Should we increase the minimum wage?

Should we increase the minimum wage in the United States?

In this episode of Ballots and Dollars, Rick Newman and Alexis Christoforous discuss the hot-button issue of minimum wage with Jessica Smith from Washington D.C. There has been a lot of discussions around the topic, especially with the ‘Fight for $15’ movement on the rise throughout the Democratic party.

“I feel like this is another issue where the Democrats are kind of blowing it,” Newman said. “It's just so easy to say ‘fight for 15, fight for 15’ when there's no chance of passing the bill. The Democrats are saying ‘let's go for the revolutionary approach. We're going to put all this power into the pocket of the ordinary worker.’ Except, it's never going to happen.”

Newman continued with how this approach is actually hurting the Democrats’ cause.

“Guess who you end up turning off with this bill?” he said. “Every business owner in the country. Any voter who owns a business or knows somebody who owns a business is listening to you say $15 an hour up from $7.25 and the details get lost. It sounds like you basically just want to double everybody's wages at the bottom end of the scale.”

A clear solution

Newman also argued that there is a clear solution to the problem, but will anyone play nice to get it accomplished?

“This problem is so solvable,” he stressed. “It's just infuriating how dysfunctional and ridiculous Congress can be. The way to set minimum wage policy is decide what the dollar amount should be, and then index it to inflation so you never have to deal with it legislatively again. From there, it just goes up by the amount of inflation.”

Is it really that simple? Find out today on the latest episode of Ballots and Dollars.