GOP House Candidate: Get Government In/Out Of Minimum Wage

There is a special election for a Florida House Seat.  The Republican candidate, David Jolly, was recently asked about President Obama’s call to raise the minimum wage.  His response was well (to put it kindly) confused:

Republican David Jolly said he supports a minimum wage, but doesn’t think politicians should set it.

“Minimum wage should be indexed to inflation or subject to a cost-of-living adjustment like any other federal income program …” Jolly said in an email. “That means some years it may go up, other years it may stay static. Barack Obama is not an economist, neither is the Congress.”

So it should be indexed to inflation (actually a great idea) but where does it start? I think Congress and Barack Obama may have something to do with that.

By: Stuart Shapiro

Stuart is a professor and the Director of the Public Policy
program at the Bloustein School of Planning and Public Policy at Rutgers
University. He teaches economics and cost-benefit analysis and studies
regulation in the United States at both the federal and state levels.
Prior to coming to Rutgers, Stuart worked for five years at the Office
of Management and Budget in Washington under Presidents Clinton and
George W. Bush.