Wednesday, January 15, 2014

List of "Economists" Who Are Calling for an Increase in the Minimum Wage

Below is an absurd letter sent to government leaders, it calls for an increase in the minimum wage and claims that "the weight of evidence now show[s] that increases in the minimum wage have had little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers, even during times of weakness in the labor market" .

Following the letter are the names of the economists who signed it. I have highlighted those that I know are clearly political and regular apologists for the state. There are sure to be others in this group.

Dear Mr. President, Speaker Boehner, Majority Leader Reid, Congressman Cantor, Senator McConnell, and Congresswoman Pelosi:

July will mark five years since the federal minimum wage was last raised. We urge you to act now and enact a three-step raise of 95 cents a year for three years—which would mean a minimum wage of $10.10 by 2016—and then index it to protect against inflation. Senator Tom Harkin and Representative George Miller have introduced legislation to accomplish this. The increase to $10.10 would mean that minimum-wage workers who work full time, full year would see a raise from their current salary of roughly $15,000 to roughly $21,000. These proposals also usefully raise the tipped minimum wage to 70% of the regular minimum.
This policy would directly provide higher wages for close to 17 million workers by 2016. Furthermore, another 11 million workers whose wages are just above the new minimum would likely see a wage increase through “spillover” effects, as employers adjust their internal wage ladders. The vast majority of employees who would benefit are adults in working families, disproportionately women, who work at least 20 hours a week and depend on these earnings to make ends meet. At a time when persistent high unemployment is putting enormous downward pressure on wages, such a minimum-wage increase would provide a much-needed boost to the earnings of low-wage workers.
In recent years there have been important developments in the academic literature on the effect of increases in the minimum wage on employment, with the weight of evidence now showing that increases in the minimum wage have had little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers, even during times of weakness in the labor market. Research suggests that a minimum-wage increase could have a small stimulative effect on the economy as low-wage workers spend their additional earnings, raising demand and job growth, and providing some help on the jobs front.
Sincerely,
Henry Aaron, Brookings Institution
Katharine Abraham, University of Maryland
Daron Acemoglu, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Sylvia Allegretto, University of California, Berkeley
Eileen Appelbaum, Center for Economic and Policy Research
Kenneth Arrow, Stanford University*+
David Autor, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Dean Baker, Center for Economic and Policy Research
William Baumol, New York University+
Jared Bernstein, Center on Budget and Policy Priorities
Josh Bivens, Economic Policy Institute
David Blanchflower, Dartmouth College
Alan Blinder, Princeton University
Heather Boushey, Washington Center for Equitable Growth
Clair Brown, University of California, Berkeley
Gary Burtless, Brookings Institution
David Cutler, Harvard University
Sheldon Danziger, Russell Sage Foundation
Angus Deaton, Princeton University+
Gregory DeFreitas, Hofstra University
Peter Diamond, Massachusetts Institute of Technology*+
Avinash Dixit, Princeton University+
Arindrajit Dube, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Ronald Ehrenberg, Cornell University
Henry Farber, Princeton University
Nancy Folbre, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Robert Frank, Cornell University
Richard Freeman, Harvard University
Claudia Goldin, Harvard University+
Robert Gordon, Northwestern University
Darrick Hamilton, The New School
Heidi Hartmann, Institute for Women’s Policy Research
Raúl Hinojosa-Ojeda, University of California, Los Angeles
Harry Holzer, Georgetown University
Marc Jarsulic, Center for American Progress
Lawrence Katz, Harvard University
Melissa Kearney, University of Maryland
Adriana Kugler, Georgetown University
Mark Levinson, SEIU
Frank Levy, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Lisa Lynch, Brandeis University
Julianne Malveaux, Past President, Bennett College
Ray Marshall, University of Texas, Austin
Alexandre Mas, Princeton University
Eric Maskin, Harvard University*
Patrick Mason, Florida State University
Lawrence Mishel, Economic Policy Institute
Alicia Munnell, Boston College
Samuel Myers, University of Minnesota
Manuel Pastor, University of Southern California
Robert Pollin, University of Massachusetts, Amherst
Michael Reich, University of California, Berkeley
Robert Reich, University of California, Berkeley
William Rodgers, Rutgers University
Dani Rodrik, Institute for Advanced Study
Jesse Rothstein, University of California, Berkeley
Cecilia Rouse, Princeton University
Jeffrey Sachs, Columbia University
Emmanuel Saez, University of California, Berkeley
Isabel Sawhill, Brookings Institution
Thomas Schelling, University of Maryland*+
John Schmitt, Center for Economic and Policy Research
Robert Shapiro, Georgetown University
Heidi Shierholz, Economic Policy Institute
Dan Sichel, Wellesley College
Timothy Smeeding, University of Wisconsin, Madison
Robert Solow, Massachusetts Institute of Technology*+
A. Michael Spence, New York University*
William Spriggs, AFL-CIO
Joseph Stiglitz, Columbia University*
Lawrence Summers, Harvard University
Peter Temin, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Mark Thoma, University of Oregon
Laura Tyson, University of California, Berkeley
Paula Voos, Rutgers University
* Nobel laureate
+ Has served as American Economic Association president

10 comments:

  1. Maybe these intellectual cartel bosses can start with their own places.
    How many of them are slave-driving their TA's and research assistants so they work at far far less than minimum wage.
    Why don't they cut back on their conference junkets, do more teaching and less glamorous wonking so their "slave-wage" assistants can live too?
    And while we're talking about utter double standards, here's how the US State Dept, now on a global campaign to raise wages for domestic workers globally (but only domestic workers, no one else)
    here's what THEY pay their local employees:

    http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/05/13/state.employees.pay/index.html?iref=werecommend

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Lila, this is relevant: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8pFC3LKMIQo

      Delete
  2. Some at U.S. diplomatic posts earn less than $1 a day

    WASHINGTON (CNN) -- A new State Department report says some local employees hired by U.S. embassies and other posts around the world are so poorly paid they have to cut back to one meal a day or send their children to peddle on the streets.

    The State Department has established a "working group" to better assess pay situations for locally employed staff.

    The report from the department's Office of the Inspector General looked at how the U.S. pays more than 51,000 local, non-American employees in about 170 missions. In addition to the hardship caused to the workers because of inadequate pay, the report found that the U.S. is losing staff to other higher-paying employers and may not be able to fill vacancies with qualified people.

    While the report did not name missions where such situations occur or provide numbers of low-paid employees, it blamed an overwhelmed, inadequately staffed employment office in Washington for the inability to make appropriate changes to pay levels and to keep up with events overseas, such as inflation that quickly erodes buying-power.

    The report says the hardest-hit local employees are those at the lowest levels, and quotes some employees as saying they make less than $1 a day.

    Some U.S. missions are in impoverished parts of the world where low salaries are common, and there is a wide range in pay depending on what jobs are performed and where. But the report sets out a stark picture of the richest country in the world paying some of the lowest salaries.

    "Twenty-seven missions presented compelling arguments that their lower-grade employees fall short of minimal living standards," the report said.

    ReplyDelete
  3. Populism has even reached into the field of economics apparently. The laws of supply and demand apply...I guess sometimes and not others. LMAO

    ReplyDelete
  4. Have any of these geniuses ever had a real job?

    ReplyDelete
  5. What the about the right to choose? The right of the employer and employed to agree on the amount of the wage.

    ReplyDelete
  6. Analyst shunned after knocking Apple, Amazon for ethics
    Opinion: Do great products and great returns make up for immoral behavior?


    It’s never a good idea to go on CNBC and point out even just a few tiny flaws in our wonderful capitalist system.

    Equity research analyst Ronnie Moas tried this last week, and here’s happened: The show’s host insinuated he was having a nervous breakdown; He received anonymous death threats; He lost tens of thousands of dollars in business as some clients became outraged and dropped his service; He got pasted with labels and trash-talked in the media. Watch the interview.

    “His research report is a lot of baloney — and could be financially dangerous to investors,” a Jan. 12 story in the New York Post opined.

    The words of Moas, founder of Miami-based Standpoint Research, were never called “financially dangerous” before. His research boasts top rankings from briefing.com, Yahoo Finance and Motley Fool. He says his time-stamped stock recommendations have bested the Standard & Poor’s 500 more than 69% of the time since 2008. He sells his research mostly to hedge funds and institutional investors who profit from the advice.

    “I am not a communist, socialist or anti-conservative,” Moas said in a telephone interview.

    Moas merely noted: Phillip Morris sells a product that kills people; Apple pays contract workers in China so little they have been committing suicide; Amazon’s founder Jeff Bezos sits on a $27 billion fortune while his warehouse workers suffer low pay and unfair working conditions.

    http://www.marketwatch.com/story/analyst-shunned-after-knocking-apple-amazon-for-ethics-2014-01-15?

    ReplyDelete
  7. "In recent years there have been important developments in the academic literature on the effect of increases in the minimum wage on employment, with the weight of evidence now showing that increases in the minimum wage have had little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers, even during times of weakness in the labor market. Research suggests that a minimum-wage increase could have a small stimulative effect on the economy as low-wage workers spend their additional earnings, raising demand and job growth, and providing some help on the jobs front."

    Hey, idiot Professors and Nobel laureates, has there been any research on how extending unemployment benefits increases long term employment? You need to write another letter ASAP if you want to retain any credibility/relevance whatsoever. Calling Princeton! Harvard! Cornell! MIT!

    ReplyDelete
  8. Wow, maybe I should make a career change and become an economist since I understand basic economics better than the folks on this list. You would think they've at least read Economics in One Lesson by Hazlitt but maybe not. Maybe some just skimmed the text. They probably couldn't get through the first chapter of Human Action or Man, Economy, and State.

    ReplyDelete
  9. Microcephaly appears to have become the primary requirement for a Nobel Prize, tenured position at a univesity, or senior government position.

    [Overeducated clueless people...]

    ReplyDelete