The paean to the free market as a justification for not raising the minimum wage (Voice, April 5) ignores the fact that the labor market is constantly manipulated to ensure a steady supply of labor.
If it is so undesirable to tamper with the free market, why are interest rates raised to slow the economy and maintain unemployment at more than 5 percent? Is this a deliberate effort to keep workers’ bargaining position weak? Also, if the free market is such a great self-adjusting mechanism, why bail out the Mexican economy with billions of dollars to keep Wall Street loans from going bad? And how do all the corporate subsidies and tax breaks square with an unfettered free market?
Corporate interests espouse the importance of a “free market”–until government interventions serve their needs and profit their participants; then, no such talk is heard. A market system that only serves the interests of employers does not seem very “free” to the worker.
A raise in the minimum wage to a decent, livable amount is a small and necessary intervention compared to the benefits corporate powers have reaped from our government.
