The Washington Post, interestingly, points out that “‘Free lunches’ like the $15 minimum wage may hurt the people they’re meant to help.”
TANSTAAFL. With self-serv Ordering Kiosks, kitchen automation, and factory pre-preparation, can it be so long before the old idea of “The Automat” is new again?
Take the proposal to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, a policy endorsed in the Democratic Party’s new “Better Deal” platform.
An increase in the federal minimum wage, stuck at $7.25 for eight years, is long overdue. But more than doubling it would likely result in massive job losses and cuts in work hours.
We’ve already seen preliminary evidence that raising wages in Seattle to $13 has produced sharp cuts in hours, leaving low-wage workers with smaller paychecks. And that’s in a high-cost city. Imagine what would happen if Congress raised the minimum wage to $15 nationwide.
