Ohioans will vote for youth unemployment
They won't think they're doing that. They won't think, period. What's to think about? Everybody wants more money. But every rise in the minimum wage has led to unemployment among unskilled and marginal workers, which is something this state can't afford, given its precarious economy.
Ohioans for a Fair Minimum Wage (a front group for the AFL-CIO) has put on the ballot something people have no right to vote on: a contract between two people, and the use of an individual's wealth as he sees fit. If there is any chance of defeating this at all, it's going to require a stronger advocate than Ohioans to Protect Personal Privacy, which has built its campaign around what it says are burdensome record-keeping requirements embedded in the amendment. That may be the case, but it's really besides the point. Personal privacy was breached the minute the state stuck its nose into private deals between employer and employee.
A coalition of Commie pastors will be supporting the job redistribution, in spite of Matthew 20.
Comments
Posted by: Brian Gray
Posted on: September 7, 2006 02:03 PM
Much of the data I have seen has not supported what some economists are predicting would occur when minimum wages are increased.
For example, look at this study. I wonder what factors each of the two different views are hiding from the articles and discussions, as something else must also be in play here.
Posted by: Jeffrey Quick
Posted on: September 7, 2006 02:35 PM
Minimum wage is just a specific instance of price control as applied to labor. If in fact labor price controls function differently from commodity price controls, it may have to do in part with the relative inelasticity of the labor market: people need to work, and employers need to work them. Also, people's productivity is pretty elastic. And there may be some pump-priming at work, in getting money into more people's hands. But a skim of this study saw that it doesn't address youth unemployment (where "basic needs" are generally being provided by parents).A study based on labor statistics won't pick many of those people up, as they aren't applying for unemployment or otherwise being tracked in the system. And of course none of these utilitarian arguments confront the moral issue: whose money and whose life is it?