The Microeconomics of the Minimum Wage

Short Paper # 1 – The Microeconomics of the Minimum Wage
Short paper # 1 is due at the end of Week # 2 (9 pm, with a grace period until 11:59 pm). Papers
submitted after 9 pm and up to and including 11:59 pm on the due date are late but NOT penalized. Any
paper submitted after the grace period is late and penalized at the rate of one letter grade per day late
(or any portion thereof). Blackboard is the official time keeper. After 3 days, any paper not submitted is
graded as zero. The paper must use at least three disciplinary sources but not necessarily peer-reviewed
sources. Students may use their textbook as a source, but it will NOT count as one of the three required
sources. Short paper # 1 must include graphs, a works cited page, have proper APA format throughout
the paper, and must be the equivalent of 4 pages of APA properly formatted writing. The paper will
automatically be evaluated for originality by Blackboard SafeAssign. You might find it helpful to review
the Prof Battista’s handout “Writing in Economics using APA and Visual Aids: Some Helpful Hints.”
Students may find the textbook helpful in applying concepts from their knowledge of chapter 3 (supply
and demand, consumer surplus, producer surplus and deadweight loss, price floors), chapter 4 (labor
markets), and chapter 5 (elasticity of demand, determinants of elasticity, price floors)
Short paper # 1 is worth 100 points and assesses Pathways SLO’s 1-5, and Gateway LO’s A-D.
The Minimum Wage has existed as a legal entity in the United States for almost 80 years. There is a
thorough and passionate debate about the impacts the minimum wage has on employers, employees,
compensation, costs, unemployment, and efficiency, to name just a few. Noting what has been
mentioned above, write a paper in which you explore the economic benefits and economic costs (the
“pros and cons”) of the minimum wage in the USA. As always, it is not an option to opt out and say
there are no benefits or there are no costs – your job is to explore the issues. At the end of your paper,
you may offer your own opinion of what you think of all this.