A two-page designed rebuttal to the five most common arguments against raising the minimum wage to $25–30/hour for all workers, including tipped workers. Framed around the Living Wage For All campaign — 8 states, 9 campaigns, 17 million workers.
The five myths, answered:
"Raising the minimum wage will kill small businesses." Higher-wage states have higher restaurant growth rates. Denny's CFO confirmed six consecutive years of positive guest traffic as California's wage rose. 2,500+ restaurants have joined OFW's RAISE network. Small businesses (25 or fewer employees) get a decade-long phase-in to 2037; larger businesses hit $30 by 2030. OFW and UC Berkeley Haas are building a free calculator, toolkit, and training program to help small businesses get there profitably.
"Raising wages will make everything more expensive." The Alameda County $30 study projects prices rise 0.9% while workers' earnings rise 21.2%. UC Berkeley's study of California's $20 fast food wage found prices rose just ~1.5%. OFW's Dime a Day analysis: raising the tipped minimum wage costs the average household 25¢ a day. Target pays up to $24; Costco's average exceeds $31; Bank of America's floor is $25 — and they still offer affordable goods.
"Raising wages this high will cause massive job losses." The seven states requiring the full minimum wage for tipped workers have higher restaurant employment growth and small business growth than subminimum wage states. California's $20 fast food wage produced no job losses — fast food establishments grew faster there than in the rest of the U.S. The Alameda County $30 study projects a net positive employment effect — raising 182,000 workers' earnings by $2.2 billion and creating nearly 6,000 new jobs from increased consumer spending.
"$25 and $30 are unrealistic — too high, too fast." $25 today is worth nearly what $15 was when Fight for $15 began. 45% of workers today earn under $25/hour — nearly identical to the 44% earning under $15 in 2012. $25 is the new $15. And $25 still isn't the cost of living: the MIT Living Wage Calculator shows a single parent with one child needs $33/hour even in the cheapest county in America; in Alameda County, over $62/hour. $30 is the floor, not the ceiling.
"Raising wages will just speed up robots replacing workers." Prior attempts to replace servers with iPads and robots haven't reduced industry jobs — labor savings aren't why restaurants adopt self-service. Panera's kiosks led to 10,000 new hires. The most comprehensive minimum wage research (88 studies, U.S. and international) finds negligible employment effects. ATMs didn't kill teller jobs; they increased them.
Business voices featured: Michael Shemtov (Butcher and the Bee, TN & SC) and Beth Wagner (Honky Tonk BBQ, Chicago) — both arguing raising wages levels the field and strengthens local economies.
Sources cited: EPI; Newsweek (2021); Batt, Lee & Lakhani (2014), Cornell ILR; OFW RAISE Network; Movement Economics (2026); OFW/QCEW; Reich & Sosinskiy (2025), UC Berkeley; Harvard Shift Project (2024); Benner & Jayaraman (2012); MIT Living Wage Calculator; Dube & Zipperer (2024); Technomic (2017); Jacoby (2015); Forrest (2017).