That’s the argument anti-market zealots use in defense of their constant pressure to increase the minimum wage. You’d hear John Edwards, for example, say something like that to a crowd of friendly leftist voters.
Anyone who is interested in finding out the real impact of minimum wage laws should read this editorial in today’s Wall Street Journal. One effect of the increasing minimum wage is to curtail programs run by government agencies to train young adults so that they might obtain skills employers want.
When government interferes with the market mechanism and arbitrarily enforces prices floors or ceilings, there are always bad results. Why couldn’t there be a “liberal” candidate who has the guts to say that and propose ways of helping people who have low job skills that don’t involve messing up the price system? That would be this year’s “Sister Souljah” moment.
