Mark Souder: “I believe that in actuality that the increase in the minimum wage will hurt those who least can afford to be hurt. I…”

“I believe that in actuality that the increase in the minimum wage will hurt those who least can afford to be hurt. I know in inner-city Fort Wayne we have been trying to get a grocery store to relocate back there. We lost all the major downtown grocery stores. This will increase their wage rates basically 20 percent. They already made a market decision that they could not put it there and we are making the market decision more difficult. In the small town that I grew up and other small towns, the increases in the minimum wage are helping to take very marginal businesses under. We are seeing the Wal-Martization of America because suburbs can afford, through economic growth, to afford a lot of this. We need to look at creative ways, particularly for small businesses to deal with it.”