Oddly, I didn’t find any of that nuance or context in your original comment. You presented absolutes and the data proved you wrong. Maybe the population has grown by more than 10% in 2.5 years like food service employment. At the same time, the overall unemployment rate has fallen since the wage hikes started.
> You presented absolutes and the data proved you wrong.
I could say an absolute statement that throwing more wood on the fire would make it hotter. If it also happens to drop into the lake, that doesn't prove me wrong. In any such statements, there's an implicit assumption that other effects stay the same, that I am not dropping the fire in the lake.
Seattle has undergone enormous change in the last 5 years due to Amazon. Ignoring that in any cause/effect analysis of the overall city invalidates the analysis.