Essay On Minimum Wage Should Not Be Raised

There are three main reasons why the federal minimum wage should not be raised; it would result in job loss, it would have little effect on reducing poverty, and it will result in higher prices for consumers. When the federal minimum wage increases, one route a business can take is to raise their product prices. The reason a business would have to take such an action is because minimum wage jobs where meant to be easily performed and meant to be payed accordingly. In The Negative Effects of Minimum Wage Laws by Mark Wilson a 2004 “review of more than 20 minimum wage studies looking at price effects found that a 10 percent increase in the U.S. minimum wage raises food prices by up to 4 percent” and in a 2007 study from the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago found that restaurant prices increase in response to minimum wage increases. Another route that a business can take if the federal minimum wage where to be increased, to begin replacing its cashiers or workers with self-ordering machines and other machines. In 2010, Joseph Sabia and Richard Burkhauser estimated, “nearly 1.3 million jobs will be lost if the federal minimum wage is increased to $9.50 per hour” and a 2006 review had more than 100 minimum wage …show more content…
However, the federal minimum wage was never intended to be something to live off of nor to raise a family on. It was meant to be for people who are young, have no more than a high-school education, and to only work part-time. In the previously mention article by Mark Wilson the 2012 review said, “One recent academic study found that both state and federal minimum wage increases between 2003 and 2007 had no effect on state poverty rates” and “Since 1995, eight studies have examined the income and poverty effects of minimum wage increases, and all but one have found that past minimum wage hikes had no effect on