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I have a problem with this question.

Is it necessary for the argument to assume that the fast food minimum wage availability is representative of the general minimum wage job availability in general?

FF MW jobs being representative is not necessary as the FF MW jobs could have really underperformed by staying roughly the same. While the rest of the non-FF MW jobs were increasing, FF MW jobs stayed roughly the same. This would still count as being unrepresentative, yet it would not hurt the argument.

Bump

Good point. FF could be non-representative, while the argument was even stronger.

I *think* the reason it works is that if Fast food isn't representative, then the argument's evidence is crappy. Suppose I argue that America is less rich than Luxembourg (true). My evidence is that hobos in America are less rich than citizens in Luxembourg.

That's a pretty bad argument. Hobos are unrepresentative of average population wealth.

Now, as it turns out, my conclusion is correct. The average american is less wealthy than a citizen of Luxembourg. But that doesn't make my argument good.

It would only be a good argument to mention hobos if they were somehow representative. Likewise with fast-food.

Make sense? I just thought this up on the spot, so I'm sure I didn't express it as well as I could have.

Thanks for your take on it. I still must maintain that it is not necessary for it to be representative. You can negate the assumption and have it STRENGTHEN the argument.

My point was that negating the assumption the way you said it would strengthen the *conclusion*, but it wouldn't help the argument, which is premise + conclusion.