National Employment Law Project, April 2011

“Minimum Wage Effects Across State Borders,” a new study by economists Arindrajit Dube, William Lester and Michael Reich published by the respected Review of Economics and Statistics, provides the most rigorous and sophisticated study to date of the effects of increases in the minimum wage on job growth in the United States. Taking advantage of the fact that a record number of states raised their minimum wages during the 1990s and 2000s–creating scores of differing minimum wage rates across the country–the study compares employment levels among every pair of neighboring U.S. counties that had differing minimum wage levels at any time between 1990 and 2006.

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