Martin Regg Cohn: How Missouri´s minimum wage rates will trump Ontario´s wages of sin
(The Star Food)

Happy New Year, unless you live on Ontario’s minimum wage.In which case, tough luck.Ontario’s law mandating a $1 increase to the minimum wage, as of Jan. 1, has been formally rescinded by Premier Doug Ford. Instead, he legislated a 31-month freeze on the hourly minimum of $14.Better luck in America, where the minimum wage is on the march while Ontarians stay frozen in time.New York welcomed the New Year with a $15 minimum wage, catching up to San Francisco, but still lagging Seattle, which bumped it up to $16 last week.Ah, that’s in U.S. funds. At prevailing rates, New York’s $15 minimum is worth about $20 in Canadian currency.Read more: Ontarians rally in support of $15 minimum wage: ‘We cannot survive’Opinion | David Olive: The benefits to raising Ontario’s minimum wage are tangibleHigher drunk driving fines, static minimum wage: These are the changes taking effect in Ontario in 2019You can do the math. Seattle’s minimum wage workers ($21.25 after conversion) earn about 50 per cent more than their Ontario counterparts — with no sign of an economic slowdown after several years of pay hikes on the west coast.Ah, you say. Ontario is different.Weren’t we warned of the high price to be paid by workers earning higher wages — the proverbial and political wages of sin?TD Bank predicted 50,000 to 150,000 jobs lost by the end of 2019 if Ontario went from the old $11.60 an hour to $14 and then $15.The Ontario Chamber of Commerce countered with an even more apocalyptic study claiming 185,00 jobs were “at risk� from raising the minimum wage last year.When big banks and big business raise the alarm about workers losing their jobs, presumably they have the best interests of our economy at heart, not their own self interest. Right?But what if they’re wrong — not so much ideologically, but empirically and economically?Never mind the awkward tweet from the chamber’s president, Rocco ...