In the wake of Governor Jerry Brown announcing proposed legislation to raise California’s minimum wage by 50 percent – from $10 to $15 per hour by 2023 – economists on the left and right are weighing in to warn about negative consequences to workers and the economy overall.

The New York Times quotes liberal minimum wage expert Ben Zipperer from the Washington Center for Equitable Growth saying that the risks of California’s plan are significant:

Many economists, even some on the left, worry that a potential loss of jobs in a number of cities where wages are comparatively low could largely offset, and perhaps even more than offset, the boon of higher incomes at the bottom of the wage scale.

“Just as the benefits of this policy are likely to be greater because it covers a greater share of the work force than for past minimum wage increases, the risk of these costs is also higher,” said Ben Zipperer, an expert on the minimum wage at the liberal Washington Center for Equitable Growth. “It’s very unclear how that’s going to stack up.”

The Times reports that California’s plan could disproportionately impact lower-cost, inland cities like Bakersfield and Fresno, where University of Massachusetts professor Arindrajit Dube says “a majority of workers are likely to be directly or indirectly affected:”

San Francisco and San Jose, both high-wage cities that have benefited from the tech boom, are likely to weather the increase without so much as a ripple. The negative consequences of the minimum wage increase in Los Angeles and San Diego — large cities where wages are lower — are likely to be more pronounced, though they could remain modest on balance.

But in lower-wage, inland cities like Bakersfield and Fresno, the effects could play out in much less predictable ways. That’s because the rise of the minimum wage to $15 over the next six years would push the wage floor much closer to the expected pay for a worker in the middle of the wage scale, affecting a much higher proportion of employees and employers there than in high-wage cities.

“This is a big experiment,” said Arindrajit Dube, an economics professor at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst whose work has shown that modest minimum wage increases typically have limited effects on employment. “In areas like Fresno, a majority of workers are likely to be directly or indirectly affected.”

Meanwhile the conservative American Action Forum today released a study finding that California’s minimum wage hike will cost the state nearly 700,000 jobs:

American Action Forum (AAF) research has consistently shown, however, that proposals to raise the minimum wage often hurt those they intend to help by increasing joblessness among low-skilled workers and failing to deliver income gains to those who are actually in poverty. So, what would happen in California? This massive minimum wage increase could cost the state almost 700,000 jobs.

So if liberal and conservative economists agree that California’s plan will cost workers’ jobs and represents a significant risk to the economy, why is the state making itself “the guinea pig in a bold economics experiment?” The reason, says a key California labor leader, is that “the effect of empowering workers to influence their own fates could be transformative politically.” In other words, the reason is politics:

Moreover, the benefits of the higher wage may be more than purely economic.

Dave Regan is president of SEIU-United Healthcare Workers West, which represents more than 85,000 hospital workers in California and deployed more than 2,500 members to collect hundreds of thousands of signatures to qualify a minimum wage ballot initiative. He said that even if there were potential economic downsides, the effect of empowering workers to influence their own fates could be transformative politically.

“There’s so much cynicism, anger,” Mr. Regan said. “To have the governor and legislature responding in a positive and constructive way to our members is really important. It shows, ‘Wow, what we do really does matter.’”