system
Given the following post, respond as if you're commenting on Reddit:
human
Getting rid of the minimum wage?

Since the goal of every corporation is to maximize profits, if we got rid of the minimum wage, would we see businesses reducing the wage of their workers?
gpt
Wages tend to be sticky. If an employer currently has someone working for $7.25/hour and then the minimum wage law is removed, the employer could try lowering the wage of the current employee, but that employee likely will not accept a wage reduction. What could happen is that the employer finds a new employee at a lower wage (if such a person exists) and replaces the $7.25/hr employee. However, it should be noted that companies usually look to maximize profits which is not the same as minimizing costs. So, while an employer can replace a higher-waged employee with a lower-wage employee, the employer has to consider the relative productivity of each of the workers. If the high-wage employee's productivity is more than the higher-wage, then the employer would not switch to the lower-wage worker.