> Simply comparing each month’s job growth with the same month the previous year, which avoids the problem of picking a start date, reveals that California’s fast-food sector gained jobs in all but one month since September 2023.
As for who the losers are, the data is quite clear: Mostly corporate profits. The rational response of a corporation when faced with a law that reduces its profits is to lobby against the law and invest in propaganda that disparages the law.
> That doesn’t mean raising the minimum wage had no negative consequences. Reich and his co-author, Denis Sosinsky, found that the higher minimum wage caused menu prices in California fast-food chains to rise by about 3.7 percent. That number is far lower than the “$20 Big Macs” that critics of the law warned of, but it’s still significant at a time when many consumers are deeply upset over the post-pandemic spike in food prices. Even so, Reich points out that this number pales in comparison with the 18 percent raise that the average fast-food worker received because of the new law. (The authors calculated that about 62 percent of the wage increase was absorbed through higher prices, while the rest was likely absorbed by a mix of reduced turnover and, crucially, lower profits for franchisees—hence the massive industry resistance.)
Finally, why a shell game? There is nothing hidden here, there is no con. No money is secretly moved around. Workers have more money. Owners and consumers less (the latter very slightly so).