Mr. Appelbaum Misses the Forest

The underlying concept is, however, simple. If you increase the cost of any activity, people will reduce the quantity of that activity that they perform. The cost of labor has increased (see “disparate impact analysis” from the Labor Department). Regulations have multiplied. And the economy stagnates. The only people surprised by this are those who willfully ignore the facts. Continue Reading →

The Minimum Wage Yet Again

David Neumark, J.M. Ian Salas, and William Wascher (NSW) used the same data that both ADR and DLR used. Their paper “Revisiting the Minimum Wage − Employment Debate: Throwing Out the Baby With the Bathwater?” (January, 2013. National Bureau of Economic Research Working Paper 18681). In fact, the title is too kind. ADR and DLR have apparently thrown out the baby and kept (and published) the bathwater. Continue Reading →

The Times Has Discovered That Costs Matter in Obamacare

“The Chapmans acknowledge that they are better off than many people, but they represent a little-understood reality of the Affordable Care Act.” … Perhaps this was “little-understood” by the geniuses who run the New York Times. But many economists, including me, pointed out that costs and prices would inevitably rise given the mandates and rules included in Obamacare. Continue Reading →