Here is a posting that is fairly recent, and topical: it deals with the link made in the Congress between the minimum wage and the "Death tax". Seems someone noticed Sauer Krauthammer (SK) distorting "the facts" , on the fabulous Fox no less, to suit the party-line.
SK is wrong on both issues -
1 ) raising the minimum wage does not materially damage small businesses or employment levels of minimum wage earners (or others earning more, for that matter)
2 ) repealing the current estate tax does not amount to a protection of small businesses and /or farms.
"a July 2005 Congressional Budget Office report found that based on an analysis of 1999 and 2000 estate-tax returns, only 135 family-owned businesses would have owed any estate tax at the current exemption level of $2 million. By contrast, about 4.5 million active businesses with assets under $5 million filed income-tax returns in 2002, according to the IRS."
That is way less than 1%. (If you do the math, lets say there are 4 million small businesses, 135 is 0.003375 %.
As for the minimum wage, Sante Fe, NM, has seen mostly positive effects from its minimum wage increase, and in New Jersey, increasing the minimum wage did not decrease jobs at all. As quoted in the above posting, increasing the minimum wage also increases payroll and revenue taxes: "Think Progress also noted that a report from the Wisconsin Department of Workforce Development found that the state's 2005 minimum-wage increase "produced $175 million in additional payroll and a $3 million boost in state tax revenue."
To cap this off, consider this - the Federal minimum wage has not been increased for a good while, but Congress has voted itself numerous pay increases. Isn't there something wrong with this?
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(For part 1 of this new series, visit "Sour on Krauthammer".
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