Well, regardless, prices increase while wages stagnate regardless, and the federal minimum wage does seem to drive the floor and by consequence probably a lot of the rest of that stagnation.

Doesn’t seem to me that it makes sense to peg a federal minimum wage that stays the same for long periods of time while also seeing “inflation” constantly drive prices up (I’m using inflation as a catch-all to sum up all flavors of price increase, not just what’s strictly meant by the term normally). It’s inconsistent - two sides of one coin, but somehow one keeps getting larger while the other remains unchanged…?

But beyond that, yes, you’re right, it’s no panacea of any kind, because the bigger problem is that all markets (including labor markets) are driven and in effect controlled by the largest players. They don’t have to collaborate and conspire directly, though of course being above the law they often happily do. But yeah, not necessary, by and large they merely have to act in their own self-interest to produce the system of advantages for them causing the accompanying monstrosities we see everywhere for everyone else (us).

Raising the minimum wage is good but it isn’t anything close to a solution, the spiraling problems keep spiraling. But remember, that’s constantly, always happening, in directed ways, regardless. Bad idea to worry over downstream effects of things that clearly help folks struggling the ~worst. Address the actual problem, leave those folks out of it, I say.

[Edit: if you’d like a real-time example of price changes and govt relief being solidly one-sided - watch what happens as companies fight for and receive the court-approved reversals of collected tariffs. You’ll see some token price decreases and a few more strident responses, I expect, but by and large companies will have raised their prices to keep their profit margins intact, having a hateable president to blame and garner acceptance among consumers - and then they’ll get back the money they did send for the tariffs, then keep prices high because that’s how it works when people accept new normals (and boyyy have we Americans proven great at accepting new normals). Then fund some campaigns/events/PACs/whatever with a slice of the money as thanks, keep the good times rollin.]

[Edit edit: looks like when this would take effect is spread out so long anyway that it just gives plenty of time to do what I’m describing and I guess you were worried about too maybe. Lovely.]