Minimum Wage a Help or a Hurt?

Washington Post on raising Minimum Wage

The Washington Post editorial “Hurting the 0.3%” takes an offensive stance on a proposed minimum wage raise. The article relies heavily on new numbers that speculate on the impact such a raise might make on employment. The writer of the article begins by throwing jabs at those who have been heralding the raise. They write focusing completely on the speculation that between 0-1 million jobs may be lost due to a raise in minimum wage to 10.10 by 2016. This completely ignores the positives such a raise could have on the 0.3%.  The Post article instead focuses on the idea that most minimum wage workers are not from low-income households because they are mostly “including teenagers and secondary earners”.

A New York Times editorial tackles the same subject with a broader much more relevant view. They acknowledge the potential loss of employment but also state the many positive effects such a pay-raise could have on millions of Americans. 

NY Times Minimum Wage 

 “The vast majority of those getting raises would not be teenagers with part-time jobs. Nearly 90 percent of them are adults 20 and older, and 53 percent of them work full time. Women represent 56 percent of them.”

Both articles target the same audience but the Washington Post uses sloppy word choice and makes useless digs to convey their point. The article is neither accurate, informative nor particularly persuasive. It makes the work of teenagers from low-income families irrelevant and implies that secondary earners are not important to their households. When more often than not a secondary income is what keeps some American families above the poverty line. Overall the Washington Post fails to adequately inform its audience.

And thus the contraceptive war continues…

NY Times on Contraceptives

        A few days ago The New York Times editorial board wrote “A Missing Argument on Contraceptives” detailing an impending Supreme Court decision on March twenty-fifth. Two companies Conestoga Wood Specialties and Hobby Lobby, are both protesting the requirement to provide contraceptive coverage to their employees in the name of their own religious beliefs.

       I first read about this story when news broke of Hobby Lobby’s threat/announcement that they would be closing down their stores should the hearing not sway in their favor about eight months ago. Backlash from their announcement also allowed religious minority groups to make serious statements about the type of product Hobby Lobby keeps in stock, specifically the glaring lack of products that are affiliated with any other religion other than Christianity.  Hobby Lobby is constitutionally allowed to pick and choose what they sell in their stores, and they sorely wish they could pick and choose what health services they covered as well.

        The New York Times article outlined how the Supreme Court decision could sway, and it marks an essential moment for the ever growing rift between church and state over contraceptives. The article does not mention how crucial the Courts decision is to the continual steady growth of gender equality, but it is. Women’s healthcare needs to become a non-issue and this decision will take it one baby step closer to becoming one.