1520-6688/asset/cover.gif?v=1&s=34a5683810bf955fca6de38ef989911f3cb4c4c5 "Journal of Policy Analysis and Management")
Richard V. Burkhauser is Professor of Economics and Senior Fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Studies, Vanderbilt University.
1520-6688/asset/PAM_centre.gif?v=1&s=96edd5541b4bd8c8e91f8cf53388d6c4a41cd95d)
Targeting Efficiency
The minimum wage and the poor: The end of a relationship
Article first published online: 1 FEB 2007
DOI: 10.2307/3324424
Copyright © 1989 Association for Public Policy Analysis and Management
Additional Information
How to Cite
Burkhauser, R. V. and Finegan, T. A. (1989), The minimum wage and the poor: The end of a relationship. J. Pol. Anal. Manage., 8: 53–71. doi: 10.2307/3324424
- †
Richard V. Burkhauser is Professor of Economics and Senior Fellow at the Institute for Public Policy Studies, Vanderbilt University.
- ‡
T. Aldrich Finegan is Professor of Economics, Vanderbilt University.
Publication History
- Issue published online: 1 FEB 2007
- Article first published online: 1 FEB 2007
- Abstract
- Cited By
Abstract
The belief that minimum-wage legislation helps the working poor is one reason for its continued popular support. The authors track the household incomes of low-wage workers and find that a radical transformation has occurred in the half century since the passage of the original minimum-wage law. Today most low-wage workers live in households well above the poverty line. Hence, those living in poverty will get only about 11 percent of the gains from the higher minimum-wage increase proposed in the Kennedy-Hawkins Bill. Low-wage workers in families with incomes three or more times the poverty line will get nearly 40 percent. Thus it is not clear that increases in the minimum wage make good policy even if no jobs are lost as a result.