The Patriot Post® · CBO Says $15 Minimum Wage Will Cost 1.4M Jobs

The Congressional Budget Office released its latest analysis of the Democrats’ loudly touted $15 minimum wage campaign and found what conservatives and the economically sound have long argued: It would cost American jobs … and a lot of them. The CBO concluded that a $15 per hour federal minimum wage — a raise of more than 100% from the current rate of $7.25 — would effectively kill off 1.4 million jobs, resulting in 1.4 million Americans receiving a minimum wage of $0 per hour.

Not only would the $15 minimum wage kill off nearly a million and a half jobs, it would also raise the cost of living for Americans across the board. If a grocery store employee suddenly costs double, the price of milk will go up to pay for it. Mandating this wage hike would also raise the cost of the federal government itself, because the CBO projects that it would add an additional $54 billion to the national deficit over the next decade through additional unemployment checks and other income redistribution.

The CBO’s report does note that $15 an hour would raise the income of some 17 million people currently making less than that, but it would prevent young, less experienced workers from gaining employment. “Young, less educated people would account for a disproportionate share of those reductions in employment,” the report states. Those young workers, such as those in the fast-food industry who are in most need of gaining work experience rather than higher wages, will be further prevented access to jobs due to the higher employment costs for employers. That in turn could reduce their wages over time because their resumés are thinner. Meanwhile, advances in automation will be adopted at an even faster rate.

But socialists like Senator Bernie Sanders still refuse to accept the economic reality of the damage caused by so drastically increasing the minimum wage. He called the CBO report “hard to understand,” while he continued to demand that Democrats press forward on $15 minimum wage even without any Republican support. “The only way to increase the minimum wage to $15 an hour now is to pass it with 51 votes through budge reconciliation,” Sanders contended.

For the Democrats, this minimum wage play has everything to do with getting more people relying on government — and on them as a party. If some 18-year-old loses his job, he may not know it’s due to Democrat policy. But he will know that Democrats pushed to get him a higher wage and then an unemployment check.

This whole thing is nothing more than a feel-good policy that in the real world is a practical disaster. But when has the real world ever stopped leftists from projecting their ideological fantasies onto the rest of us?