Economics Rears Its Ugly Head In That Most Unlikely of Places

The laws of economics hold, even in DC:

DC City Council Chairman Phil Mendelson announced Monday that he along with several other council members would introduce a bill during Tuesday's session to repel Initiative 77, the city's newly-passed $15 an hour minimum wage.

Council members Jack Evans, D-Ward 2, and Brandon Todd, D-Ward 4, announced they would back voiding the initiative, which DC voters approved by a 55 percent to 44 percent margin just last month.

"I don't believe the law that Initiative 77 would put into place is good for our city, good for our restaurant industry or good for our workers," Evans told a local ABC affiliate. Evans and others on the city council as well as Democratic Mayor Muriel Bowser have long been critical of the initiative. The DC charter allows the council to overturn voter-passed initiatives by a simple majority vote, which the anti-Initiative 77 side appears to have.

Repealing the initiative makes good economic sense.  Whether or not overturning a bad (but entirely legal) law that the voters want makes for good democratic governance, that's an entirely different story.