I hate this capitalist horseshit about minimum wage (i.e., everything they ever say about it, literally everything, but especially the fact that minimum wage has not kept up with inflation or the cost of living (two related but distinct concepts)) and "low-skill" workers (i.e., the degrading terms they use for anyone poorer than them or who doesn't buy into the so-called American Dream of exploiting others for profit (e.g., artists, communists)) and that somehow minimum wage increases are causing automation (which is an indefensible act of mental gymnastics to justify the behavior of big business assholes who would fire every single employee and keep all the money for themselves if they could), but there is one point I believe that--I think--maybe they'd agree with me on: the effect on small business. It is true that it could be hard for small businesses to keep up with minimum wage increases.

Small businesses usually don't rake in millions of dollars in sales per location, so they already can't keep up with the sheer number of employees corporate businesses hire, and they can't afford to go through such high churn rates as corporate businesses tolerate. Corporate businesses don't give a fuck about their employees; they're completely disposable, so why train them up or invest in them, why develop a personal relationship that inspires loyalty? A corporate business will just hire far too many employees, give them shit hours, impart no value to the employees, and hire more when people quit. A small business can't afford to behave that way; they need highly skilled and loyal employees.

Small businesses may not be able to pay as much as a corporate business at $15/hour minimum wage either. They may just not do enough business to afford it. If you're a niche shop in a shitty location that only brings in a couple hundred dollars in sales per day, you could be serious trouble. To make matters worse, the corporate businesses can afford to automate (which requires a fucking R&D budget and crazy expensive tech at this point), but small businesses can't, so corporate businesses are going to make even higher profit due to having cut labor costs and thus further out-compete the small businesses by lowering prices. Corporate businesses won't stop there, either. I predict McDonald's and so forth will increase their pay to above the minimum wage just to fuck over small businesses who can't afford to pay their employees so much.

That's why I think there should be a small business exemption for the minimum wage. Now, it would have to be more complex than that, because corporate businesses could easily abuse a simple loophole. Maybe small businesses could, in lieu of paying a high minimum wage, offer business partnerships to potential employees; the owners would have to reveal their financial records and "employees" would be allowed to make a choice whether they want to invest in the business via working there 40 hours a week in exchange for a percent of the profits. Small businesses could compete with giant corporations by essentially becoming co-ops or worker collectives. Going to work for a local small business would be like joining a startup; you consider the value of your time and the profitability of the business, and you go into it if you like what you see. Universal basic income could provide a safety net to protect co-op partners from the risk of potentially not making a living wage.

Maybe I went too far. Four paragraphs in, it seems I've gone full post-capitalism commie. I do think there's room for discussion, though, regarding the effect of increasing minimum wage on small businesses.