Causes and consequences of American minimum wage legislation, 1911-1947

This dissertation examines the early history of American minimum wage legislation. Chapter 2, the first substantive chapter, examines the twenty eight state laws passed prior to 1938. It is shown that most of these laws were ineffective. Typically the minimum rate was set below the market wage, penalties for violations were insignificant, or no attempt was made to enforce the law. The chapter then explains why so many laws were passed when they did so little. The legislative process is modeled as a game between legislators, interest groups and voters. Passing an ineffective law was an equilibrium outcome because big business, a powerful interest group, opposed effective legislation while voters favored the principal of legislation but did not monitor its effectiveness.