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Wal-Mart Warms to the State
...And yet, let us think this through. Might there be another reason Wal-Mart would advocate a higher minimum wage?

Before looking at the evidence, let's do some a priori theorizing based on the history of US corporate regulation. Historians such as Robert Higgs, Butler Shaffer, Dominick Armentano, and Gabriel Kolko have chronicled how the rise of business regulation, including intervention in market wages, was pushed by large companies for one main reason: to impose higher costs on smaller competitors.

This is how child labor legislation, mandated pensions, labor union impositions, health and safety regulations, and the entire panoply of business regimentation came about. It was pushed by big businesses that had already absorbed the costs of these practices into their profit margins so as to burden smaller businesses that did not have these practices. Regulation is thus a violent method of competition....

...Moving from theory to reality, we find that this is precisely what Wal-Mart is up to. The hint comes from the news stories: "Wal-Mart maintains that it pays above the current $5.15 an hour minimum wage to its employees."

Now, most readers might just look at this as a case of leading by example. Would that everyone were as fair as the wonderful Wal-Mart! But a second look suggests another interpretation, namely that it wants to slam its smaller competition, which will be seriously harmed by having to pay more for labor.

The current minimum is $5.15. According to studies, Wal-Mart pays between $8.23 and $9.68 as its national average. That means that the minimum wage could be raised 50% and still not impose higher costs on the company.

Wal-Mart itself makes even more elaborate claims on Walmartfacts.com: "The national average for regular hourly Walmart wages is nearly twice the federal minimum wage, and higher in urban areas." If true, the national minimum could be raised by 100% and leave the company unaffected.

So who would it affect if not Wal-Mart? All of its main competition....