Watch IL State Sen. Don Harmon Make a Fool Himself on Minimum Wage – WP Original

By: Mark Glennon*

 

In an Illinois Senate committee hearing yesterday on raising the minimum wage, a witness tried to describe research indicating that, while relatively skilled, secure workers benefit from a higher wage, the unskilled, most vulnerable often lose their jobs entirely. What the witness tried to describe is actually a lengthy compilation of all major research on the minimum wage — dozens of studies done here and around the world, which are not consistent on all points.

 

The compilation is in a 155 page report completed by the National Bureau of Economic Research (the NBER). As you probably know if you follow big economic issues, and as you would hope is known by your representatives who vote on them, NBER is among the most respected, non-partisan groups of economists around. Its researchers have included 13 past chairman of the President’s Council of Economic Advisers and 24 Nobel Prize Winners in Economics. They have included Democrats and liberals like Paul Krugman, Austan Goolsby, Joseph Stiglitz and plenty of others.

 

The NBIR paper says, “the studies that focus on the least-skilled groups provide relatively overwhelming evidence of stronger disemployment effects for these groups.”

 

But what happens when you try to tell that to a champion of the underprivileged intent on capitalizing on the popularity of raising the minimum wage?  Arrogance, rudeness and willful ignorance.

 

Listen to Senator Don Harmon (D-Oak Park) and judge for yourself. That’s his voice you here through most of the video. The initial question is from a different senator, Terry Link (D-Waukegan) but the rest is Harmon.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_detailpage&v=L2j-r0WybvI#t=13

 

Nope, never heard of NBER. But what’s astonishing is Harmon’s claim, made twice, that he’s never seen “any credible economic research that a modest increase in the minimum wage does anything other than help spur economic growth and help the economy.” Really? Haven’t spent even 30 seconds on Google, which would turn up that research? Never took Econ 101?  Senator Harmon in fact has an MBA from the University of Chicago, so let’s just say there’s an issue of, um, honesty in his claim.

 

This isn’t about whether the minimum wage should be raised. Reasonable people differ about that, as do economists (though the NBIR says “among the papers we view as providing the most credible evidence, almost all point to negative employment effects”).

 

Instead, this is about willful indifference to genuine questions raised by evidence.

 

Personally, I have always thought the minimum wage is pretty much a wash, looking at it just from the standpoint of the poor — better wages for some but zero wages for others — so I’ve never had a strong opinion about it.

 

But I do have a strong opinion about this: Senator Harmon and plenty of others on the minimum wage bandwagon don’t give a darn about the evidence.

 

*Mark Glennon is founder of WirePoints

 

 

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Jim Palermo
9 years ago

I know the National Bureau of Economic Research to be a highly credible research organization of the country’s foremost economists which produces well researched, peer reviewed economic studies, but I’ll let you readers see a description of NBER and make up their own minds…

http://www.investopedia.com/terms/n/nber.asp

Mike
9 years ago

In 2014 the Friends of Don Harmon PAC (ISBE committee ID 16283) received contributions from various PACs associated with IBEW, AFT, AFSCME, & NEA. So you can get an idea how special interest groups funnel money both to PACs that support the advisory question, and to candidates that support the advisory question. IBEW Local 364 PAC – $500 – $3/10/2014. IBEW Local 701 PAC – $1,000 – 2/9/2014. IBEW PAC Voluntary Fund – $300 – 9/29/2014. Local 134 PAC-International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers – $500 – 3/3/2014. Chicago & Cook County Building and Construction Trades Council – $1,000 – 3/3/2014.… Read more »

Mike
9 years ago

Ballotpedia has an entry about the minimum wage increase advisory question on the Illinois November 2014 ballot. They found $2,675,928 campaign cash in support of the measure, split amongst two PACs, and no cash in opposition. Committee to Raise Illinois’s Minimum Wage: $962,228. Committee to Reduce Income Inequality & to Support Human Right: $1,713,700. Top contributors: IBEW PAC Educational Fund: $450,000 AFT: $425,000 AFSCME: $400,000 NEA: $250,000 http://ballotpedia.org/Illinois_Minimum_Wage_Increase_Question_%282014%29 The contributors are all labor unions. IBEW is the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers. AFT is the American Federation of Teachers. AFSCME is the American Federation of State County & Municipal Employees.… Read more »

Mike
9 years ago

The Senator in the video does not look like Don Harmon.
Maybe Terry Link?

Mark Glennon
9 years ago
Reply to  Mike

The voice is Don Harmon’s. Only the initial part was a different senator and, yes, that’s Terry Link. I clarified it all above. Thanks.

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