George F. Will Quotes

Standing athwart ineffective, feel-good legislation shouting, 'Stop!' is seen as a betrayal of those struggling to get their footing on the lowest rung of the economic ladder. Yet raising the minimum wage hacks the lowest rungs off the ladder altogether. But economic logic doesn't wash with liberals who are intent on inflaming class warfare.

If you're fighting against a minimum wage increase, you're fighting an uphill battle, because most Americans, even most Republicans, are okay with raising the minimum wage.

A recent poll showed that nearly half the American public believes that the government should redistribute wealth. That so many people are so willing to blithely put such an enormous and dangerous arbitrary power in the hands of politicians – risking their own freedom, in hopes of getting what someone else has – is a painful sign of how far many citizens and voters fall short of what is needed to preserve a democratic republic

The concept of minimum wage is crazy, if you really stop to think about it. If $8 an hour seems right, why not $20 an hour? If it's coming by order of the government, why stop at any level? Why not just say everyone should get what Gates gets?

The minimum wage was due for an increase, but it was important that we offset its cost to small businesses.

The theory that if wages go up, employment goes down isn't a physical law like F=MA. It's a moral law, like 'Bedtime is 9:00 P.M.'

When I started in the business, the minimum wage was $1.25. I've seen an enormous number of wage increases. Basically, it applies evenly to everyone in the business.

Raising the minimum wage, as President Obama proposed in his State of the Union address, tends to be more popular with the general public than with economists.

The minimum wage is something that F.D.R. put in place a long time ago during the Great Depression. I don't think it worked then. It didn't solve any problems then and it hasn't solved any problems in 50 years.

A minimum wage leads to higher levels of unemployment.

You have to change people’s minds to stop inflation.

There are some who incline to favor a “minimum wage,” but who “kick at” a “maximum price.” Such surely forget that the capitalist could here just as easily as in the case of a rise in wages compelled by a workmen’s combination, or by any other cause, take his old profits out at the other end by raising the price of the manufactured article.

War always produces a higher standard of wages.

By a continuing process of inflation, governments can confiscate, secretly and unobserved, an important part of the wealth of their citizens.

Every government interference in the economy consists of giving an unearned benefit, extorted by force, to some men at the expense of others.

To some extent, it is [that] everybody is resistant to change. Today, you’d be hard-pressed to find anybody that was opposed to the smoking ban … All of Western Europe followed New York City. Many of the states around here did. Every major city, including in the tobacco-growing states in the United States, did. Brazil is smoke-free. Mexico City is smoke-free. All of France, Italy, Spain, England—they’re all smoke-free. It takes a while. Leadership is about doing what you think is right and then building a constituency behind it. It is not doing a poll and following from the back. If you want to criticize the political process—and it’s probably true throughout history, and certainly not just in the United States—I think it’s fair to say, in business or in government, an awful lot of leaders follow the polls.

Where the minimum wage would be if it tracked the changing incomes of the top 1 percent: $22.62

If the opponents of an increase in the minimum wage were correct, then every time you fly to Seattle, you've got to bring a bagged lunch because there shouldn't be any restaurants because they should have all have gone out of business as a result of raising the minimum wage.

Some states are doing better than others. Some states naturally have stronger economies. So it's not as simple as saying, 'Let's go to $15.' If you do it wrong, you can hurt the very people you're trying to help.

The government does not add value to the economy. It removes value from the economy by imposing taxes on one citizen and providing cash to another.

I think the right-wingers have to buddy up to the fact that either the minimum wage has to go up, and people get enough money to live, or you're always going to have people needing government assistance. You can't have it both ways.

But can we please stop insisting that if low-wage workers earn a little bit more, unemployment will skyrocket and the economy will collapse? There is no evidence for it. The most insidious thing about trickle-down economics is not the claim that if the rich get richer, everyone is better off. It is the claim made by those who oppose any increase in the minimum wage that if the poor get richer, that will be bad for the economy. This is nonsense.

It takes quite a bit of nerve for Democrats to complain about inflation. This reminds me of germs complaining about the disease.

A minimum-wage law is, in reality, a law that makes it illegal for an employer to hire a person with limited skills.

Good economics is good politics.