Raising The Minimum Wage

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Raising the minimum wage might sound nice, but in reality it will not impact society in a positive way. Living on minimum wage is not easy at all. A raise in the minimum wage is just a small measure of help for those who are in need of it most. It is a benefit without hard cost. A raise in the minimum wage seems logical, right? Wrong. Recently California was the first state to approve the $15 minimum wage. They plan to increase the minimum wage $1 every year until it reaches $15. By doing this the state will go through an economic downturn, increase of unemployment, and rise in inflation. There should not be a raise in the minimum wage in California.
A major consequence of raising the minimum wage is unemployment. Raising the minimum wage will …show more content…
In reality minimum wage workers are a lot of the time not the only worker in the household. They are usually teenagers with a parent or both parents also working who aren’t poor. Also a lot of the people in poverty are unemployed. A website explained that, “There are large segments of the poor that receive no direct benefit at all from the minimum wage – the unemployed, stay-at-home parents, Uber drivers and other “gig” employees, etc.” (Matt Zwolinski). There are also a lot of people who are retired working these jobs who receive an income from their Social Security. This increase in wage will not cause a decrease in the amount of families in poverty. Targeting the low-wage workers is just not an effective way of fighting against …show more content…
A website explained, “The case for a higher minimum wage grows even weaker when you stop to consider that there are vastly superior alternatives for steering money to low-income households. For example, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office has found that expanding the earned income tax credit is a much more efficient way to fight poverty than increasing the minimum wage. has found that expanding the earned income tax credit is a much more efficient way to fight poverty than increasing the minimum wage.” (Hassett, Strain). There are also other government programs that would be beneficial to those in poverty. An example of one would be a program called the Earned Income Tax Credit (EITC). “The EITC boosts incomes of low-wage employees through their tax return, supplementing incomes at a sliding scale, phasing out as incomes rise so that work is always incentivized (unlike with some other welfare programs.)” (Ortiz). The EITC helps millions of low-income, working class people and their kids leave poverty or make poverty less severe every year. These are just a few of the several much better options that help the working poor without putting their jobs and the businesses they work for at
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