The Effects of a Minimum Wage Law

My topic of interest is the effects of raising minimum wage in the U.S. Minimum wage is defined as the lowest wage permitted by law or by special agreement. In 1938, President Roosevelt signed a bill called the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938, which set the minimum wage at $0.25. Although, overtime inflation devalued the amount of the dollar so it was raised there on. After raising the minimum wage the cost of living would keep going up every year. Also, currently advocates are arguing that the living wage should be 125% above the poverty line so that full time workers can afford a living.

Raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour can have detrimental effects on society. Some issues that may arise are increases in unemployment and small businesses not being able to handle the financial burden, which will lead into job benefit cuts. Furthermore, a rise in minimum wage will cause inflation and businesses to raise the prices of their goods and services. People purchasing power will continue to stay the same; the struggle to close the gap between products and services will not

The minimum wage was first introduced in 1894 by New Zealand, and "it covered all businesses and all industries across the entire country.” (BeBusinssed) Right before it became a big hit with many other countries, it was also started in Australia “where at the time it was only covering six industries that were notorious for paying low minimum wage.” (BeBusinessed) Over time by 1902 it grew to cover 150 industries. After being used by many other countries, the United States started their own minimum wage, the first minimum wage was introduced by Franklin Delano Roosevelt in 1938. At this time "Minimum wage was set at

Minimum wage is the minimum hourly wage an employee can earn from work. President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed the minimum wage law on June 25, 1938. However, the United States has not always had a minimum wage. The United States minimum wage has been in effect since the Great Depression. Before then there was no minimum wage and there certainly were not any legislation to look after workers from development. Many of workers had to work in awful environments such as factories and sweatshops and they were only paid a few pennies a week. The minimum wage started at 0.25 cents per hour and the maximum workweek at 44 hours in 1938. As of today, the federal minimum wage is at $7.25 an hour, part of the Fair Labor Standards Act.

House Bill 230, or the most recent bill introduced in North Carolina to increase minimum wage, was introduced by the House of Representatives on March 12, 2015. After the first version of the Bill was introduced, it was revised once. The bill was introduced because the goal of the state is to provide a minimum wage that allows for a decent and healthy life for its citizens. As the value of the American dollar continues to change, so does the average cost of living. The primary sponsors of the Bill were Representatives Farmer-Butterfield, L. Hall, Fisher, and Cunningham. The Bill states that “Employers shall pay employees wages no less than the minimum wage for all hours worked in North Carolina.” It then states that minimum wage in North

Introduced in 1938 as part of the Fair Labor Standards Act to help with the Great Depression, the minimum wage was the first form for federal action to make sure employers are paying their labors. Started at just $0.25, the current federal minimum wage is $7.80, but many states have their own minimum wage, some higher than the federal minimum wage and some lower. The minimum wage makes sure that the workers have a sustainable income and are not paid very low. Unfortunately, in this time period, the current minimum wage is not enough to survive without extra income. Kevin A. Hasset and Michael R. Strain point this fact out in their article The minimum-wage debate, “In addition, workers who earn the minimum wage are generally not the primary

Although, the minimum wage is not the same in all place in the States, almost all those who are depending on it are unsatisfied and are hoping for a rise even though some people see the rising as risky. In 1992, Card David wrote an article about Using Regional Variation in Wage to Measure the Effects of the Federal Minimum Wage. He pointed out that '' arise in the federal minimum wage will typically affect a larger fraction of workers especially teenagers in some states than in others. That variation across states depend on the fraction of workers initially earning less than the new minimum.'' (Card David 1) He agreed that many States had already passed state – specific minimum wages above the new federal standard. As a result, the fraction

The minimum wage is the lowest wage employers are to give an employee for every hour working . In the United states this was not always the case, it was not until the end of 1800 some sort of regulation was established. In 1984 New Zealand published the first minimum wage law (Smith, Halpen 2018). As other countries adopted this law United States also created their own version as they released The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 (FLSA) . This established a minimum wage and overtime pay. The new law at that time also required some form of recordkeeping for the first time, along with setting a standard for youth employment, for full-time and part-time workers in the private sector, Federal State, and local governments. During this time

Who is hurt and who is helped by an increase in the legal minimum wage?

In 1938, the first national minimum wage laws in the United States were passed as part of the Fair Labor Standards Act, which served as “a floor below wages,” to reduce poverty and to ensure that economic growth is shared across the workforce. Today, many people who work for companies that pay at or near the minimum wage and remain near or below the poverty level rely on government health and food security and income programs to supplement their living expenses. Since 1938, there have been many additional policies to the Fair Labor Standards Act that have changed many things, such as increasing the national minimum wage numerous times to the currently salary level, which was set in 1997. The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, from the United States Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division, was a policy to change the federal minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 in three additions, which began in July of 2009. (U.S., 2009).

Price floor is most commonly defined as a government price control that establishes the minimum allowable price that can be charged for a particular good or service (Ragan, 2013). The most popular and recognisable examples of a price floor is minimum wage. Fundamentally, a minimum wage is the lowest hourly wage that employers can legally pay their employees (MCEE, 2008). For much of the past century, the minimum wage has been a controversial subject among policymakers and economists around the world (change and X). The focus of this paper is to elaborate on the term binding price floor and how it can lead to a surplus of a particular commodity. In line with this focus, the student will relate these findings to the more common practice found in today’s society, this being minimum wage. With this being stated, the student will uncover which groups will most likely be benefited or disadvantaged from an increase in the legal minimum wage, as well as whether minimum wages should be increased, decreased, or eliminated altogether.

According to Kohen, Gilroy, and Brown (1982) look at what changes business make as a result of an increase in the minimum wage in addition to the effect the increase in the minimum wage has on levels of employment in different segments of the economy. The Effect of the Minimum Wage on Employment and Unemployment describes the resulting changes businesses make to cope with a minimum wage increase as “Shock” effects. First of all, some businesses, which were originally inefficient, drastically increased the productivity of their operation in order to offset the minimum wage. Secondly, firms that rely too heavily on labor will be forced to fire workers to better minimize costs. Thirdly, required level of effort might be raised for the workers

As the strongest developed country in the world, United States had legislated minimum wage to guarantee income for workers in early time. Minimum wage is an efficient tool to improve labor market in history. However, the first country legislated minimum wage is New Zealand that was enforced by compulsory arbitration (Verrill, 1915:105). United States legisted minimum wage system with the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 and set the federal minimum wage is $0.25 per hour. The 1938 Act was applicable generally to employees engaged in interstate commerce or in the production of goods for interstate commerce (US Department of Labor, 2009). Then the minimum wage level increases several times because of productivity improvement and increasing inflation rate. The federal government has to update the minimum wage level frequently. In 1961, there was new policy extended coverage primarily to employees in large retail and service enterprises as well as to local transit, construction, and gasoline service station employees (US Department of Labor, 2009). In 1966, the labor system

In the United States, minimum wage has remained at a low number for several years. Minimum wage is defined as the lowest possible income that an employer can legally pay an employee. This ensures that all people are fairly paid and not defrauded by companies or businesses. Minimum wage is considered a price floor and the minimum wage laws determine the lowest price possible that any employer must pay for labor. In an economic model, the quantity of supplied is greater than the quantity demanded and the minimum wage is above equilibrium price and quantity. Minimum wage prevents labor supplied and labor demanded from moving

In the 20th century, was the first time that the United States created the minimum wage and would influence world-wide economies. Since then, this economic system has been a controversial topic all over the world between the workers and employers. Historically, we can analyze the positive and negative effects of raising the minimum wage. Moreover, literature researchers have also analyzed the impact of the minimum wage on the economy on social, economic, and professional aspects. Therefore, the following literature reviews will discuss these aspects which are fast-food unionization, the grocery stores wage distribution, low wage work in five European countries and the USA, minimum wages reduce employment possibilities, inequality trends, the consequences of doubling the minimum wage, employment effects of minimum and subminimum wages, certifying voluntary living wage employers, minimum wage and Mexican and Central American influx, and collective bargaining.