[handoflixue]

Is it? Minimum wage is a pretty simple law, compared to the paperwork and bureaucracy of existing welfare programs. I suppose you could go with Universal Basic Income, but I'm not convinced society is actually ready for that one yet.

How would such a program even work? If we say the Maintenance Wage is $15, is the government just paying the difference between that and the market rate? If so, it seems the ideal salaries to offer are $0 (let the government subsidize it) and $16+ (but you could just get two $0 workers, so I'd expect pay scales to really start at more like $30?)

This seems like it rapidly descends into Bureaucracy or Communism

[zeroCalories]

Just because a law is simple does not mean it's efficient. We are talking about the total value being produced. But if you want simple, something like a negative income tax would be simple and decently efficient.

[navi0]

This already exists: Earned Income Tax Credit: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earned_income_tax_credit