City Council: I understand that you are discussing raising the minimum wage in Menlo Park to $15 an hour. As has been shown time and time again across our country, when the minimum wage is raised, it usually results in either fewer people being employed, people working fewer hours, and/or businesses closing (or a combination of the above). It is basic economics. The best minimum wage is actually zero dollars. Based on the skills and experience level a job requires, in a relatively free market, the labor can be had to fill the job at an appropriate pay level. Pay too little and no one will apply. Pay too much and you may attract overqualified people, but you won’t be able to compete due to your bloated payroll costs. If you set a minimum wage, please give me a rational argument as to why it should be $15, and not $17.50 or $20 or even $50 an hour. Surely Menlo Park is expensive and $50 an hour would go a long way to allowing more people to afford it here. But when you start to think about it, there can be no logic to setting a minimum wage. Let the market do it for you. Best regards Lane Nonnenberg Sent from my iPhone Received on Thu Aug 22 2019 - 14:45:29 PDT
