The Minimum Wage - Settled Once and For All

I have a 1963 Canadian silver dollar in my pocket right now... half an ounce of silver. It's heavier than the loonie sitting next to it... heavier than the dollar bill in your wallet. Heavier than the lie of fiat money...

At today's prices, the silver in this coin is worth about $50 Canadian. The face value is one dollar. I believe it is still considered legal tender at $1.

I carry it around for those special moments when someone in front of me starts talking about the minimum wage...

Someone starts in... you've heard it all before, a thousand times, I'm sure... wages haven't kept up with inflation... people can't afford rent... the system is rigged... the little guy is getting screwed over and needs a helping hand... and frankly, these are valid concerns to have. Valid impulses... it's important to acknowledge that.

I let them finish... I hear them... I listen. They think they're making points... but in reality, they're making my case for me and they don't even know it yet.

When they're done, I pull out the coin and put it in their hands... it's a gift, but not in the way you might think... I'm not giving them the coin, I'm giving them a lesson.

"Would you rather earn a dollar an hour in these," I ask, pointing at the coin, "or fifteen dollars an hour in today's money?"

They stare at it... give it a flip or two... feel the weight. Their hand does the work that their brain has been refusing to... suddenly things seem less abstract and a lot more real.

A dollar an hour in 1963 silver is roughly thirty dollars an hour today in USD. A 1963 worker earning one dollar an hour had more purchasing power than a 2025 worker earning fifteen... the minimum wage didn't fail to keep up with inflation... the dollar collapsed underneath it... that's the real story.

They don't have a reply... not because I was rude... because the coin answered the question they didn't know to ask.

Here's where most conservatives lose this argument.

They get into the studies. They cite the CBO. They argue Card and Krueger versus Neumark and Wascher. They spend three hours doing exactly what the progressive came there to make them do...

That's the trap... you don't win the minimum wage argument with studies... You win by asking the questions the progressive can't answer. Force it on them... trap them. You're the predator, they're the prey. Make them feel the weight of that, just like they feel the weight of the coin.

The minimum wage isn't a serious economic policy... it's a legitimacy ritual. The apparatus governs the economy by performing care for the workers it harms... It transfers wealth and opportunity from the politically invisible (teenagers, inexperienced workers, the formerly incarcerated, destitute seniors trying to get by) to the politically loud (union members, established employees, the legions of economically ignorant voters the law was actually passed for).

The architects of the policy know this... the voters don't. The economic literature is settled... they keep raising the wage because the ritual matters more than the result. That's politics... the truth is a liability... voters want comforting lies... we are ruled by the Paul Krugmans of the world, not the Thomas Sowells.

Politics, dressed as charity... an iron fist wearing a velvet glove.

If you're three hours into an argument about the minimum wage, you're not arguing. You're being eaten...

This argument should take you three minutes at the dinner table... two replies online. If it's taking longer than that, you haven't been trained yet. That's not a failure... that's a starting point... I can help you upgrade your game.

The first rule of engagement: never enter a battle without a plan to dominate. The minimum wage is the easiest battle on the field. If you can't dispatch it in two replies, every other fight you walk into will eat you alive.

This morning I dispatched a progressive on the page in three questions. I've turned it into a case file and made it public so you can see exactly what the membership looks like inside: stopbeingprey.com/case-files/settled-fact.

That's what the membership is. It's not a newsletter... it's an armory.

I'm building case files and dispatch protocols for every argument the right keeps losing. The minimum wage is one of the first... there are more coming, inside, only for founders.

$8 a month locked for life. 100 founder seats, 61 are gone as of writing this. When the last one fills, the door closes... the price goes to $13 forever. These 100 will be my inner circle, and that really means something to me. I won't forget it.

Here's the door: stopbeingprey.com/membership.