The minimum wage is a hot button issue in todays political climate, especially with the November elections just around the corner. Some candidates want to raise it to a ‘living wage’ and some think it is fine where it is. This issue hits close to home, in fact, because a law was recently passed in Pennsylvania to raise the minimum wage. The point of this article, however, is to pose an alternative and more logical solution. Abolish the minimum wage.
What happens when you need to pay people more to make a product or provide service? The price of that product or service increases. An easy way to see this is to imagine what would happen if the minimum wage were raised to $100 per hour. At first this might seem like a good idea, but take a closer look. If I own a record store and I have to pay an employee $100 an hour to work there my CDs will raise in price to an amount probably close to $300. In this case you still have to work three hours to buy a CD. Things just become more expensive.
The minimum wage is also a direct violation of our rights as employees and employers. If I, at my record store, want to pay someone $2 an hour to sweep my parking lot I should be allowed to, as long as the other person agrees to it. If you are doing a job that is worth $5.15 an hour then you will get paid that much. If you think that you are being under paid then find somewhere to work where they pay you better. That is your right.
The only entity that is helped by a minimum wage is the government. The propaganda behind it is almost ingenious. They tell the poor and middle class that the minimum wage will be beneficial. They tell us we will make more money and that we will become more wealthy, which is only a half truth. We do start to make more money, but we absolutely do not become more wealthy. We now have to pay more for goods and pay more money to the government in taxes.
The minimum wage is a free-market nightmare and needs to be stopped. If we abolished the minimum wage and returned to the gold standard this countries economy would be in a lot better shape. These ideas, however, would be detrimental to the government so I doubt we will see them implemented anytime soon.
