Washington Minimum Wage Failure

In 1998, Washington voters approved Initiative 688, dramatically boosting the state minimum wage from $5.15 to $5.70 on Jan. 1, 1999, and to $6.50 on Jan. 1, 2000, and, for the first time in the U.S., indexing the minimum wage to inflation. Since that time, Washington's population and total job growth has outpaced the national average, while employment in the hospitality and food service industries has lagged the average. There is really only one possible explanation for this. The imposition of a minimum wage "tax" on employers forced them to hire fewer people. While this is not a surprising outcome to anyone remotely familiar with economics, it will probably be a surprise to those in government, who are not members of that group. In fact, the Seattle City Council has doubled down on that job-killing policy by imposing a $15 minimum wage.