[quote=EconProf]
UR, you are citing busy fast food places in Hillcrest, but the range of minimum wage workers in America covers a wide swath of industries–agriculture, leisure, lodging, mom and pop stores, etc. The jobs are entry level, and almost no one stays at minimum wage for long. Also, almost never is the minimum wage earner the only income source for the household. The handicapped and the risky hire, especially minority youths and high school dropouts get these jobs at the bottom of the income ladder in order to prove themselves and move up from there. I’d rather not cut off the bottom rung of the income ladder for these people.[/quote]

2 problems with your position:

1: We are not talking about a global increase.
I will not assert that raising wages in Mississippi is important. This conversation is exclusively about the city of SD.

2: The assertion that this removes the lower rung of income is faulty. That minimum has been reduced dramatically in the last few years just from inflation. And not even high or galloping inflation.
By your logic a nonexistent min wage would be preferable for lower-skilled workers.
One has only to look at the fact that virtually every developed economy has adopted min wages to determine the overall benefit (or lack thereof) of this faulty thinking.

Bonus point:
I was not making the assertion earlier that economists are a diverse and non-homogeneous group. That reality is so obvious as to be absurd.