaid is determined by wages. With raising the minimum wage some people would lose their eligibility for Medicaid because they are now making more money. Although, some people may be able to gain eligibility for subsidized coverage, not everyone would get that opportunity (United States, 2014). The system makes it very difficult to lift people out of poverty by raising the minimum

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