A Daily Mail editorial from the Charleston Gazette-Mail
CHARLESTON, W.Va. — A report issued by the Alliance for a Just Society this week reiterates what everyone knows: minimum wage workers in West Virginia and across the country cannot make enough money to actually support their basic needs.
This shocking news comes from a report titled “Pay Up, Long Hours and Low Pay Leave Workers at a Loss.”
This report, with data for each state, recommends policy makers go beyond the current $15 per hour minimum wage rate bandied about by politicians to a higher rate, which would average $16.87 per hour nationally (although only $14.44 per hour in West Virginia due to the state’s lower cost of living).
Raising the minimum wage is popular among politicians who either don’t know, or don’t care, how the business world works. The call can sound impressive to voters with little understanding of economics.
But those who study economics have the data to show that, as nice as a mandated raise in the minimum wage sounds, raising the rate actually hurts the very people the politicians say they are trying to help.