Being Classically Liberal

John Green is a hero on the left. They love him because he is seen as a smart person who uses facts to back up his points and disprove conservative ideas. In his latest video, Green talks about how it is a myth that minimum wage increases, increase unemployment and how increasing the minimum wage will reduce poverty.

First of all, the first study which he cited, which claims raising the minimum wage has no disemployment effects, (by Card and Krueger) has been debunked by several different people several different times. When other researchers re-evaluated the study, they found that data collected using those records “lead to the opposite conclusion from that reached by” Card and Krueger. [1] Next, the study he cites which says that the minimum wage reduces poverty actually examines how the Earned income tax credit and a minimum wage increase effect the poverty rate of women with children (when utilized together). The authors of this study also say that such policies raise certain types of people out of poverty (women with children) while pushing others (individuals without children) into poverty. The study actually says, "our results also indicate that interactions between the EITC and minimum wages lead to adverse effects on the employment and earnings of less skilled individuals without children...which suggests that the benefits afforded to single women come at a cost" [2]

It's also worth noting that since 1995, 8 studies have set out to examine the effects of the minimum wage on poverty and 7 of them found it did not reduce poverty. [3] The only one that did find a reduction of poverty was authored by Card and Krueger, the same guys who said raising the minimum wage would increase employment (and whose studies have been debunked by other researchers as previously noted). Of course, John Green ignores this fact because it doesn’t confirm his worldview. Also, Green’s claims that raising the minimum wage won’t cost jobs are utter nonsense. A recent meta-analysis of minimum wage research since the 90's found that minimum wages increases absolutely destroy jobs. The authors actually concluded that 85% of the most credible studies on the minimum wage find negative employment affects [4]. It seems as though John Green is just an apologist for the left and isn't actually interested in the implications of his policy prescriptions. 

Citations:

[1] http://www.nber.org/papers/w5224

[2] http://www.socsci.uci.edu/~dneumark/MW%20EITC%20ILRR.pdf

[3] http://www.people.vcu.edu/~lrazzolini/GR2010.pdf

[4] http://www.socsci.uci.edu/~dneumark/min_wage_review.pdf

Original video here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZI9aDHLptMk