Our motion stated that “ The government should set minimum wages to reduce poverty and inequality. I was arguing against the said motion. Although it isn’t mentioned in the motion, we mainly argued using Singapore as an example. I think that our motion is a bit vague, as the minimum wages can reduce wage inequality hypothetically, but only to a small degree, and there are more feasible solutions regarding solving the prevalent issue of poverty. To sum up, I was not trying to argue that minimum wages won’t reduce inequality/poverty, but that it is ineffective and there are better alternatives to it.
In the debate, the opposing team (pros) had a compelling argument that with the implementation of minimum wage, those struggling in the lowest socioeconomic classes will earn more, as Caleb said something along the lines of : “Countries with minimum wage have a much higher lower class”, effectively eradicating poverty and closing the gap between the rich and the poor, and their claim is backed up by evidence. The opposing team compared Singapore with Norway, two countries in similar economic positions, as they both have similar GDP per
…show more content…
This raises the cost of living for everyone in the country, and the high cost of living is identified as one of the largest factors of poverty in Singapore, which is definitely not what we want. Singapore is ranked as the country with highest cost of living in the world (Economist Intelligence Unit). Even if the companies with “huge budget surpluses” are willing to decrease their profit levels to pay for the low income earners, the impact is just too insignificant in the grand scheme of poverty. In US, the minimum wage was increased from $7.25 per hour to $ 10.10 per hour, however it only reduced the number of people in poverty by 900,000, as opposed to the 16 million people it was supposed to help. (Congressional Budget