Do Minimum Wages Reduce Employment? A Case Study of California, 1987–89

David Card

ILR Review, 1992, vol. 46, issue 1, 38-54

Abstract: In July 1988, California's minimum wage rose from $3.35 to $4.25. During the previous year, 11% of workers in the state and 50% of California teenagers had earned less than the new state minimum. Using published data and samples from the Current Population Survey, the author compares changes in the labor market outcomes of California workers to the corresponding changes in a group of states with no increase in the minimum wage. The minimum wage increase raised the earnings of low-wage workers by 5–10%. Contrary to conventional predictions, however, there was no decline in teenage employment, or any relative loss of jobs in retail trade.

Date: 1992
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (183)

Downloads: (external link)
http://ilr.sagepub.com/content/46/1/38.abstract (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:ilrrev:v:46:y:1992:i:1:p:38-54

Access Statistics for this article

More articles in ILR Review from Cornell University, ILR School
Bibliographic data for series maintained by SAGE Publications ().