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The Effects Of Minimum Wage On The Society

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Minimum wage is the topic I chose because there has been a controversy regarding raising minimum wage and the impact of minimum wage to the society. Whether it would aid workers or not. There have been arguments of laypersons of increasing minimum wage to a very high level and there are arguments against it.
History behind minimum wage
The Ordinance of Labourers (1349) is the forerunner to the minimum wage. The Ordinance was a ruling by King Edward III who established a maximum wage for laborers in England (Mihm, 2013). King Edward III was reliant on serfs to work his lands. In fall season 1348, Black Plague annihilated the population in England (Thorpe, 2014). The severe scarcity of labor caused wages to climb and caused King Edward III to set a wage ceiling. The Statute of Labourers (1351), which is one of the amendments to the ordinance increased the penalties for paying a wage above the set rates (Mihm, 2013).
The wage ceiling laws were later used to set a living wage. An amendment to the Statute of Labourers in 1389 set wages to the price of food. As times passed, the Justice of the Peace, who had the authority in establishing the maximum wage, also began to establish official minimum wages. King James I later formalized with the passage of the Act Fixing a Minimum Wage in 1604 for workers in the textile industry (Mihm, 2013).
In the 1890s, modern legislative tries to adjust minimum wages in New Zealand and Australia (Starr, 1993).
The movement for a minimum wage

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