Futurism:
Study Shows That Minimum Wage Hikes Put More Jobs at Risk of Automation
15 August 2017
The desire for a higher wage is pretty self explanatory. However, the impact a minimum wage increase could have on society is not so clear.
In an effort to shed light on this subject, researchers at the National Bureau of Economic Research (NBER) conducted a study, and they’ve concluded that a minimum wage hike might not necessarily lead to happier workers. In fact, it could lead to fewer workers as such an increase has historically resulted in the loss of more jobs to automation.
For this study, authors Grace Lordan of the London School of Economics and David Neumark of the University of California, Irvine looked at minimum wage changes in the United States from 1980 to 2015. They realized that these changes affected the number of so-called “low-skill” or minimum wage jobs — such as packing boxes or using sewing machines — in various industries in the country.
Related publications
People Versus Machines: The Impact of Minimum Wages on Automatable Jobs
Published August 2017
Available on the NBER website