Make everything worse for those just starting out; make it even harder to find a job. The minimum wage will go up next year around 5%, from 513 to 540 euros, or 3% more than expected inflation.

 

When a person is starting out in a job, he or she usually has little experience or training in the specific task at hand (in other words, others know how to do the job better). That person’s only way for getting into the work force, to improve and climb the salary ladder to a higher income in the future, is to be paid little to learn a lot. The reasons are clear: no company wants to hire an employee who doesn’t do the job well –as was everyone’s case in the beginning. The free market, the least prepared can still find a job, and the way to do so is totally eliminating the minimum wage.    

 

Imagine if some enlightened government decided to pass a law raising the minimum wage to 60,000 euros. Would this help the people? Would there be jobs for all? Would the least fortunate among us find more jobs? No. What would happened is that only big time executives would have jobs, the black market would skyrocket and many of us would be given pink slips and sent out on the street without a chance of ever finding another job.

 

If the minimum wage is bad for demand, it is equally bad for supply, especially for small businesses. Imagine you have a small newspaper stand and two boys lend you a hand. Imagine the government imposed a minimum wage you could not afford. Clearly, you would have to fire one of the two boys, or both or pay them under the table with the risk of getting caught. If you fire one or both boys, you will have to take on their tasks leaving you no time to do the other things that might benefit the business in the medium to long term. The quality of your small business would drop and thus your income would as well. There is a joke in the United States (not a good one, but it makes the point) about the minimum wage. A small businessman (SB) and young worker (YW) are talking:

 

SB: I have good news and bad news for you. The good news is the Democrats won and have imposed a $600 minimum wage.

YW: Hey, that is fantastic. What is the bad news?

SB: You’re fired. I can’t pay that much.  

 

The minimum wage is one of politicians’ many errors. They have used it to appeal to well-intentioned people’s emotions for decades in a crude attempt to gain votes without caring the least about human welfare. Politicians do not work for the common good, but laugh at it, issuing freedom-squashing mandates. We cannot tell how a government is from its words, but from its deeds. And when a state fails to eliminate the minimum wage, its desires are clear: it wants to destroy the economically “weak” to ruin the future of the entire community.