Quite true. The former situation is rare, though. Even when it appears that there are 10 firms chasing 9 employees, a 10th is likely to materialize when they find out where the vendors are situated, diminishing the opportunity for the 9 that were already in line.

It isn't that rate. This phenomenon is the reason that every single job doesn't pay the minimum salary required by law.

Kind of. That's just supply and demand. But markets are never perfectly efficient.

From my personal experience working in an industry that hires a lot of minimum wage workers, I encounter a lot of people who just don't realize that they could make more doing something else. I mean, they understand in some nebulous way that higher paying jobs exist, but not in an actionable way. With more information, they might notice that they could squeeze out a particular guy making $30 by doing the job for $25 per hour. But they don't even go there because they lack the information needed.

At the same time, those minimum wage jobs I speak of aren't going to pay more if the people leave – the work would just disappear. So while these individuals would make more, they would place downward pressure on the overall market in making such a move. By keeping the information hard to come by, however, you can avoid some of that competitive pressure.

I think we basically agree.