Raising The Minimum Wage Essay

The topic of raising minimum wage seems to attract a multitude of controversy. On one side, experts agree that raising a family on one minimum wage salary is almost impossible for someone who puts in fairly large work hours. Nonetheless, business owners agree that increasing these salaries will result in significantly less jobs, as well as force them to increase the prices on their consumer products. Federally, minimum wage workers earn $7.25 an hour, totaling up to $15,080 annually, with approximately six hours of working time per day. However, the price varies with state, with places like Massachusetts and Washington paying $11 to workers hourly.

Ira Knight, who is an author of article “Let’s Make the Minimum Wage a Living Wage”, expresses an opinion that increasing the minimum wage would help all struggling workers and at the same time improve U.S economy. On the other side, Janice Steele in her article “Keep the Minimum Wage Where It Is” argues that raising the minimum wage would have bad effects on workers, consumers and small businesses. Ira Knight’s article seems to be the stronger of the two positions because her arguments are based on several recent studies, and last but not least, she had a personal experience with the minimum wage job.

Should the minimum wage be raised? This question is the question being asked by millions across the United States. Most people will say yes, however, an economist will most likely say no. This is a very important subject and what the people of the United States should be compelled to notice as well as take action on the minimum wage. In the United States, 3 million people make less than the federal minimum wage. Furthermore, with over 60 million people living in the lower middle class the minimum wage is not high enough. That's why the minimum wage should be raised to $15 an hour because CEO's support it as well as it presents a living wage.

Should the minimum wage increased to $10.10 an hour? This has increased over the years and everyone has their opinions. Those who are in favor of increasing minimum wage to $10.10 believe that more money will decrease poverty and the unemployment rate. Those who oppose the increase in the minimum wage, believe that it should not be increased and should stay the same, because it will cause businesses to close up because they are not making enough money to survive in the economy An increase in minimum wage would have to make the employees work harder to make increase sales of the business. I believe that the minimum wage should not increase to $10.10.

. Burkhauser found no evidence that minimum wage increases were effective at lowering overall poverty rates or poverty rates among workers. Even by targeting populations that raising the minimum wage was supposed to protect, such as less educated single mothers, Burkhauser confirms that minimum wage increases did little to alleviate poverty for less educated single mothers as well. Additionally, David Neumark of the University of California-Irvine and William Wascher of the Federal Reserve Board analyzed family-specific flows in and out of poverty as a result of an uptick in the minimum wage. Neumark and Wascher used current population survey data and found that when the minimum wage was increased some workers were lifted out of poverty, but others lost their jobs and found themselves in poverty as a result of raising the minimum wage. Neumark and Wascher’s findings suggest that minimum wage hikes only redistribute income among the poor and near-poor households. Only junior high school dropouts seem

Fast food workers around the country are fighting to raise the hourly pay minimum wage and their union rights.

Recorded in 2015, average living wage has been recorded at $11.87, as the minimum wage would’ve been if Congress had adjusted it for inflation over the past 35 years. While $7.25 may not seem that bad, when factoring some general expenses. Giving into consideration for the general public the biggest reason the minimum wage should be increased is the dramatic heights which gas prices have been shooting up again. Due to our national situations, gas prices have risen to nearly three dollars a gallon. Say one person were making the minimum wage amount third of their money goes to their gas tank. Unless such person lived precisely close to their job, it’s proven to be very costly. About 7.3 million personnel in the United States would value from an increases in the minimum wage. Almost 5,256,000 of those individuals, around 72%, are authorized drivers that could desperately use financial assistance with the rising prices and inflation. “The federal government is not living up to its responsibility so the states are acting,” (Senator

"No family gets rich from earning the minimum wage. In fact, the current minimum wage does not even lift a family out of poverty."

Proponents of raising the minimum wage claim that if the minimum wage was raised, then many economic and social problems would be alleviated. This contention is at odds both with economic principles and years of creditable research. The effect of raising or even having a minimum wage has been studied extensively and the majority of studies have proven that raising a minimum wage does not have the desired effect. Both micro and macroeconomic forces affect the results of raising the minimum wage. The secondary effects of raising the minimum wage are bad both for

Minimum wages go all the way back to 1938, during the great depression, when the stock market crash and bank loan were failing. Families need income of some type, were they wanted to make it fair were individual could get pay the same without a college degree. I am going to start off with a little about minimum wages history and how this could help our Economic.

“Of course, nothing helps families make ends meet like higher wages. … And to everyone in this Congress who still refuses to raise the minimum wage, I say this: If you truly believe you could work full-time and support a family on less than $15,000 a year, go try it. If not, vote to give millions of the hardest-working people in America a raise.”

A bill increasing the current minimum wage is greatly needed, and our government officials should demand a raise due to the increase in the cost of living, as it’s no longer realistic. We need higher paying wages for all, middle and lower class income levels. Without some sort of help and support from our government the economy will only get worse. Students will not be able to afford the cost of school and living. Single family households will not be able to support their selves.

A question plaguing economists in the news the last couple of years is what would the effect of an increase in the fast food industry minimum wage be for the workforce. Better yet, how would it effect the fast food industry itself. There have been certain areas of the country that have already increased fast food workers minimum wage, but the debate is would it work elsewhere. With the increase in the demand from fast food workers for a minimum wage increase it has spurred on a heated debate what the outcome would be with many believing that it would devastate the fast food workforce with a large increase in workforce reduction enabling the fast food industry to keep it’s ever growing profit margin. However, there are those that would disagree with that assessment. The problem that is seen is that both sides of this issue forget to take a step back and look at the whole picture like the smaller group of economists have that understand that there is positive and negatives to the fast food industry minimum wage increase. Also, with a look at the bigger picture it can be seen that with the minimum wage increase in fast food jobs is farther reaching than just the fast food industry. It will unavoidably affect many other industries across the U.S. with a demand for a nationwide federal minimum wage increase as the fast food industry has laid the ground work for the “how to” guide for adjusting to a wage

The article that we are critiquing is aimed to assess the blow of increased minimum wage from $4.25 to $5.05 per hour in 1992 on the employees working in fast-food restaurants in New Jersey and Pennsylvania. The author has shown two comparisons in this study. The first comparison is the employment growth rates at the fast food stores in New Jersey and Pennsylvania, before and after the minimum wage raise. The second comparison is the change in employment rate from fast food stores (in both states) that pay higher wages initially to the lower wage stores. Krueger Card concluded that there was no indication or signs that the minimum wage increase, decreased employment

Debates about the wisdom of hiking minimum wage levels are stuck in a rut. Opponents say higher minimum wages kill jobs, while supporters maintain that higher minimums reduce poverty and spur consumer spending, benefitting everyone. Many if not most economists believe both arguments to be true: higher minimum wages do indeed cost some jobs, but they also raise the standard of living for large portions of the population.