A minimum wage increase to $15 an hour, as Biden proposes, would kill jobs, especially the jobs of lower paid hourly workers. That’s insane during this lockdown economy. Andy Pudzer, a Senior Fellow at the Pepperdine University School of Public Policy, lays out the issue.

“President-elect Joe Biden proposed increasing the federal minimum wage from the current $7.25 to $15 an hour as part of his coronavirus relief package. Such a dramatic increase would exacerbate the devastating impact economic lockdowns are having on small businesses, while doing great harm to 10.7 million Americans who are unemployed…The situation is so desperate for struggling small businesses that Congress recently increased the total funds available under the Payroll Protection Program to nearly $1 trillion to help them pay their employees and stay afloat.” Business owners will not just go complacently to the chopping block. They will raise prices and fire workers to ease the burden on the bottom line.

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“Biden proposes adding another $190 billion in aid for minority businesses. But if small businesses are already on the cusp of failure and need help just to pay their employees, why impose a big wage increase that makes doing so more difficult?…In 2019 the Congressional Budget Office analyzed a House bill that proposed raising the minimum wage to $15. It found that in the year the increase took effect it would reduce family income by nearly $9 billion due to the loss of about 1.3 million jobs, increased consumer prices and reduced economic growth.” Another million jobs after the tens of thousands lost by the pipeline cancelation.

“Imagine the devastating impact a $15 minimum wage would have today in the wake of economic lockdowns sparked by the COVID-19 pandemic that have destroyed tens of thousands of small businesses. The result to date is both the 10.7 million people unemployed plus another 7.1 million people who are out of the labor force (so are not counted as unemployed) but who want a job now. That means nearly 18 million people are competing for only 6.5 million job openings, according to the latest data from the Bureau of Labor Statistics.” Biden wants to add many more unemployed to that number. Absolutely politically batty right now and worse for the economy.