Hi $20 Minimum Wage, Bye Teen Jobs

Letter to Ephesians: Yet another delusional progressive myth bites the dust as the “share of teens who are working is the lowest since August 2020” thanks in no small part to the blue states mandating a higher minimum wage that’s as much as $20 per hr.

The WSJ’s editorial board didn’t pull any punches in analyzing the latest government employment stats: “Teen jobless rates are higher in states with higher minimum wages ... Artificial intelligence [& a soft economy] is/are reducing jobs for young people, or so we keep hearing. But what about the increasing number of teenagers who are priced out of jobs by government? This is something you won’t hear politicians talk about this Labor Day, but we thought readers might like to know.”

The devil is in the details, the editors advise. While overall, US unemployment remains low, they noted, if you “drill down into the DOL jobs data ... you’ll see that unemployment among 16 to 19 years old has shot up to

15.2% in July from 11.8% in January,” the lowest in 5 years. One state stats with the nation’s highest teen unemployment, California, also has one of the highest minimum wages at $16.50 per hour, while its Democrats set a $20 per hour minimum in 2023 for fast-food restaurants chains. As a result, teen unemployment there averaged 21.2% or TWICE the national average. Now, either California teens are unique in just dreamin’ their lives away or those minimum wage jobs have become too expensive for too many employers to stomach.

Davd Soul