It had nothing to do with the invention of self-service pumps.
Uh-huh.
Economic data is historical data. It can produce correlations, never, ever Cause and Effect. Someone please design for me a control system based on correlational data.
In other words, "I can't produce any data showing where job growth slowed or people lost jobs because of a higher minimum wage, thus all data is garbage".
Which is why the economic growth rate is, over the last 100 years, inversely correlated with the power of economists and our government.
You think it's economists who are behind the movements to raise the minimum wage? You think government wants this and working people are against it? Maybe you should look at this:
http://www.politico.com/story/...
"On minimum wage, voters support raising the federally mandated minimum, 72 percent to 27 percent, including a majority of Republicans, who support it 52 percent to 45 percent"
And surprisingly, even 61% of small business owners support raising the minimum wage. Now why would that be?
http://www.usnews.com/opinion/...
Your argument that a raise in the minimum wage is something thought up by economists and government is just provably wrong.
Which is why the economic growth rate is, over the last 100 years, inversely correlated with the power of economists and our government.
You complain about "correlations not being causation" and then come up with THAT argument, which is based on a spurious correlation? Every rise in the minimum wage has been not the result of eggheads in government, but because of a groundswell of demand from the people who are, you know, actually doing the work.
There's not a single person in national elected office, House, Senate, or White House who has a PhD in Economics. Not one. There are people with other kinds of PhDs and professional doctorates, but not one single economist. But, you argue, economists control everything. Here's a correlation for you, "People who espouse neoliberal economic theories are highly likely to throw any kind of argument at the wall, based on no data or even any kind of provable theory." If anything, if you want spurious arguments and assertions based on nothing but feelings and doctrine, go to an Austrian School economist or someone who believes that crap.