So these threads usually have a kind of friedman-esque approach to this question: Minimum wage laws stop people earning at all if they're worth less than the minimum wage.

Maybe this is true for many small businesses, but what proportion of low wage employees in America are working for companies with whom their employees at such pay have basically no negotiating power?

It's all well and good making these often glib approaches to policy, but if we know anything about economics it's that prose does not beat evidence when it comes to seeing what actually works.

No no no, you see it's merely a winner take all where there are far fewer buyers willing to buy from the lower earning producers. Those who can't produce enough can engage in hunger games for a coveted minimum wage paying position, and the rest can work as 1099s and be 'liberated self-employed business owners' minus a hefty 15% cut from uberslave.com

Maybe we should make it work other direction. You can't pay less than 90% of value worker produces.