Need peice of information Desperately

[TheAnswerTo1984is1776]

Now I know I didn't just think this up for no reason what so ever.
I was having a debate between me and a teacher and I brought up that before the 1800's or maybe the 1500's unemployment was virtually zero because of no mimimum wage laws.


If I remember right I found this peice of information from lewrockwell.com but im not sure

If anyone has any idea what im talking about please post sources because as of right now I look like an idiot bc he called me out on it lol.

[KCIndy]

Well, good news and bad news.

Sadly, there were indeed multiple periods of high unemployment before minimum wage laws were passed. Here in the U.S. you can find examples of this during the Great Depression of the 1930s, as well as a shorter but severe period in the 1890s. (Google "Panic of 1893" for more info).

On the other hand - and you might want to point this out to your teacher - minimum wage laws did absolutely nothing to prevent more recent economic downturns, including a recession in the early 1970s, the "stagflation" period that cost Jimmy Carter a second term of the presidency, the shorter recession of 1991-3 during which Clinton won the presidency over the first George Bush with the slogan, "It's the economy, stupid!" as well as the tech stock crash of 2000 and, last but not least, the current economic downturn that currently plagues the nation.

But if it were me, I would simply argue the case on principle. Ask your teacher this: "If someone wants to employ me, and offers me $5/hour to do a simple, easy job that I will enjoy, and I agree that $5/hour is a perfectly acceptable wage to be earning, do you really think the government has the moral right to interfere in this private, mutually acceptable contract?"

The teacher, if he is of the usual statist variety, will tell you the government does indeed have this right, and that the government is only watching out for your best interests.

Frankly, I doubt you'll ever get the guy to concede, even though the moral high ground is actually yours. One more reason our public school system has become so abominable, sad to say.


Anyway, let us know what happens!

And +Rep for being willing to debate the teacher. That takes guts.