Study says minimum wage increase means loss of jobs

Nearly 2 million jobs lost over 10 years if wages go to $12

They won’t tell you how you should cast a vote for president but the National Federation of Independent Business will tell you that the one who wants to raise the pay for minimum wage workers the most will cost the nation jobs.

That’s what a new study shows says Bill Smith, president of the Wisconsin chapter of the group.

He says the study shows 1.8 million jobs will be lost in the next 10 years if the federal minimum wage is raise to $12 an hour and then adjusted for inflation.

“It’s a very valid, unbiased look at the economic impact of increasing the minimum wage, particularly on smaller businesses,” Smith said.

Smith added that those who argue for raising the minimum wage just don’t understand the economics of such a move.

“It’s the smaller businesses, businesses with fewer than 100 employees that are forecast to lose nearly 800,000 jobs or about 43 percent of all the jobs that would be impacted by an increase,” Smith said.

The same increase in the federal minimum wage would cut national economic output by $2 trillion over the same time period, he added.

It’s Hillary Clinton who has said she’s in favor of $15 an hour. Donald Trump, at least most recently, says he’d be in favor of raising the federal minimum to $10. 

“It’s not just the impact on the labor market,” Smith said, “but the impact on the overall economic growth of the country in our state.”

Smith thinks it’s unclear from the study how many more jobs there would be currently had the federal minimum wage not more than doubled over the last 35 years.

“The unfortunate reality that everyone must understand, a government mandated increase in the cost of labor, would not put more money in the worker’s pockets,” Smith said. “Many of them would end up in the unemployment line.”