In the wake of great criticism, we feel it is imperative to inform the campus of the importance of the current motion in the federal legislature to increase the minimum wage from the stagnant $5.15 per hour to $7.25, a proposal that is overwhelmingly supported by over 650 credentialed economists, 5 Nobel Laureates, the Democratic Party, and even President George W. Bush. As College Democrats, we feel that the case being made against a minimum wage enhancement is presumptuous and unsubstantiated.
To deny the positive effects the minimum wage has had upon the lives of countless average Americans since Franklin Roosevelt implemented it at the federal level in 1938 is absurd. Even more so is the too common allegation that raising the minimum wage will have detrimental effects upon employment and inflation. Were this the case, history would be replete with examples, but it isn’t.
Due to the rising inflation rates of the last decade, the value of the minimum wage is now the lowest it has been since 1951, having dropped 20 percent since it was last adjusted in 1997. According to the Economic Policy Institute, a full-time minimum wage worker has a gross annual income of $10,712. This, we understand, may not bump a household comprised of a single person below the poverty threshold (determined by the Department of Health and Human Services to be $9,570 gross household income for the year 2005) but for a household of two or more, as is the case with over a million single parents with children who cannot accrue the required $12,830. It is literally impossible to work full-time earning the present minimum wage and be anything but destitute.
The mainstay of most arguments against a minimum wage hike relies upon the assumption that there are enough minimum wage recipients to cause an escalation in overall market prices once workers receive a $2.10 pay raise. That is simply not the case. If $7.25 were established as the lowest hourly wage permissible under federal law, 11% of the U.S. workforce would see an increase in their salaries. That is neither enough to cause the spike in inflation predicted by its detractors nor the loss of jobs due to the increase in the cost of labor, which is undoubtedly an essential input.
Furthermore, as of November 2006, 28 states chose to raise their minimum wages above the mandatory federal level of $5.15 or passed legislation that will accomplish that within the next year (North Carolina is included among these). These states have not seen the ramifications that opponents of a minimum wage boost warn of.
As a long overdue increase in the minimum wage is a basic tenet of the Democratic Party’s platform, we felt obligated to defend this measure.
In its 69-year life span, the minimum wage has played an indispensable role in the economic well-being of many honorable working people. On January 10th of this year, the passage of the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 through the U.S. House of Representatives was smooth and authoritative. It is our hope that it will pass the Senate without impediment.
