Resolved: Minimum wages in the United States should be raised to ensure the welfare of its people

I stand in firm negation of the resolution that states,"Resolved: Minimum wages in the United States should be raised to ensure the welfare of its people."I do not believe that we will have any arguments over the terms used in the resolution since all of them are well known enough for debaters to have a sufficient knowledge regarding their definitions.Contention 1: Raising the minimum wage will result in major job losses. This obviously clashes with my opponent's first contention in which he makes the exact opposite argument. Let me explain how this will happen rather than just stating a fact that shows that the unemployment rates will increase. According to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics, about half of the people that made minimum wage were age 25 or younger. This means that the people who are paid these low wages do not need to live off of these funds. This means that if MW was required to increase that employers would look for better and more skilled people to occupy jobs so that they are not wasting valuable money on kids. Not only will the younger people of the US lose valuable experience in a workplace environment, but they will also be affected negatively down the road due to their lack of experience. Obviously, we would be harming the future of many adolescents which is not in the favor of the general welfare of our American people.The Pro stated in his case that the 1996 change in legislation that increased minimum wage benefited the country and did not harm job growth. However, this is not really applicable to twenty years in the future as economic times have changed drastically since then. If the country had not had its historically bad recession in 2008, the situation might be different, but that is not the case and therefore the country has less money to spend for things such as higher wages.So, we must look at the statistics in the past few years, in order to make a slightly accurate prediction. Let's compare the statistics of states that had minimum wages higher than $7.25 (the current federal minimum wage) and states where it was $7.25. The unemployment rate and average job growth of the states in the first category was 7.4% and .5%, respectively, while the states with a $7.25 MW had a 6.4% unemployment rate and .8% average job growth rate. The difference of these systems shows that the states with $7.25 MW had a 1 percent lower unemployment rate and a .3% higher average job growth rate. This shows the result of states raising the minimum wage slightly. Imagine if we were to more than double the current minimum wage to allow people to "live" off of these funds. Let's just say we as a country would be "something that starts with an 'F', ends in a 'D', and rhymes with firetrucked". Also according to bls.gov, with every 1 dollar increase in the federal minimum wage, the unemployment rate increases by an astounding 1.48%. If we were to increase the minimum wage by $7.75 to $15, it would be predicted that we would be increasing the unemployment rates by 11.47%. This means that we would be projected have 36 million people unemployed in the US.Contention 2: By increasing the minimum wage to 15 dollars an hour, the incentive to get a better education will be removed. The reason that many people are likely to get an education in today's society is so that they will be able to get a good job that pays far above minimum wage. If we increase minimum wage, it may become easier to get a well paying job without getting an education. This is hurting the future of the United States as the youth of our nation will begin to feel less and less a need to get a good education after high school. If we set the precedence that our country will always increase the FMW so that our people can live off of jobs that require no skill, we are showing future generations that this is okay and this will lead to the harm and destruction of our economy and our society itself.Contention 3: Increasing the minimum wage will harm small businesses, the foundation for a stable economy. If we increase the FMW, small businesses that are already struggling to pay their employees will be burdened with the unsolvable problem that is the lack of money. More money required to pay for jobs = less jobs for people in small businesses = an economy that is ruined. Small businesses are vital to the growth and thriving of the U.S. economy because of the fact that they create jobs, therefore becoming the building blocks in which the big money making corporations can thrive and feed our economy. Many small businesses that become larger businesses, will likely stay in the communities that they were created in leading to local economic growth. So, we can deduce that more small businesses that we have spread out through America will lead to national economic success. However, if we were to take the foundation of small businesses out from under these large corporations, the economic building that we Americans pride ourselves in will come crumbling down, a large reason for the recession in 2008 according to many economists.Now onto further refutations to the Pro's case.I have already refuted my opponents first contention above so I shall proceed to my elaboration on my refutation to his second contention.If we look at the statistics it is found that hardly any people in the US are actually working for minimum wage. In the United States, only 3 percent of the population of hourly paid people (25+ in age) work for minimum wage. In other words about 2.25 million people are required to "live" off of these incomes. This shows that my opponents second contention regarding people not being able to live off of MW is a very tiny problem if we look at the situation from a cost-benefit analysis.To refute contention 3, I would just like to point out that this argument can't really be used to reason why we should increase minimum wage. First of all only 3.7 million people work in the fast food industry, a mere 1 percent of America's population. Secondly, the reason that the people working in these occupations need to have financial help is because the jobs in this industry are ALL bad paying jobs. Jobs in the fast food industry don't call for 15 dollar an hour wages because they require no skill and a meant to be a part time job where employees are expected to make a low salary. Flipping is hamburgers is not a career and we can agree that a person working in their career occupation deserve more than a teen that flips hamburgers and messes up your orders way to often. The thought process that these people deserve to be able to live off of their fast food employing jobs is simply irrational. No one is going to be able to make a living sweeping floors and heating up frozen foods, and this has, and always will be, the case in any economy.In order to earn more money, people who are currently occupied by these jobs need to focus on using this money to pay for an education that will give them a chance at making more money at higher skilled occupations. These fast food organizations need to make a profit in order to stay in business, it is quite a simple fact of the matter. If the profit made by one hamburger goes to paying the worker twice as much as the profit, the restaurant will have to increase the cost of the burger leading to less people buying the burger and the restaurant going out of business. These businesses cannot hand out money willy nilly and expect no long term negative consequences to follow. So, they must pay these workers less so that they, the restaurant, can stay in business. If people wish to have higher pay, they must put in the work that is required to secure a better paying job, they can't just expect to earn more money for such simpleton's job.For these reasons, I stand in firm negation of the resolution.