The belief that increasing the minimum wage is socially beneficial is a delusion. It is short$-$sighted and ignores evident reality. Workers who retain their jobs are made better off but only at the expense of unskilled, mostly young, workers who either lose their jobs or can't find a job at the legal minimum. Supporters of minimum$-$wage laws maintain that they enhance the work ethic and increase the standard of living of workers and that they decrease the cost of social welfare programs and protect workers against exploitation at the hands of their employers.