The Economic Impact of a High National Minimum Wage: Evidence from the 1966 Fair Labor Standards Act

Martha Bailey, John DiNardo and Bryan Stuart

No 26926, NBER Working Papers from National Bureau of Economic Research, Inc

Abstract: This paper examines the short and longer-term economic effects of the 1966 Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) which increased the national minimum wage to its highest level of the 20th Century and extended coverage to an additional 9.1 million workers. Exploiting differences in the “bite” of the minimum wage due to regional variation in the standard of living and industry composition, this paper finds that the 1966 FLSA increased wages dramatically but reduced aggregate employment only modestly. However, the disemployment effects were significantly larger among African-American men, forty percent of whom earned below the new minimum wage in 1966.

JEL-codes: J23 J38 J88 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2020-04
New Economics Papers: this item is included in nep-his and nep-lma
Note: DAE LS
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Citations: View citations in EconPapers (4)

Published as Martha J. Bailey & John DiNardo & Bryan A. Stuart, 2021. "The Economic Impact of a High National Minimum Wage: Evidence from the 1966 Fair Labor Standards Act," Journal of Labor Economics, vol 39(S2), pages S329-S367.

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Journal Article: The Economic Impact of a High National Minimum Wage: Evidence from the 1966 Fair Labor Standards Act (2021)
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