Neighborhood Ministries

Joe Biden is pushing for a $15.oo minimum wage from the current $8.50. Just about every State that has passed such a law has canceled it within a few months. It destroyed many small businesses before they were repealed. Wages don’t appear by magic. An employer has to recover the cost of increased wages by increasing the price of his goods or services or laying off workers. A sudden rise in wages will generally force him to do both. Every State enacting such a law saw massive loss of jobs and massive increases in the cost of goods and services. Any increase has to be gradual but even those are generally non-productive. The rise in prices generally wipes out any gains in wages and hurts the businesses who see fewer people able to afford their goods. When I worked for the welfare department (now Job & Family Services), the price of gasoline went from $.50 a gallon to $1.00 a gallon overnight because the Arabs cut back our supply of oil. My caseload went from 150 to 250 clients within a few months because of the businesses that laid off workers or folded up. That only affected transportation and heating. A massive rise in minimum wage would create massive layoffs across all industries.