Burger Flipping

Now that President-Elect Biden has signaled his support for an increase in the federal minimum wage to $15, the critics of such a move have already been busy with their insulting characterizations of people who make the minimum wage. 

Arguments against the minimum wage increase:

* It's just high school kids working those jobs, they'll graduate and find something better

* If you don't like making minimum wage, find a better job

* It's unskilled labor

* Paramedics make $15/hour (or really, fill in your favorite profession that already makes $15/hour or slightly more) - are you saying "burger flippers" are worth as much as paramedics?

* Companies will go out of business or lay off employees if forced to increase wages

Let's dispense with the economic argument first. Research has shown that increasing wages, counterintuitively, doesn't cause businesses to close or to lay off workers. 

https://www.businessnewsdaily.com/8984-increased-minimum-wage.html#:~:text=Researchers%20say%20raising%20the%20minimum,businesses%20or%20reduce%20job%20opportunities.

Business owners by and large are not philanthropists. They will take whatever action is necessary to maximize profits. If they voluntarily raise wages, it's usually because of outside pressure. Often it because of increased competition for employees due to low unemployment. Your paycheck is based, not on what you need, but on the lowest amount that your employer feels they can get away with paying you. If revenues increase for whatever reason, fewer competitors, lower costs or reduced taxes, most employers will not turn around and increases wages because they don't have to. 

The idea that all or most minimum wage jobs are filled by high school students is also a myth. While it is true that high school kids, if they are working, are working in minimum wage jobs, people from all walks of life are working in low-paying jobs for a variety of reasons. Higher paying positions typically require specific training or education. This may shock people who are college graduates, but not everyone can afford to go to college. Of course there are alternatives, two of my children joined the military. One is a career NCO and the other combined student loans with support from the military to get a college degree and a teaching job. Two of my children have union jobs with decent pay and benefits. Circumstances and decisions made years or decades ago will affect ones ability to find a high paying job. Single parents with young children are often limited in the jobs that they can take. Some people, often through no fault of their own, do not have the education or training that would qualify them for a higher paying career. 

The bigger picture that is often overlooked is that these lower paying, lower status jobs are still necessary. If we want there to be restaurants where we can enjoy a nice dinner in our free time with our discretionary income, someone has to be "flipping the burgers". In virtually any industry there are "front line" workers who do the bulk of the work, who get things done. This is not to say that supervisors and administrators are not necessary, but that there would be nothing to supervise or administrate without those front line workers. In any business that I have ever been in, if every non-manager had called in sick the place would have fallen apart (and I say that having been a manager at most of the businesses where I was employed). A related issue is that in most industries the only way to advance, i.e. to make more money, is to be promoted to management. The problem with this is that management is a skill set that is separate from the underlying business. You may be the best [fill in the blank] but may have no ability to effectively supervise your former peers or manage the business that you are engaged in. But most positions have a maximum wage rate, and once you reach that ceiling, you have one option: become a manager. This paradigm ignores the likelihood that a front line workers with many years of experience will bring more value to the business than a rookie with the same job title. 

The last item that I will address is the comparative value argument. Usually it takes the form of comparing the average compensation of paramedics or teachers to the $15/hour suggested minimum wage and implies that minimum wage workers aren't the equals of paramedics or teachers. This isn't the slam dunk that opponents of a minimum wage increase think it is. It's an argument for increasing the remuneration of teachers and paramedics. And speaking of comparisons, some studies indicate that if the minimum wage kept pace with inflation and productivity increases, it would be $24/hour.