Businesses being cost-conscious suggests that minimum wage laws can hurt employment

From Mark Perry. 

"Most people understand generally that businesses are extremely cost-conscious, operate on thin profit margins, and have to operate as efficiently as possible to survive and stay in business, and will shift their factories and production facilities from high-wage to low-wage countries. But then many of those same people seem to think that small businesses and restaurants in cities like LA who operate on razor-thin margins and who employ minimum wage workers can somehow easily absorb a 66% increase in their labor costs? The eventual $6 per hour increase in LA’s minimum wage will increase the annual cost of employing a full-time minimum wage worker by more than $13,000 (including employers’ share of payroll taxes). No wonder the LA business community objected. In comments I featured before on CD, raising the minimum wage to $15 per hour is not a political problem, it’s a “math problem.” And the “new math” of a $15 minimum wage will break the system for many restaurants and small businesses."