The Short Version
The claim that minimum wage increases "consistently and universally" raise unemployment is not supported by the evidence. While some studies find modest negative employment effects for specific subgroups (teens, low-skill workers), high-authority research from the CBO, IMF, NBER, and UK government reviews finds effects that are often near zero, negligible, or even positive in concentrated labor markets. The absolute framing of "consistently and universally" is contradicted by decades of empirical research showing highly heterogeneous, context-dependent outcomes.