#FightFor15? Even liberal economists agree it’s a “gamble”

The belief in the $15 minimum wage to defeat poverty borders on the religious. Empirical evidence casts doubt that the benefit will be so smooth and so unequivocal.

“I can understand why some people look at the evidence and disagree with me. What I can’t understand is the high level of certainty that some proponents have,” Adam Ozimek wrote for Economy.

For small minimum wage increases spread out over time, studies have found negligible changes in employment levels. For the dramatic change that a $15 minimum wage will bring, however, the effects are unprecedented. In Cleveland, for example, unions want an immediate 85 percent increase, which would be a shock to the local economy.

Businesses and the economy can be resilient and absorb costs by raising prices, cutting services, or becoming more productive. The aggregate effect of artificial cost increases, though, can muck up the resiliency of employers.

Ozimek cited a 2012 study by Yusuf Soner Baskaya and Yona Rubinstein that analyzed the minimum wage’s effect on teenagers, finding that “minimum wage hikes have a large and statistically significant effect on teenage employment.” Another by Jeffrey Clemens and Michael Wither in 2014 found that “the 2007-2009 federal minimum wage hike significantly reduced employment” by tracking specific individuals over time.