Democrats regained the congressional House. Now they should immediately confront the federal minimum wage rate issue.

I’m among those that advocate a minimum wage rate gradually increased to higher purchasing power and thereafter monitored and (when necessary to retain its targeted purchasing power), it should be updated prior to New Year’s date of the following year. In my opinion, annual increases of 12% until the rate achieves 125% of its February 1968 purchasing power is reasonable.

It would be possible, but politically problematic for the Republican majority U.S. Senate not to pass an alternative bill responding to the Democratic House’s bill. Usually, there are differences between bills that may, (or may not) be reconciled by negotiators from each chamber. A bill sent to the president for his consideration must be passed by both houses with exactly the same drafted language. That usually requires both chambers to again vote and pass a draft of the bill that’s a mutually agreed upon update.

Possible House’s negotiating positions:

The Senate will be displeased by the concept of pegging the rate’s purchasing power.
The House’s alternative position could be, lose the purchasing power provision but give us 15% annual increase for 10 years.

The Senate may then find the purchasing power concept less objectionable but they're then displeased with the 12%.
The House’s alternative position could be, 8% increase every Labor Day until the rate achieves 125% of its February 1968 purchasing power, but the rate’s additionally annually updates reflecting changes in the CPI-U will begin prior to the New Year’s day following the enactment day of the Bill.

I hope the Democratic negotiators would be polite and respectful beyond civility, but FIRM! they should not acquiesce or attempt to placate to the opposition. Democrats should be fully prepared to leave the negotiating table and permit the differences to be resolved by the 2020 general elections.

Respectfully, Supposn

The minimum wage is now and always will be $0. No law will change that. Mandating a higher minimum than the market supports always increases unemployment, and lowers the overall average household income of the regulated population. Which then cascades to other real costs to society. This has happened 100% of the time when government engages in price-fixing of labor. Progressives will never learn how economics works.

Except it's not and it doesn't.

Australia says hi, our minimum wage is similar to what the Ds propose and our economy has had lower unemployment than the US for most of the past decade or so

Poverty among full time workers should not be a thing in a first would country so yeah, they need to gradually raise the minimum wage to a level where a full time worker on minimum wage can live a comfortable (in that they're not worried about making rent or buying food/gas etc) if not luxurious lifestyle.

Newoldguy's statement seems to 'make sense' on paper the same way a lot of libertarian economics make sense on paper but in terms of real world applications a reasonable minimum wage does more to fight poverty than 'letting the market set it'

If the right was serious about illegal immigration and unemployment they'd raise fines to business-ruining levels for any business found to employ illegal immigrants but that hurts the wealthy's bottom line so they have no interest in doing that.

Not one word of this post is true. Obviously, the MW is not $0. Mandating a higher MW does not increase unemployment until we get to the MW inflection point, which we are nowhere near right now. You are blinded by what the right wing wants you to think. None of your post has any basis in reality. The person that will never learn is you. Kudos for posting useless, patently false drivel.

It's all true and well studied for decades. It's amusing to watch you guys in your echo chambers create your own realities and tell each other it's true until you believe it.

An overwhelming majority of economists oppose minimum wage laws and believe they have a net negative effect. Such laws are merely a redistribution of wealth with costs that reduce the total wealth, and they hurt the least skilled the most.

Except you're wrong

Since it's so well studied care to provide a citation? I've seen nothing that was published in a reputable source that indicates modest min wage increases raise unemployment.

If I do you'll probably quibble about the meaning of modest. But the current rage is for $15 per hour, which is a 100% increase from the current federally mandated minimum wage. A number of surveys of economists have shown that about 75% of them agree an increase of this magnitude will increase unemployment. You can find these easily. There are also many empirical studies over the past 50 years that show this actually happens. Yes I know a couple of economists refuted the conclusions about Seattle. They don't have the consensus opinion.

There is also a wage shifting effect due to minimum wages that pushes wages to a higher skill level and reduces average wages for unskilled workers. Employers require more skill when minimum wage goes up. The whole idea is purely redistribution, and that has costs associated with it that reduce overall wealth. That much isn't really even in dispute by any economist. Some argue that the redistribution is a good thing, so that is a valid argument. But saying it doesn't have a cost is not valid, and saying it doesn't affect the profile of who is unemployed is not valid either.

This is completely stretching what the studies find. I'm assuming you're primarily referring to this study put out by a right-leaning think tank to oppose increasing the minimum wage:

https://www.epionline.org/wp-content...ageSurvey4.pdf

While it does find opposition to a $15 minimum wage, it overwhelming rejects that there should be no minimum wage (only 19% of economists replied that there should be no minimum wage - with another 15% responding no federal law, but there should be local MW laws).

Additionally, the study found that most economists supported raising the federal minimum wage (60% to 28%) it's just that they didn't support $15.

Show your work.

Sounds like cite or ban time. Especially when you start by saying "If I do you'll probably quibble about the meaning"...

It doesn’t have to be a race to the bottom. Raising minimum wage forces businesses to automate in order to keep their margins down and revenues up; which creates better than minimum wage jobs in the automation sector; which results in more money spent back into the economy.

If I'm given the choice of providing a living wage to X% more people, while removing employment from Y%, where X% >> Y%, then I'd make that all day.