The minimum wage paradox

Joe Schueller

February 4, 2014 | personal

This piece originally appeared in the Daily Iowan.

There is a series of erroneous assumptions that form the minimum-wage argument, many of which President Obama cited in his State of the Union address in which he called for an increase to $10.10. Raising the minimum wage, it’s argued, will make families more mobile and equal in the economy, driving growth as a result.

The president believes it’s an elementary equation with a simple answer: Just pay them more, and everything will be fixed.

On the contrary, the economics of a minimum-wage increase demonstrate that its effectiveness in stimulating mobility is scant, if not harmful to low-wage employment altogether.