The common belief is that low-income families must have minimum wage workers in order to live in poverty, but recent research has actually proven this to be false. David Neumark provides that “57% of poor families with heads of households ages 18-64 have no workers” (2). This means a majority of these families are in poverty because of unemployment, not the minimum wage. A study revealed that many minimum wage workers are in poverty because they are unable to find full-time work. Also, economists have determined that the proportion of benefits from a minimum wage increase heavily favors non-poor families and have proposed alternative methods to bring greater benefits to those in …show more content…
The Republicans surveyed stated that they would support an increase if it lowered spending on government assistance programs (Levy n.p.). With the upcoming presidential election, more and more emphasis has been put on the presidential candidates’ opinions on the minimum wage in our country. Democratic candidate Hillary Clinton has supported an increase to $12 an hour by the year 2020, while other Democrats, such as Bernie Sanders and Martin O’Malley, support $15 an hour. Republican candidates Jeb Bush and Scott Walker both believe that the minimum wage should be set by the states because of the wide variety of living costs across the country (New York Times n.p.). The Democrats argue that this is an ineffective way to regulate minimum wage because numerous states are still at the federal mandated $7.25 an hour, despite having living costs far beyond this wage floor. Both Donald Trump and Marco Rubio have taken stances based on the effect a minimum wage increase will have on businesses. Trump believes that raising the minimum wage will make it harder for American businesses to compete with cheap foreign labor. Rubio expresses concern with making workers more expensive than machines that can do the same job. As presidential hopefuls voice their wide variety of opinions on the minimum wage law, it is important that we