If employers can’t afford to hire, then workers don’t earn anything.
The objective of a minimum wage is to allow people to participate in the economy and support the vital supply chains that enable capitalism, not just to protect workers. When workers can afford that participation they contribute to the overall health of their regional economies and business makes more money. I can think of few better ways of bringing the various areas of the country together in prosperity than allowing everyone to be a positive force in the economy.
That isn’t to say that I don’t agree that $15 is too low in many regions, because it is. The minimum wage is what we have to work with, however ineffective it may be, so that is where we should begin. However, I believe a much better approach would be to establish a federally funded guaranteed job program that is entirely at the discretion of the workers. It could be managed at the state and local level to make the most of the available labor, but should not become a further burden on those governments.
The government uses its power over land and its use, as well as provides most of the infrastructure business uses to create profits. Just providing a currency that can drive commerce and act as a store of value uniformly is a large benefit to capital. By organizing the economy around that currency via taxation the government should accept the responsibility for assuring everyone access to the currency sufficient to supply basic needs, and not subject them to the whims of business for those.
Setting a bottom for private employers in each area by providing a real choice for workers that doesn’t involve the threat of destitution would only assure that employers meet the minimum in each area, and would be stabilizing to the economy by providing a countercyclical to business cycles injection of federal funds to provide demand and secure supply chains. Employers would gain access to a labor pool with all social and work skills intact, as well as benefit from the public purpose work the participants would do and their greater consumption made possible by the wages.
