TRY THIS SIMPLE TEST.

Hi. Do you live in America? Ever had a job there? Good. Let me show you something that The Anchoress wrote about why the minimum wage is evil:

Prior to minimum wage laws, a smart employer knew that he could not keep good employees without paying them their worth. Once employers were told what they “must” pay, however, it created a baseline that mentally (and perhaps emotionally) narrowed, rather than broadened an employers sense of what wage was fair or deserved. In fact “fair” and “deserved” went out the window. If all a businessman (or woman) had to do was make sure a minimum wage was being paid, what did fairness or merit have to do with anything?

And that sort of thinking, born of the good-intentions of our own government — is how we get to the reality of a 20-year employee making $8.25 an hour, and having to live a pretty hardscrabble life.

OK, people who've worked for actual bosses, and observed first-hand why they do and don't give raises -- does your assessment suggest to you that employers pay as little as they can get away with because that increases their profit margins? Or does your experience suggest that they pay as little as they can get away with because the government inflicted upon them "a baseline that mentally (and perhaps emotionally) narrowed, rather than broadened an employers sense of what wage was fair or deserved"?

If the former, congratulations, you're a normal human being living in the actual world. If the latter, congratulations, you may have a job as a conservative columnist.