Minimum Wage War

I keep hearing news of impending problems with the economy due to numerous causes, the most obvious being the cost of fuel to get anywhere, especially with it's expected rise in the next few months. One area that I think you can expect to start seeing some steady changes is in the food service industry, that is anything from White Castles to Fine Dinning.
First of all, I hope that I turn out to be wrong on this somehow, but I just can't see how an acceptable balance will be found.
The problem is this: PART A) Minimum Wage is now $7.00 per hour (in Ohio), that is for any person off the street regardless of experience. Don't get me wrong, i think that it needed to be raised from the $5ish dollars it was for so long, a number of people unfortunately are reliant on minimum wage to pay their bills and keep from becoming homeless, but that's a different story all together. PART B) The average starting pay for food service workers probably averages at about $9.00 per hour for someone with some previous experience in food service. I believe McDonald's starts at around $8.50 per hour, however they have plenty of capital to draw on and certainly have a much higher profit margin than restaurants that are more upscale.
PART C) Typically, restaurant owners, especially if a restaurant is owned by a group of people, are not going to want to endure great strain on their profits due to a rise in the cost of employment, here are some options of what will be done; 1. Higher costs of eating out, even more so than just with inflation since it now cost more to ship foods with rising fuel costs. That Filet Mignon that everyone thinks is so great no longer will run you $18-$25 an entree but more like $25-$30. Increased cost of goods, and labor will eventually make their way to the plate. 2. "The Wal-Mart Dilemma"- Restaurants that are accustomed to hiring more experienced people to offer higher quality goods and services will begin to hire less experienced people at a cheaper wage to maintain similar menu pricing that won't scare off customers. The idea here is same quality for a lower price. This can work to an extent, but eventually, you get what you pay for. Wal-Mart is Very affordable (hence the grotesquely large company that it is) but they have what has got to be some of, if not the worst customer service of any store in the United States. A huge company can afford to do this because people will buy needed/wanted items regardless of service especially if the end product is acceptable. However, if a restaurant begins to drop off in their service and their food becomes "less than acceptable" at the same time, this could completely destroy a small or independently owned operation. (Although this could be a great way to thin out the over abundance of mediocre-to-bad Italian Pasta/Pizza and Chinese restaurants in town). 3. Finally, much smaller portions. (this is my positive spin on a bad situation) Quality could remain the same as what has come to be expected, Prices could remain the same as they have except for the occasional hike due to inflation, the only noticeable difference is one that The U.S. has needed for quite some time anyway, less food on the plate. Let's face it, most of us aren't going to starve to death if that ridiculous 12-14 ounce steak goes down to an 8 ounce one, god forbid, there might leave room for some vegetation on the plate. There are some other health benefits to this as well, less meat (any miscellaneous dead animal) on the plate coupled with more vegetables and legumes (the mid west gets plenty of frickin starch!) could eventually lead to less cancer, lower risk of heart disease, lower rates of obesity and type II diabetes, children that will actually live longer than their parents, the list could go on.
I just wanted to put this out there so people aren't too surprised in the next year or so as things start to really change, especially if the minimum wage continues to rise each year, in which case the economy will eventually, completely fall apart and we'll be run by another country, but until then,
Eat your corn! -g