My "best of" 2014 - opeds

Over the next two weeks, I'll go through some of my professional highlights for the year.  Here are excerpts from the four opeds I published in 2014:

1.  Voter ID laws protect voters

There are two key arguments against the voter ID requirement. The first is that voter fraud doesn’t exist, which would mean the law has no benefits. This argument is laughable. Just ask Melowese Richardson, who was sentenced to five-years in prison for voting for Obama multiple times in Ohio.

2. TV show "Suits" shows danger of restricting people from jobs

While I find the show entertaining, it troubles me because these types of situations happen in real life. There are people who would be good at a job, but restrictions make it illegal for them to work. The show raises a good question: If somebody wanted to pay a non-lawyer for legal advice/representation, why should that be illegal?

3. On the gender wage gap

If you insist that the gender wage gap is a result of discrimination against women, here are a few other claims that must be equally true. By the same logic, young men are discriminated against in favor of young women. Women in their 20s without children out-earn men by as much as $1.08 to every dollar, according to some estimates. It must also be true that white men are discriminated against in favor of Asian-American men, who earn over 5 percent more than white men. To claim either of these as discrimination would be ridiculous, though, right? There are differences in job types, education levels, hours worked, and other factors that lead to these wage differentials. But these factors are just as responsible for the overall difference in wages between men and women.

4. Let's eliminate the minimum wage for teenagers 

The minimum wage is a bad law. A high minimum wage prompts many firms to hire fewer teenagers – or none at all. Companies will only hire a teenager if they think that teenager will increase their profits, and a higher wage means less profit. Often workers are replaced with machinery, and if you’ve seen touch-screens at grocery stores or restaurants, you’re familiar with how easily machinery can replace young workers if lawmakers enforce high minimum wages. This hurts most the group that it purports to help – low-wage workers, by making many unemployable.