While I appreciate the efforts of Vermont Democrats to drive more job creators and commerce into New Hampshire, I must take issue with blatant economic stupidity when I see it. Pseudo-Republican Gov. Scott has vetoed their minimum wage bill. The Democrat’s response is, well, stupid.
Related: Five ways a $15 minimum wage is bad for N.H.
It is best described as dishonest class warfare virtue-signaling absent even the most basic understanding of economics and running a business.
In his veto letter, Scott said fiscal analysis projected job losses, a decrease in employee hours, and increased cost for goods and services if S.23 was enacted. …
Senate President Pro Tem Tim Ashe (D/P-Chittenden) has taken issue with Scott’s analysis, and said it signals the “Governor’s use of the word ‘affordable’ has no meaning.”
“The idea that $120 million in wages for these 40,000 people over the next two years would not be in their best interest, which the Governor actually claimed in his letter, it’s almost impossible to understand how someone could reach that calculus,” Ashe said.
I’d like to thank Senate President Pro Tem Tim Ashe for the number because if you have half a brain you’ve already figured it out. If you are a Democrat, I’ll try to explain.
If you make something cost 120 million dollars more tomorrow than it cost today, that money will come from..?
- Money Tree.
- Economy Wrecking Virtue-Signaling Democrats.
- Fewer jobs, fewer hours, and higher prices for all goods and services.
If you said three, you are correct. And we aren’t just being partisan rubes. The data is solid on this and we have a lot of real-world evidence. If you use government force, or any force, to drive up the cost of doing business, the business has to find a way to cover the expense. Including the current minimum wage effects that arbitrarily make something more expensive (thanks to busybody do-gooders who are playing with other peoples’ money).
Seattle, New York City, Portland, name a state or liberal run (into the ground) city that has done this, and the same three things happen every damn time.
- Employees get fewer hours and often less total take-home pay.
- Prices go up (which erases any benefit from the wage increase).
- Businesses close (creating unemployment).
And the people hurt most are (of course) the people the Left is claiming they will help. Low skilled or unskilled workers, single moms, teenagers, and more often than not minorities (including refugees and recent immigrants – legal or otherwise).
When the market is free to tie the value of the work to the skillset of the worker ( a wage), businesses create opportunities and train up new hires. As employees increase their real value, they can earn higher wages or take those skills to new jobs with higher starting pay or better benefits.
Valuable work creates the reward, rather than the Democrat’s method of trying to randomly award (or reward) workers absent actual work or value.
Vermont, which is both physically and ideologically to the left of New Hampshire is swirling the drain. And while Gov. Scott is no conservative, even he can see that an arbitrary minimum wage hike will push jobs and business across the river into New Hampshire. All for, most likely a left-wing sop to union bosses who can increase union dues when wages are forced up by the law.
I’d be more than happy to watch that happen from here but in the interests of the livelihood of Vermonters who don’t want or can’t move, my suggestion is this. Support your Governor’s veto. The State House looks like you last hope. And then as soon as the next election comes around (and every election after that), make a point to ending Democrat majorities in your elected bodies.
It’ll take a few years, but you’ll thank me. If you don’t, we’ll happily take your job creators over here in the Granite State.
