Mailbag: Minimum-wage hike would aid struggling families, economy

Assemblyman Matthew Harper’s recent commentary on raising the minimum wage (“Wage proposal would hurt economy,” July 23) is wrongheaded and misinformed.

Unfortunately, Harper’s argument rests on anecdote (“I worked for minimum wage when I was a teenager”) and ideological commitment rather than the facts.

Here are the facts according to current economic and social research: The typical minimum-wage worker today is not a young teenager. The average minimum-wage worker is over 20 years old (88% nationwide) and many support a family with their earnings, according to a 2014 article in the New York Times. More than half are women.

Raising the wages of these people would raise family incomes and reduce worker turnover. This would result in more money in the pockets of working people, which would translate into more consumer spending. This, in turn, would boost economic growth.

This is why most small-business owners (perhaps not most large corporations or conservative politicos, however) support a higher minimum wage. In addition, research has shown that increasing the minimum wage has no effect on employment rates and the number of jobs available in a community.

If it is true, as Harper suggests, that fewer teenagers work now than they did several decades ago, this probably is because the recent economic recession coupled with rising rates of economic inequality have produced a situation in which most minimum-wage jobs are occupied by more mature workers striving to support themselves and their families. These hardworking people deserve a living wage just as much as Harper does.

While it may be correct to suggest that a higher minimum wage could push up wages for other workers, this would be is a good thing. There is no evidence that this kind of wage movement would lead to higher rates of unemployment. Instead, the evidence is that higher wages for the working and middle classes truly grow an economy.

If the assemblyman wants to “work on growing our economy so that all of California benefits,” he should take off his ideological blinders, read the evidence and support Senate Bill 3.

Thomas Meisenhelder

Huntington Beach

*

Use Oak View School for district office

Re: “City’s symbols of lost opportunity” (July 23):

This column was right on. Oak View Elementary School should be closed and used as a resource center for the neighborhood and the relocation of the Ocean View district office.

The students are at a disadvantage in many ways — isolation from the rest of Huntington Beach, along with an unfair transfer to middle schools. When they leave Oak View after completion of fifth grade, they are separated into four different middle schools. Then after completion of the eighth grade, they are reunited at Ocean View High School.

This does not happen at any of the other schools. During the most critical developmental years, the students are not together. This makes no sense at all.

Ocean View School District is in the process of selling school sites to ease its financial crisis. The district office could be relocated to the Oak View site.

This is a very practical idea, since most administrative work is done inside, thereby eliminating the playground issues caused by the nearby Rainbow Environmental Services. On a practical level, district officials would learn how the students and the families they serve live and cope.

Carol Kanode

Huntington Beach

*Plastic bags pile up, marring the city

Tourists, welcome to beautiful Huntington Beach! But please try to avoid looking at the eyesore of wind-blown plastic bags jumbled in the weeds along Pacific Coast Highway from Brookhurst Street to Beach Boulevard.

This is thanks to our forward-looking City Council, which saw it as our right to be handed plastic bags wherever we shop. Albertsons! CVS! Walmart! They are all festering there, folks. This is not a non-problem of an errant bag, as letter writers have said, but full-scale ugly.

Linda Kline

Huntington Beach