Would Eliminating Corporations Lead To A Higher Minimum Wage

Is a $15 minimum wage only helping big corporations and hurting small businesses?

There may be some of the effects of favoring larger companies you describe. However, there would still likely be substantial, antipoverty effects. There is a vast literature on the effects of minimum wage increases. I have not seen any other case that covers s situation in which the minimum wage was double in a country as large, diverse and with as wide a range of cost of living as the US has. $15.00/hour is low enough it would not assure workers in Manhattan the same living standards workers in Pueblo now have. https://www.aei.org/publication/...I think you could potentially  have some perverse effects where unemployment effects of the increase would be focused in poor, rural communities and people would be forced into employment in urban areas that may actually provide lower living standards than they have already.  Here is what I would propose instead of just a simple, $15.00/instant increase:a) adjust the current mininum wage by local cost of living in each county. That means $19.30/hour in Manhattan and a $10/hour national average.b)  Raise the EITC so that it is sufficient to eliminate all poverty among workers in the 20% of counties with the lowest cost of living.c) In any county the next year that has either an increase in commercial real estate values or a decline in unemployment, raise the minimum wage by 10%.d) reapply any savings in EITC costs from minimum wage increases to improving EITC's ability to lift working families out of poverty.Within 8 years you would have at least a $15.00/hour minimum wage in any county that was not having clear, economic problems. You would also eliminate the worse  regional poverty and contain regional dislocation.

What would happen if the minimum wage was eliminated?

The answer would depend on “why” it was removed.There are two ways that a minimum wage might possibly be removed.The first, and most likely, way that the minimum wage would be removed in the United States would be if the corporations who control the US government passed legislation to repeal the minimum wage laws.The second way that I could see the minimum wage being removed, would be if having a minimum wage was no longer necessary because workers were being paid adequately in the US.In the first example, where the corporations use their influence in Congress to get the minimum wage repealed, what would happen is poverty would skyrocket. Many employers would reduce their already inadequate compensation rates. Since the minimum wage is the “standard” by which other wages are measured, even those fortunate few who make living wages, would suffer decreases.This reduction in wages across the board would have a chilling effect on the economy and cause a recession or economic depression, as demand for goods and services decreased because the working class could no longer afford to buy things.In the second case, where the minimum wage was no longer necessary because working class citizens are earning living wages, just the opposite would happen. If our working class citizens who are the majority of the “consumers” in our economy, earned living wages, the economy would actually grow as a result. The demand that their wages produce for goods and services, would cause the economy to expand. That economic expansion would create new jobs, and lift wages across the board which would make minimum wage laws unnecessary.There are five wealthy advanced nations that have no minimum wage requirement, because they don’t need one. They have no need of minimum wage laws for two main reasons:Their governments are actual democracies, and therefore workers are represented in the government, and their rights are protected, andTheir workers are well represented before their employers by unions who can negotiate fair wages and benefits for them.When workers have representation in the government, and when they are allowed to bargain with their employers collectively, the need for a minimum wage becomes unnecessary.

The Michigan GOP just denied raising minimum wage due the economic restraints on businesses. Is there a credibility to this reasoning?

No! There is no credibility to the reasoning of the GOP in Michigan, for their refusal to raise the minimum wage.What does “economic restraints” even mean????? I am so disappointed that so many of our citizens are so economically illiterate, that they will accept these vapid explanations that lack any substance at all, as justification for the expansion of poverty among our own Working Class.All we need to do is look around us. There is a fast food outlet on practically every retail corner in the country. Every community has a Walmart. Most communities have a Home Depot and a Lowes. There are hotel chains all across the country. Staples, Office Max, and other “big box” outlets abound. And all of these gigantic corporations are primarily staffed by minimum wage workers.And all of them would have us convinced that they are barely profitable, and that raising the minimum wage would result in widespread economic collapse, skyrocketing unemployment, and the onset of economic depression.As Robert Reich would say…”Baloney!!!!”If we were not economic illiterates, we would realize several things. These giant corporations are highly profitable. That’s why there are so many of them. Their profit margins are extremely large, which is why almost all of them are owned by people who are already rich. And raising the minimum wage would not even make a noticeable dent in that profitability. Every one of these giant corporations does business in decent countries that require living wages for their citizens. If there was any truth at all to the ridiculous whine that they are all “economically limited” in how much they can pay their workers, you’d think that they would be unable to turn a profit in Australia, Canada, Japan, Denmark and the other nations of the EU. But if you travel elsewhere in the world, you will find all of the US based minimum wage businesses we have here, everywhere else as well.The fact is that the “economic restraints” excuse for our poverty level wages in the “richest country in the world”, is just simply a lie. It is a betrayal of our own Working Class, by our US Wealthy Class and the corporations whose profits we subsidize with our taxes.And we would readily understand this if we were capable of employing the most basic common sense when considering economic issues.

What would be the impact if the US government eliminated minimum wage?

Unless you live in Alabama, Louisiana, Mississippi, South Carolina, Tennessee, New Hampshire, a Native American reservation, or a US Territory… nothing at all.All of the other US States have statutorily defined minimum wages of their own, which would remain completely in effect. Minimum wage laws in state broadly (very broadly) follow cost-of-living levels in their states, so CA’s minimum wage is higher than Kansas’s. Many cities, especially coastal cities, have even higher local minimum wages to help local service and retail workers afford the higher local prices.The states listed above don’t have a minimum wage law of their own. (New Hampshire doesn’t have one, but statutorily references the Federal minimum wage, which would no longer exist.) Most likely, there’d be pressure to adopt one, but it could be lower than the current Federal level is in some of the poorest states with the lowest cost of living and the highest unemployment.They’d be free to set whatever is appropriate for the tribe, if desired. Puerto Rico, Guam, American Samoa, the US Virgin Islands, Native Sovereign Nations, and other US territories are the areas most directly affected. (Native Sovereign Nations are not bound by state minimum wage laws, but are covered by the Federal one.) Local legislation would probably ensue there as well.IMO, this is basically working as design. The Cost of Living varies dramatically across the United States, and by definition the *Federal Minimum* Wage should be whatever is not high enough to cause inflation in the poorest (or lowest-CoL) area in the jurisdiction, while meeting the socially efficient desired point for that region. Everyone else with a higher CoL should adopt higher state/local minimum wages as needed.In short: Call your city councilman or state rep, not your Congressman.