Increasing the minimum wage creates a platform for all these elements of business prosperity. NFIB claims that the small business climate is tenuous in Washington state. The drivers for small business prosperity appear to be in place. Increasing the minimum wage encourages retention strategies for keeping employees by paying them better and investing them as partners in production and profitability. This is exactly what welfare reform should be encouraging.
Small businesses don t hire people moving off welfare as an act of charity.
They hire them to help these businesses turn a profit. If they did otherwise, they would go out of business. Increasing the minimum wage nudges all businesses to the high road of productivity, human capital investment, and profitability, which benefit both businesses and welfare recipients. They suggest educational opportunities, the earned income tax credit, and other federal programs as solutions to aiding the working poor. These solutions cost taxpayers money.