The increase in federal minimum wage is a great concern for many low-skilled workers and Democrats alike, but unfortunately, there is also a strong correlation between minimum wage hikes and unemployment for young black males, as was recently pointed out by the Foundation for Economic Education.
The Bureau of Labor Statistics (BLS) reported that the unemployment rate of black teens (ages 16 to 19), reached 40.1 percent in June. This is a sudden 12-point increase since May when unemployment among this demographic was 28.1 percent. One explanation for this occurrence could be the mid-year wage hikes enacted on July 1, when 14 cities, states, and counties, plus Washington, DC required employers to raise their minimum wage.
In total, the minimum wage rose in 15 places: “two states — Maryland and Oregon, plus Washington, D.C., Los Angeles County, Calif., and 11 cities. That includes Chicago, eight cities in California and two in Kentucky,” according to the Wall Street Journal. “While the federal minimum wage has been $7.25 an hour since 2009, cities and states are embracing increases that go as high as $15 an hour…San Francisco’s minimum wage, which will rise to $13.00 Friday from $12.25, is set to reach $15 by 2018. Chicago’s minimum, which will jump to $10.50 an hour Friday from $10.00, is set to reach $13 by 2019.”
The late economist Milton Friedman once said overpaid minimum wage workers have disastrous outcomes for employers who “are not in the position to engage in that kind of charity.”
“The law says that here’s a man who has a skill that would justify a wage of $5 or $6 per hour (adjusted for today), but you may not employ him, it’s illegal, because if you employ him you must pay him $7.25 per hour. So what’s the result? To employ him at $7.25 per hour is to engage in charity. There’s nothing wrong with charity. But most employers are not in the position to engage in that kind of charity,” Friedman said. “The people who have been hurt most by the minimum wage laws are the blacks. I have often said that the most anti-black law on the books of this land is the minimum wage law.”
If Friedman’s conclusion is precise, black teen boys will find employment unachievable and may engage in more illegal activity for financial gain. Violence among African American boys could spike higher than its already alarming rate, because gang activity is lucrative.
“Gangs provide other attractive opportunities such as the chance for excitement by selling drugs and making money,” according to the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention. “Social, economic, and cultural forces push many adolescents in the direction of gangs.”
Many of the cities and counties, i.e. Baltimore and Chicago, suffer from crippling gang violence as it is. Baltimore is the “heroin capital of the United States,” and there are about 100,000 gang members in Chicago versus the 12,000 law enforcers, according to ABC News.
Labor unions must come to terms with the fact that minimum wage could only benefit teenagers and or other low-skilled dependents. Organizations like Fight for $15 and politicians like Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders either unwittingly or recklessly do not care about the potential fallout from unnaturally spiking federal wages. It’s ironic that most Democrats push for solutions to end the school-to-prison pipeline, but their efforts to increase wages will lead more desperate black teens to live a life of crime, which they cannot undo and is toxic to their communities.
