Optimal minimum wage in a competitive economy

Arantza Gorostiaga and Juan F Rubio-Ramirez

No 2004-30, FRB Atlanta Working Paper from Federal Reserve Bank of Atlanta

Abstract: This paper studies the use of a minimum wage law to implement the optimal redistribution policy when a distorting tax-transfer scheme is also available. The authors build a static general equilibrium model with a Ramsey planner making decisions on taxes, transfers, and minimum wage levels. Workers are assumed to differ only in their productivity. The authors find that optimal redistribution may imply the use of only taxes and transfers, only a minimum wage, or the proper combination of both policies. The key factor driving their results is the reaction of the demand for low-skilled labor to the minimum wage law. Hence, an optimal minimum wage appears to be most likely when low-skilled households are scarce, the complementarity between the two types of workers is large, or the difference in productivity is small.

Date: 2004
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-lab and nep-pbe
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