Raising the federal minimum wage has become more of a consistently pressing issue in the United States since President Obama spoke of the matter during his 2014 State of the Union Address, where he stated that he intended on raising the minimum wage by 40%, from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour. While he and his supporters argue that this would work most beneficially for America’s economy and would not result in any loss of jobs for citizens, others argue that, on the contrary, this would drastically affect current minimum wage earning employees and would also cut almost 500,000 jobs on top of other detrimental consequences. While both sides consider legitimate concerns, the argument still remains on if the risk is worth an unknown outcome.
Presently, …show more content…
The cold, hard fact is that even in the midst of recovery, too many Americans are working more than ever just to get by – let alone get ahead. And too many still aren’t working at all.” Supporters of the minimum wage policy state that the $7.25 hourly rate is no longer sufficient for American’s to meet the minimal basic standard of living, and that, because of this, many workers are having to work over the regular forty hour work week to compensate for this insufficiency. This, in turn, allows for the Fair Labor Standards Act, which was established in 1938 to prohibit child labor, mandate a forty hour work week, and set a fair minimum wage to all employees across the nation, to lose a part of its vital purpose. Raising the minimum wage, however, is believed to be the solution to this situation. Advocates further argue that raising the minimum wage would also result in a plethora of other beneficial outcomes such as economic stimulation, more job opportunities, reduced expenses for social programs, and relief of inflation. By raising the minimum wage, America would begin to restore its economy given that minimum wage workers would now have more to spend which would, in turn, allow for more money flow. This would also …show more content…
Oppositions to the increasing of the federal minimum wage argue the direct contrary to the supporters, stating that raising the minimum wage would result in fewer job opportunities and layoffs, price increases and higher standards of living, and job competition. Employers have a budget in which they use compensate for the amount of workers they hire. Just because the minimum wage increases doesn’t mean that their budget does as well. This, as critics believe, would inevitably result in workers being laid off and in fewer job opportunities since employers would be trying to maintain their budget. Arguers also state that employers would begin to increase the prices on their products to bring in more income to pay for the increased wage rate and that this would eventually create a ripple effect, and would, in time, result in a higher standard of living, the exact problem the government is already trying to compensate for. Finally, non-supporters believe that, if the minimum wage increases, more people will be fighting for minimum wage jobs and that employers will hire the more qualified workers, which would in turn make finding a job and gaining workforce experience harder for