Messrs. [David] Card and [Alan B.] Krueger conducted a famous natural experiment by studying employment at fast-food restaurants in New Jersey and Pennsylvania before and after New Jersey raised the minimum wage while Pennsylvania didn’t. … University of California Irvine economist [and Distinguished economics professor] David Neumark and Federal Reserve economist William L. Wascher, using the restaurants’ payroll data, found what most economists would have expected: The minimum wage increase in New Jersey caused employment to fall in the New Jersey restaurants relative to Pennsylvania restaurants’ employment.

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