re: #955 reason0911

That’s not what was asked. You were asked to provide evidence that a minimum wage has increased unemployment in the past.

A priori conclusions about economic outcomes are notoriously fallible, due to the vast amount of simplification that has to happen in order to produce any kind of tractable model.

In any case, here’s a counter-example: assume that there is a country with a population of 10 and only one commodity (food, which is grown). One man owns 100% of the land and pays subsistence wages to the other 9, who work on his farm. They produce 90 units of food a day (10 each), and receive 1 each, which is what they need to survive. The owner consumes the other 81 units.

If an external force institutes a minimum wage of 2 units of food per day, the owner will still employ all 9 workers. They will receive more, and he will retain less, but unemployment does not go up.

So that’s where a priori arguments about minimum wages get you.