The potential ripple effect of the $15 minimum wage

[genxlib]

The increase is absolutely necessary and would be a huge boost to the working class.

What I have been wondering about is how the low end salaries will redistribute.

At face value, there seems to be this presumption that everything below $15 will be raised to $15 and that will settle everything.

I don't see where the impact will stop there. There are lots of people who were never MW that had salaries that were between the old and new numbers. I will call them MW+. If nothing else changed, they would be MW going forward.

But there were reasons those people were MW+. Perhaps they had seniority or some supervisory responsibility. Perhaps they were full time instead of part-time. Perhaps their employer was trying to compete for employees. Whatever the reason, many of them will need to stay above minimum for those same reasons.

So the ripple effect I foresee is that many $12 jobs will jump to $18, etc.

I just don't see how an economy works with too many people stacked at the same wage. There has to be some kind of hierarchy even among the lowest end of the salary spectrum.

In the end, this could have a big impact even beyond the base minimum.

[mopinko]

1. afaik, that's exactly how it works.

folks on the low end will all get a bump.

[Turin_C3PO]

2. Yep, that's what will happen.

It might take a year or two but most people will see a bump in their earnings if the minimum wage is raised.

[TigressDem]

3. Minimum allows people to pay their bills, buy food, live without constant worry.

RE:
I just don't see how an economy works with too many people stacked at the same wage. There has to be some kind of hierarchy even among the lowest end of the salary spectrum.


There already ARE too many people stacked at the same wage - POVERTY. THAT ain't working.

MANY people with the money to live simply, put more money into the economy so your businesses CAN raise wages as the influx on money happens.


POOR people HAVE to pay rent, or get evicted.
POOR people HAVE to pay utilities or freeze, lose power and food rots.
POOR people HAVE to buy clothes to keep them warm or get frostbite in some states.

SO giving the LEAST of US a ***king break puts money into the economy.


GIVE a RICH person a tax break and they put it offshore, take a vacation, buy a gold toilet seat, another house whatever.


Having a living wage means moving lots more people into the Middle Class and having a ROBUST Middle Class has been the BEST type of economy US has seen.

[Johnny2X2X]

4. 100% right

If you have someone making $16 an hour digging ditches all day in the hot sun, they're more likely to look around and think they would rather be doing virtually anything else making $15 an hour, so they'll have to pay $18+ an hour to retain them.

And on up. Many places will pay a couple dollars more than the minimum, these jobs will put wage pressure on the $20 an hour jobs too. The ripple gets smaller the higher you go, but it's probably still noticeable at $30 an hour.