DGS49, I’m among the proponents for gradually increasing the federal minimum wage rate until it achieves no less than 125% OF ITS February-1968 peak purchasing power: thereafter it should be annually monitoring and updated to retain no less than that value.This argument will never be resolved because economic illiteracy is endemic.
But one must always ask: If $15 is good, why not$25? Why not $50? ...
In February-1968, the minimum rate was increased to $1.60 per hour, its historically highest value of purchasing power. That increase, (as had all minimum rate increases) was of some improvement to our nations’ economic and social wellbeing, but it was not of a particularly huge boon to our nation’s working-poor.
If the minimum rate’s purchasing power would have been continuously increased, our nation’s economic and social wellbeing would also have been continuously improved. But our U.S. Congress permitted the rate’s purchasing power to be reduced, and to the extents of those reductions, our economic and social wellbeing was less improved than otherwise.
I suppose (as you do), the minimum rate can be without sufficient notice, increased too rapidly or to too great of an extent. We often observed too much, or too fast introduction of a good thing can have detrimental consequences. My experiences and observations in 1968 lead me to believe that gradually increasing the minimum rate to reach the 125% of more than a half century ago, would not even approach detrimental consequences. Respectfully, Supposn
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