Anyway, My opinion of miminum wages can be a good thing. but too much of a raise can be a bad thing. When I was a CNA, I was making nearly miminum wages. I do not want to work hard for hours just to put food on the table. I don't like seeing family where both parents plus children have to work just to have shelter and food (I don't care about other luxury such as cable tv or other digital stuffs) . wages should be enough for ONE person to support a family of three. (I hate it when cost of living require two incomes like the husband and wife both have to work) . I know that cost of living go up as population of people go up so I can understand the need to raise the miminum wages to give the poor a boost.
Now the reason I think too much of a raise is a bad thing is because I 've been telling my son to get some education and do his best if he doesn't want to live in proverty. He working hard on that. The bad thing is that if he sees he can do ok without college, or even decide to drop out of school, then I am in trouble. Some of my family are drop outs, and some have talked about dropping out during their younger years (like my aunts and my brothers) but the only thing that discouraged them from dropping out is proverty. So they managed to stay in school. YOu can't really force a 16 years old to do his best in school either so it is kinda hard to place a law to prevent them from dropping out.
We really can't prevent high school kids from making decent money though, especially if they are teen parents.