The Show-Me Institute’s latest essay explores the possible impact of increasing Missouri’s minimum wage from the current $7.85 per hour to $12 per hour by 2023. Authors William Even and David Macpherson project that only about 19 percent of workers who would be affected by the increase are in families with incomes below the poverty line, and only about 10 percent are single parents.
The authors also project that 11,000 jobs would be lost as a consequence of the increased price of labor. The essay includes demographic breakdowns (by age, sex, race, and education/income levels) of those whose wages would go up and those who would lose their jobs.
