Minimum Wage should not increase to $15.

Pro's entire case revolves around the premise that an increase in the minimum wage will severely hurt employers' profits, thus leading to all sorts of unpleasant consequences like businesses going bankrupt, stock values crashing, and unemployment rates rising. However, as I am going to argue, employers' profits will *not* significantly decrease -- if anything, they will *increase*. But of course, this seems absurd -- how can forcing companies to nearly double their labor costs possibly help them in any way? The answer to this lies in 3 critical mitigating factors which Pro has neglected to mention -- (1) increased consumption, (2) higher worker productivity, and (3) lower corporate tax rates.But before I get into those, let's estimate the aggregate expense to businesses from having to double their labor costs. 42% of the workforce earns below the proposed minimum wage [1], and the current size of the workforce is about 123 million people [2], so that's roughly 52 million workers who would be getting a pay raise. Forbes calculated that the average salary of a person earning $15 per hour would be $17500 [3], and based on that, we can infer that someone earning the current MW ($7.25) would have a salary of around $8750. For the sake of simplicity (and to make this an extremely generous estimate), let's assume that all 52 million benefactors are earning the current MW, so that all of them will get an annual pay raise of $8750. This adds up to a grand total cost of... $455 billion. Keep this number in mind as I delve into my case.C1) Increased ConsumptionThis is a fairly basic principle of economics -- when consumer incomes increase, aggregate demand increases as well, and the economy expands (i.e. businesses' profits grow). This is especially true because the consumers in question are poor: "'The marginal propensity to consume is substantially larger for low-wealth than for high-wealth households.' Poor people are what economists call 'borrowing constrained.' They tend to have more needs than are being met, so when money arrives, they spend it." [4]. The point here is that the majority of money paid to employees is quickly funneled back into the economy through consumption of goods. According to a paper released by the Federal Reserve Bank of Chicago, "an increase of $1.75 in the hourly federal minimum wage raises aggregate household spending by roughly $48 billion in the year following the minimum wage hike" [5]. In this debate, we are discussing an increase of $7.75, so we can extrapolate that the resultant boost in overall consumption (i.e. revenues for businesses) would be more than $212 billion.C2) Higher ProductivityThat higher wages result in greater worker productivity is not only intuitive, but also a well-documented theory among economists, as demonstrated this literature review by the National Bureau of Economic Research [6]. In addition to the obvious increase in 'motivation' which comes from large pay raises, workers who have greater income security also experience less poverty-related stress, which further boosts their productivity [7]. Moreover, when they are paid more, workers are far less likely to change jobs, meaning that employers have to spend less on attracting new human capital, and they also receive the immense benefits of having more experienced, long-term employees [8]. In fact, one study published in the Industrial and Labor Relations Review found that "high-wage firms can sometimes offset more than half of their higher wage costs through improved productivity and lower hiring and turnover costs" [9]. Apply this to the $455 billion labor cost increase -- businesses will see at least a $228 billion growth in revenues.C3) Corporate Tax Cuts73% of the United States' welfare expenditures are received by employed individuals with insufficient wages [10], and the total amount that the US spends on welfare is about $454 billion per year [11]. However, if the MW hike in question is implemented, then all employed people will be earning a "living wage", and will therefore no longer need assistance from welfare programs. This means that increasing the MW would reduce the amount of money the government needs by approximately $331 billion, thus freeing up space in the federal budget for a tax cut -- more specifically, a corporate tax cut. The total revenue from corporate taxes is currently $342 billion [12], so a MW hike would allow us to virtually *eliminate* the tax. The takeaway here is that businesses would be allowed to keep $331 billion more of their revenues than they otherwise would.============CONCLUSION============So according to my absurdly generous calculations, the total cost to businesses will be about $455 billion.On the other hand, it was calculated that businesses would undergo massive increases in revenue from...Increased consumption -- $212 billionHigher worker productivity -- $228 billionLower corporate tax rates -- $331 billionTOTAL -- $771 billionThus, we arrive at a quite conservative estimate of the net effect of the proposed MW hike on businesses' profits: + $316 billionThis large increase in profits has a positive impact on society at large because it enables businesses to create more jobs and pursue the production of innovative goods which improve the quality of life for everyone. With that established, let's not forget the most obvious positive impact of a MW hike -- a drastic increase in standard of living for 52 million people and their families. That is a huge benefit in and of its self; just as we take it for granted that increased unemployment is a "bad" thing, we should also take it for granted that increased standards of living is a "good" thing, and due to the sheer number of people it encompasses, it alone outweighs pretty much any impact my opponent can make.Raising the MW to $15 has nothing but positive effects. The resolution is resoundingly negated.[1] http://www.nelp.org...[2] http://www.statista.com...[3] http://www.forbes.com...[4] http://www.bloomberg.com...[5] http://tinyurl.com... (pdf file, pg. 3)[6] http://www.nber.org...[7] http://www.worldbank.org...[8] http://www.nber.org... (pg. 21)[9] http://www.jstor.org...[10] http://laborcenter.berkeley.edu...[11] http://www.usgovernmentspending.com...[12] https://www.nationalpriorities.org...