This is a good thing for: minimum wage employees in firms with high bargaining power over labor markets like Walmart , and bad for a presently unknown number of people whose economic productivity isn't worth nine dollars who will lose their job, and it is bad for consumers WHEN competition has resulted in some of the reduced labor cost, of large companies with high bargaining power, to pass down to the consumer surplus. Fun fact number 1: Minimum wage was originally implemented in the United States to prevent immigrants and ethnic Americans to under bid the wages of white Americans, temporarily taking their share of the available jobs (before reduced labor costs and increased consumer base helped buoy new demand, and new jobs). By most accounts it worked. To be entirely fair however, it's likely this whole policy will have negligible effects all around. It's not at all difficult to get a job well above minimum wages before you even graduate from high school. I'll concede that I don't have a comprehensive paper to defer to on this subject, but it is my naive observation that most employers that rely heavily on minimum wage employees tend to also have high bargaining power in labor markets, and they are extracting huge producer surpluses. I.E its unlikely this will result in unemployment or bankruptcy among companies. If you look at what happens in a small town when Walmart arrives, it basically cannibalizes the low skill, retail sector market in the town. Which then turns the low skill retail sector job market into a single buyer market. Its only really in situations like this, that you really ever see a high prevalence of minimum wage jobs to begin with in the economy. So yes, there is a tendency for minimum wages to lead to higher prices, and higher unemployment, but this is a general statement, and there are exceptions. I think it is entirely possible to have a minimum wage that is: 1. higher than what it is now, 2. Low enough that most of the affected wages were lower than the new minimum in the first place, because of inequality of bargaining power rather than anything fundamental like low productivity or low labor demand. 3. That largely affects the producer surplus, without causing a blow sufficient enough to significantly impact investment. IF these three things could be accomplished, this would be the best thing for the public good. Minimum wage increases are not a free lunch, and you're going to have to make some trade offs, but ultimately there are good reasons to justify a minimum wage, and there are good reasons to think its something that requires intelligent optimization. I don't know where the ideal minimum wage is, but I highly doubt it is below nine dollars. I could be wrong, but even if I am, I still can't even begin to make sense of some of the hyperbole in this thread. Another point to make is that this isn't even necessarily a minimum wage increase: it's more or less a minimum wage upkeep. Real minimum wages have been dropping about 2% every year with inflation. Real minimum wages would probably still be lower than they were a few decades ago. People who think this will collapse the economy are about as uninformed as people who think minimum wages can't create and sustain some unemployment or increase some prices. In any event this is probably more of a gesture to appeal to the democrat political base, rather than anything that will push the economy in any direction. * Lol @ People that blame business cycles on particular political parties or presidents.

No point in talking to that guy.

Your ideals of "normal" are based on fantasy, not history.

I'm sure when OP said pseudo economists you were one of those who came to mind.

Only because you edited out the statement I addressed, my post was addressing your over sized ego and cut and pasted talking points.

Of course you didn't, you was never in a position to do that.