Free Republic

So much for changing the narrative in 2014 from the ObamaCare debacle. Democrats, led by Barack Obama, planned to go on offense over the minimum-wage rate to cast the GOP as heartless. But in his rush to the barricades, Harry Reid belatedly discovered that his caucus didn’t like the fight nearly as much as he and Obama did (via Instapundit): Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid on Tuesday delayed action on legislation raising the minimum wage, the centerpiece of the Democrats’ 2014 agenda.The Nevada Democrat made the surprising move amid escalating Democratic resistance in the wake of a Congressional Budget Office...

A war of words between the governors of Connecticut and Louisiana continued Tuesday, a day after a heated exchange in Washington over raising minimum wage. Governors Dannel Malloy and possible candidate for president Bobby Jindal were supposed to be attending a bipartisan meeting with President Barack Obama. However, Jindal, a Republican, gave his opinion of the meeting to reporters on the White House lawn. "This president and the White House seems to be waving the white flag of surrender," Jindal said. Malloy responded, "Until a few moments ago we were going down a pretty cooperative road," he said. "I don't...

MINGO JUNCTION, Ohio The roar is gone. Five years after Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel's once-thunderous mill went idle, the only sound here is that of the oldest parts of the plant being dismantled. The demolition began about a day or so before a red carpet rolled out at the White House for a state dinner featuring a dress worn by the first lady that cost more than the salary of a police officer in this town. The demolition still was going on last Wednesday, at the same time that Vice President Joe Biden boasted about the positive impact that the American Recovery...

The Obama Administration battled back against the Congressional Budget Office finding that boosting the minimum wage would cost the economy about 500,000 jobs. In a “tweet” sent out to his followers, the President wrote “The notion that raising the price of labor will cause employers to purchase less of it is an out-dated misconception. Our research shows it will create 140,000 jobs.” Jason Furman, Chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers explained that “the biggest disincentive for getting a job is low wages. Right now with the minimum wage at only $7.25 per hour it makes more sense for...

The nation’s governors emerged from a meeting with President Barack Obama Monday claiming harmony, only to immediately break into an on-camera partisan feud in front of the West Wing. Louisiana Republican Gov. Bobby Jindal lashed out first, saying if Obama were serious about growing the economy he would approve the Keystone XL pipeline project and take other executive actions. […] Jindal’s statements were the kind that Republicans often make on television appearances or at partisan events. But his colleagues had been instead expressing wide agreement and appreciation for the president’s time. Some of the governors began shaking their heads, and...

Remember: We actually pay people to report on stuff like this. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), while not exactly non-partisan, doesn’t always see eye to eye with either party in D.C. Yes, sometimes the effects of proposed Democrat economic policies are so obvious that even the CBO is forced to agree with Republicans. The CBO just reported that the Democrats plan to raise the minimum wage would cost between 500,00 to a million jobs. Initially. No. Duh. At least that many jobs; really, probably more. “The CBO analysts said their estimate of employment losses was approximate,” says Fox News. “They...

Yes, I suppose that might be true. Democrats certainly picked this not-ObamaCare battle strategically, seeing as majority of Americans do like at least the idea of a minimum-wage hike on the federal level. It’s really just so good of the Democrats to mercilessly exploit that economic populism with more intellectually bankrupt lies about the ostensible benefits of mandating employers to pay all of their workers a certain arbitrary wage — instead of doing the harder thing, like Republicans, and campaigning to make sure that Americans don’t get screwed in the process. Via RCP:(VIDEO-AT-LINK)They come walk in the door, we would...

If there's one thing that liberals are great at, it's not understanding the basic workings of an economy. They love to push fairy-tale dreams of everybody getting cauldrons of gold whilst doing no real work (but pursuing their dreams of being an interpretive dancer or a poet that only writes on aluminum scraps because of the message, man!) and the economy just hums along quite nicely. They ignore basic factors such as supply and demand and labor in favor of the hard science of "does it make me feel good." This leads us to President Obama pushing for increases to...

President Barack Obama says hardworking Americans deserve a vote in Congress on a minimum raise hike. […] Obama is praising retailer The Gap for deciding to pay its employees higher wages. He says the move will benefit about 65,000 workers and help the economy. …

A plan by President Obama and fellow Democrats to increase the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour would cost roughly 500,000 jobsbut increase wages for roughly 16.5 million Americans, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office said Tuesday. The report was immediately met with sharp Republican criticism for the wake hike plan. “While helping some, mandating higher wages has real costs, including fewer people working,” said a spokesman for House Speaker John Boehner, R-Ohio. “With unemployment Americans' top concern, our focus should be creating -- not destroying -- jobs for those who need them most.” ...Republicans argued the report puts authoritative weight...

Rare and happy is the occasion on which one struggles to distinguish between the editorial page of the New York Times and the editorial page of National Review, and yet January 14, 1987, provided such a moment. On that day, Avik Roy recalled this week, the Times’ editors not only declared their opposition to a “substantial” rise in the minimum wage, but went the whole hog, criticizing as “fundamentally flawed” the concept itself and, in policy terms at least, establishing themselves firmly on the side of the free marketeers. “The Right Minimum Wage”? the Grey Lady asked. “$0.00.” This,...

President Obama, despite analysis and facts to the contrary, stated this week that the Congressional Budget Office's analysis on raising the minimum wage is wrong. Instead, the President pushed his own narrative, seemingly making up numbers out of thin air. In their analysis, released this month, the CBO found that raising the minimum wage to President Obama's proposed $10.10 would have catastrophic effects on employment rates. Quoting directly from the source, the CBO stated: According to CBO’s central estimate, implementing the $10.10 option would reduce employment by roughly 500,000 workers in the second half of 2016, relative to what would...

Remember: We actually pay people to report on stuff like this. The Congressional Budget Office (CBO), while not exactly non-partisan, doesn’t always see eye to eye with either party in D.C. Yes, sometimes the effects of proposed Democrat economic policies are so obvious that even the CBO is forced to agree with Republicans. The CBO just reported that the Democrats plan to raise the minimum wage would cost between 500,00 to a million jobs. Initially. No. Duh. At least that many jobs; really, probably more. “The CBO analysts said their estimate of employment losses was approximate,” says Fox News. “They...

CBO report says $10 minimum wage would zap 500,000+ jobs... The guaranteed way of holding the poor, the minorities  and the disenfranchised out of the mainstream is  if you price their original services too high..." -Art Laffer Although Rep Duncan Hunter (R-Ca) attmepted to floor a bill a couple years back that would have forced the (now politicized) US Labor Department to publish real unemployment numbers -ones that actually reflect the all-time-record number of Americans who have given up/left the labor force- we still can't believe a word from this vile regime, and have to settle for outside estimates...

ANN ARBOR — The debate over increasing the minimum wage has made its way to Zingerman's, home of the $15 sandwich. Zingerman's, the gourmet deli, recently held a "Sandwich Summit" to promote the idea of making it illegal to hire someone below a set wage. The shop supports raising the minimum wage at either the state or federal level, which would make it illegal to hire a worker for less than $9.50 an hour or more. The market in Ann Arbor allows Zingerman's to charge $16.50 for a Reuben, $14.99 for a grilled chicken Caesar salad and $7.99 for a...

The White House lauded a Congressional Budget Office report on the proposed minimum wage hike to $10.10 per hour while brushing off one key finding: that such a bill could cost half a million jobs, and maybe more. “The new Congressional Budget Office (CBO) report finds that 16.5 million workers would get a raise from increasing the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour and this would help millions of hard-working families, reduce poverty, and increase the overall wages going to lower-income households,” Jason Furman, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers, and Betsey Stevenson, Council of Economic Advisers member, wrote...

I’m treating it as good news. At least 500,000 people won’t have to worry about “job-lock” now.There’s no problem here that indefinite unemployment benefits can’t solve, my friends. Once fully implemented in the second half of 2016, the $10.10 option would reduce total employment by about 500,000 workers, or 0.3 percent, CBO projects (see the table below). As with any such estimates, however, the actual losses could be smaller or larger; in CBO’s assessment, there is about a two-thirds chance that the effect would be in the range between a very slight reduction in employment and a reduction in employment...

President Obama’s big government philosophy has created an economic environment hostile to job growth and economic prosperity. He says he is committed to “shovel ready jobs,” yet onerous regulations from his agencies delay projects from moving forward and shackle businesses with costs that prevent them from expanding. His signature legislation—The Affordable Care Act—has led some employers to slash hours and freeze hiring, and may lead employees to voluntarily reduce their own hours or leave the workforce altogether. Now it appears that the President is doubling down. His newest plan to help Americans is to raise the minimum wage, a proposal...

Seattle, Wash. — At an organizing event and rally for a $15-per-hour minimum wage, Councilmember Kshama Sawant emphasized the movement should not accept any watered-down version of the wage increase “I’m throwing down the gauntlet,” Sawant said, declaring herself the first politician to support a true $15-per-hour rate. She and other rally speakers cautioned against politicians and businesses who say they support a minimun wage increase but want loopholes and exemptions.