Word: labors
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Dates: during 1990-1999
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Many economists worry about two pernicious effects of raising the minimum. The first concerns job loss. Standard theory holds that every hike in the wage triggers employee firings, with the least skilled axed first. That view has been challenged by several recent studies co-authored by Alan Krueger, the Labor Department's chief economist. A modest increase, says Krueger, would have ``negligible negative employment effects''--or, in plain English, next to no job losses. Negligible, though, is a term of art. Because wage- related costs like unemployment compensation and payroll taxes rise along with the basic wage, most experts...
...even if Krueger's right and no one's fired,'' says University of Texas economist Daniel Hamermesh, ``a raise will deter employers from hiring new workers. That's bad especially for young minorities--over 30% of whom are unemployed--because they're the people we want in the labor force, so they can begin learning basic job skills...
...other troubling question is, Who pays? ``Businesses don't simply absorb increased wage costs,'' says Rob Shapiro, whom Labor Secretary Robert Reich tried hard (and unsuccessfully) to enlist as a supporter of the raise because, as a top Clinton campaign adviser, it was Shapiro who once convinced Clinton that hiking the wage was counterproductive. ``They pass them on in the form of higher prices, which are regressive because they're borne equally by all. Thus the vast majority of the 39 million poor Americans who won't benefit from a raise will be worse off, while a very...
Israeli disenchantment is only half the problem. The peace process has been heading for the rocks over the steady expansion of Jewish settlements in the West Bank, already home to 120,000 people. Though Rabin's Labor-led coalition pledged to ``freeze'' settlements upon taking office in 1992, the government actually plans to complete 30,000 additional housing units, prompting widespread Arab demonstrations and threats by Palestinian officials to quit the peace talks. Two weeks ago, the Israelis promised Arafat what Environment Minister Yossi Sarid called ``a very deep freeze, one with no nonsense.'' But after the Beit Lid massacre...
Perhaps less well-known are the two Republicans also serving as fellows--John Schall, a former Congressional candidate and Labor Department official and Chris Henick, executive director of the Republican Governors Association...