Raising the Minimum Wage
The federal minimum wage has not been raised in over 12 years.
In those twelve years, the minimum wage has lost 21% of it's value. Currently, the minimum wage is not enough to afford a two-bedroom apartment anywhere in the United States, and not enough to afford a one-bedroom apartment in 93% of U.S. counties at fair market rent by working a standard 40-hour work week.
Quite simply, the minimum wage is a poverty wage, and while states have taken the lead to increase wages in 30 states, 20 still have a minimum wage set at the federal poverty level of just $7.25 an hour.
By setting such a low wage floor, companies like Amazon, Walmart, and McDonald's are allowed to pay below a level that workers need to survive, forcing them to turn to public assistance to survive and costing Americans billions for the benefit of their bottom line.
The history of the minimum wage
The minimum wage was created with the passage of the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1938 as part of the movement that created overtime protection, barred child labor, and created the basic collective bargaining and union framework still in use for workers across the country.
However, agricultural, domestic, and most restaurant workers were initially excluded at the behest of racist southern legislators in an attempt to bar Black workers and women from the protections of a minimum wage. The 1966 FLSA amendment expanded minimum wage protections to many previously excluded sectors of the economy, including hotels and restaurants.
In the 1950s and 1960s, Congress raised the minimum wage more frequently such that it rose roughly in line with the pace of economy-wide productivity. At the peak purchasing power of the minimum wage in 1968, a minimum wage worker earned $10.59 per hour (in 2021 dollars), 46% more than a worker at the $7.25 federal minimum wage today.
In 1996, the tipped subminimum wage was decoupled from the minimum wage, meaning that it has remained at $2.13 since 1991, despite modest increases in the minimum wage since then.
In 2015, minimum wage and overtime protections were extended to home healthcare workers, who had been excluded since the creation of the act.
Raising the minimum wage
Because Republicans in Congress have refused to budge on increasing the minimum wage for over a decade, $15 in most places is not enough. Millions of workers are still being saddled with far-below- poverty-level wages. States that have raised the minimum wage should go higher. The Raise the Wage Act of 2021, currently sitting before the House and Senate, successfully passed the House in 2019. Since then, inflation has gone up 10.7% inclusively. The fact is that, without the demand from workers, a strong minimum coalesced around the $15 requirement. It was the movement that made the demand, and that brought elected officials and corporations to adopt the minimum. wage would not have
Raising the minimum wage to just $15/hr would increase the wages of 32 million workers. This wage increase would increase the earnings of nearly 3 Black workers (31%) and 1 in 4 Hispanic workers (26%). Of those that would benefit from raising the minimum wage: 88% are 20 or older 36% are 40 or older 56% are women 39.5% live in rural areas 55% work full-time 28% have children Additionally, Southern workers would benefit the most as only one state in the Southeast (Florida) has raised their wage above the federal minimum on track to $15/hr. Additionally, state preemption laws which ban cities from raising the minimum wage locally add to the legacy of the Jim Crow South to keep workers of color and women from making more money.