This is John Batchler, conversation with my colleague Gene Marks, about the minimum wage excitement

of these last years, raising it higher and higher and higher, the studies that Gene introduces

looking at the California employment situation after several years of raising it to $20 an hour.

There is no surprise here.

Here's Gene Marks on what happens in the state of California when mandating all franchises,

all small businesses, pay $20 an hour, no matter.

More of this later.

Yeah, it is.

I mean, and you love this stuff john because i know you're

i don't think you're a big fan of the minimum wage either um you know and you know and you're

raising it you know there's a um raising the minimum wage whether you like it or not there's a

level that's sustainable and acceptable in an economic environment.

California bumped up their minimum wage in the fast food industry to $20 an hour.

It's going on a couple of years now.

So there's been like a big study that went in and looked at this.

And this is the National Bureau of Economic Research. You just published a new study in it.

And what did they find? Oh, you know, big surprise. Employment in the sector declined by almost

3% compared to everywhere else. You know, because they translated that this increase in the minimum wage

turned into a loss of 18,000 jobs in the fast food sector.

Now, is it all related to that increase in the minimum wage?

I believe most of it is.

I think that a lot of fast food restaurants either cut back on employees, put in more self-service or technology to get the job done, or simply closed up shop and, you know, in some companies are more.

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