Given that the minimum wage was last raised in 2009, and even until then was always raised in arrears, I'd argue more that it's irresponsible of business owners to not be saving for an expected increase at some point in the near future (hopefully). It's not "pulling money out of midair" - these employers have been able to effectively "underpay" employees since then.

> Some of those jobs that are out there for seven, eight, nine dollars an hour, in my view, they're simply not intended to be careers. They're not intended to be full-time jobs.

This is a huge conservative talking point - the federal minimum wage was intended to be a liveable wage, not "for teenagers/high schoolers/part timers" - this whole spin of "these jobs are not meant to be liveable" is a wholly after-the-fact revisionism.