Writer - Lily Monigold
Right now, there are a lot of debates about whether or not the minimum wage should be raised to $15 an hour. This is the question that everyone is trying to answer right now: would raising the minimum wage, potentially to $15 per hour by 2025, be a good thing or a harmful thing? There is no right or wrong answer to this question as it is entirely based on an opinion. This is an opinion and topic that is important to care about and pay attention to right now because this is a debate that is happening amongst our government at this moment. For instance, at the start of 2021, 20 different states raised their minimum wage. They all varied on how much they increased. Illinois went from $10 to $11, while Minnesota only increased by 8 cents -- $10 to $10.08. However, the federal minimum wage has been at $7.25 an hour since 2009. The state that currently has the highest minimum wage is California at $14. Washington DC’s minimum wage is $15, but is not considered a state. The states with the lowest minimum wages are Wyoming and Georgia; they are both at $5.15. Since they have to follow the federal minimum wage, however, most are paid $7.25 per hour. If you have a job that pays minimum wage, you may be thinking “of course I want the minimum wage to go up; I will make more money!” While it sounds like an obvious answer, there do happen to be negative consequences. For example, if the minimum wage is raised to $15, then some places may have to lay-off some employees. Then those fired employees definitely won’t be making a wage that is livable. The 2019 CBO report states an estimate that 1.3 million jobs would be lost if the minimum wage is raised to $15 an hour by 2025. It would cost more money for small businesses to pay their employees and this could really impact them. To continue, since small businesses would have to pay their employees more, they may have to increase their prices. This could result in just adding to the inflation already going on. Many argue that doing this would just increase salaries overall; which would then increase prices of goods and services overall. Inflation and loss of jobs are two big issues that would occur if/when minimum wage is raised to $15 an hour. These are some large issues. However, the positives, depending on your opinion, may out-weigh the bad. For instance, the main argument as to why minimum wage should be raised is because it would improve the standard of living. This means that more people would have an appropriate amount of money to live off of comfortably. A 2019 CBO also estimates that raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour in 2025 would result in an improvement of standard of living for 17 million people; bringing 1.3 million people above the poverty line. A higher wage could also generally improve employee morale. Workers may put more work into their jobs when making a higher salary. If someone is working a job that isn’t earning them enough to live comfortably, it may discourage them from working as hard as they can in their jobs. Lastly, raising the minimum wage would also have a positive effect on the economy. It would boost it because consumer spending goes up when people have more money to buy things. This then stimulates the economy. To recap, the main benefits of raising the minimum is an improved standard of living, higher employee morale, and the growth of the economy. As you can see, there are extremely valid points on both sides of the argument. This is what makes the decision so tough. Most likely, however, the near future will involve seeing a gradual rise in the minimum wage. It is only then when we will truly see all of the positives and negatives that this will have. Sources: https://www.cnn.com/2020/12/30/business/minimum-wage-2021-states/index.html https://www.paycor.com/resource-center/minimum-wage-by-state https://www.investopedia.com/articles/markets-economy/090516/what-are-pros-and-cons-raising-minimum-wage.asp#:~:text=Opponents%20of%20raising%20the%20minimum,and%20resulting%20in%20job%20losses
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