Minimum Wage

Raising the minimum wage, as proposed in the Rebuild America Act, would help women in a lot of ways. It would help pull women and their families out of poverty, narrow the wage gap, and strengthen the economy. But it would also help women in another way you might not have thought of – by improving their retirement security.

How is it that raising the minimum wage now would help women years down the line when they retire? For starters, lower earnings mean less money available to set aside for retirement. Increasing the minimum wage would give women a little extra money to save for the future. Read more »

True or false: raising the minimum wage is bad for the economy.

False. While many opponents of raising the minimum wage would have you believe otherwise, the truth of the matter is that raising the minimum wage is good for the economy. So the next time you run into a critic of raising the minimum wage, here are three points to help you set the record straight.

1. Raising the minimum wage does not cause job loss, even during periods of recession. A recent report by the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) reviewed several studies that found that minimum wage increases do not have negative effects on the labor market. The most recent study by Allegretto, Dube, and Reich (2011) looked at the impact of raising the minimum wage at different phases of the business cycle between 1999 and 2009. The study didn’t find evidence that minimum wage increases caused any job loss, even during the Great Recession of 2007-2009.

Today, July 24th, marks three years since the last time the federal minimum wage increased. It currently stands at a measly $7.25 per hour, just $14,500 for people who work full time, year round. Rep. DeLauro (D-CT) and Rep. Braley (D-IA) and Senator Harkin (D-IA) have introduced legislation in the Rebuild America Act to raise the minimum wage to $9.80 over three years, providing full-time, year-round workers with a raise of $5,100 annually – nearly 35 percent. After that, the minimum wage would be indexed to inflation to maintain its value – a huge win for workers. This would be especially important to women workers who represent two-thirds of workers earning the federal minimum wage or less, including two-thirds of tipped workers who have a federal minimum cash wage of only $2.13.

So what would $5,100 mean each year for minimum wage workers?

It’s always nice to start the weekend off with a bit of good news. Starting next year, Rhode Island minimum wage workers will get a small raise. Governor Lincoln Chafee has signed a bill that would raise the minimum wage to $7.75 per hour in the state, a 35 cent per hour increase.

As I mentioned previously, this increase falls well short of what is needed, but it’s good to see a state taking a step in the right direction. There are minimum wage bills pending in several other states – New York, New Jersey, Illinois and Massachusetts– that would do much more for minimum wage workers, the majority of whom are women, but Rhode Island is the only state to enact an increase so far this year.  So, thank you to Governor Chafee and the Rhode Island legislature for recognizing that minimum wage workers deserve a raise! Read more »

There’s some positive news on the state minimum wage front. The Rhode Island legislature has passed a bill to raise the minimum wage in the state from $7.40 to $7.75. While 35 cents an hour falls short of the raise that’s needed, as the chairwoman of the House Labor Committee rightly points out, every little bit helps. Read more »

One hundred years ago this week, on June 4, 1912, Massachusetts enacted the first minimum wage law in the United States – the first in a series of similar laws that states passed in the years before the federal minimum wage was established in the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) of 1938. 

In honor of this milestone, I read up on the history of the minimum wage and was struck by how one old adage seems to apply: the more things change, the more they stay the same.  Here are a few facts about the minimum wage in its early days that remain just as true today.   

• The minimum wage is critical issue for women.  That first minimum wage law in Massachusetts set up a commission to determine a minimum wage only for women workers, who were especially vulnerable to exploitation by employers and regularly were paid less than men.  It was the first female Cabinet member – Frances Perkins, the Secretary of Labor under President Franklin D. Roosevelt (and an all-around rock star) who later advocated forcefully for the first federal minimum wage law, often citing the particularly deplorable wages and working conditions faced by women and children.

There are currently two major pieces of legislation in Congress that would help close the wage gap. One is the Paycheck Fairness Act (PFA), which is scheduled for a vote soon. The PFA would strengthen current laws against wage discrimination by protecting employees who voluntarily share pay information with colleagues from retaliation, fully compensating victims of sex-based pay discrimination, empowering women and girls by strengthening their negotiation skills, and holding employers more accountable under the Equal Pay Act. The other is one that you might not think of: the Rebuild America Act, which would raise the federal minimum wage from just $7.25 per hour to $9.80 per hour, giving a raise to millions of women workers.

Each year, millions of workers struggle to make ends meet on minimum wage earnings. Roughly two-thirds of these workers are women. They provide care for children and elders, clean homes and offices, and wait tables. Read more »

I have to admit, I’m feeling pretty good today — I’m just hours away from starting a long holiday weekend, and I get to report more happy news on the minimum wage! Today’s update comes from New Jersey, where the General Assembly just passed a bill (A-2162) that would raise the state minimum wage from $7.25 to $8.50 per hour and index the wage to keep pace with inflation. The Economic Policy Institute (EPI) estimates that over half a million workers — the majority of them women — will get a raise if A-2162 is enacted.

That raise is sorely needed: full-time minimum wage earnings of $14,500 a year leave a mom with two children thousands of dollars below the federal poverty line in a state with one of the highest costs of living in the country. Raising New Jersey’s minimum wage to $8.50 per hour would mean an extra $2,500 per year, which could make a real difference for women and families struggling to make ends meet. And indexing the wage for inflation would help ensure that the buying power of the minimum wage does not erode as it has over the past decades; indeed, if the minimum wage had kept pace with inflation since the 1960s, it would be more than $10.50 per hour today.

Low-wage workers and their families are not the only ones who would benefit from a minimum wage increase – New Jersey’s economy would get a boost, too. More money in workers’ pockets means more dollars flowing into local businesses, and that means more jobs: according to EPI, raising the minimum wage to $8.50 per hour would generate over $277 million in economic activity in New Jersey, creating close to 2,500 jobs. Read more »

There's good news and bad news for women and families in New York this week.

The good news: The State Assembly recently voted to raise the minimum wage from $7.25 to $8.50 per hour and tie it to the rising cost of living. That would mean an extra $2,500 each year for minimum wage workers in New York, nearly two-thirds of whom are women.

The bad news: To keep up the momentum on this critical issue, we need strong leadership from Governor Cuomo and the state Senate — or the bill is likely to stall.

More good news: You can help. Tell Governor Cuomo to fight for a strong minimum wage increase and tell your state Senator to pass the minimum wage bill, A. 9148. They need to hear from you! Read more »

You could help get hundreds of thousands of working New Jersey women a much-needed raise. More than half of the workers earning the state minimum wage of just $7.25 an hour are women. Many of these women struggle to support families on just $14,500 for a year of full-time work — thousands of dollars below the poverty line for a mom with two kids.

This Thursday, May 24 a bill that would raise the minimum wage to $8.50 per hour and tie it to the rising cost of living will be before the General Assembly.

Take action: click here to look up your Assemblymember's phone number. Then, call and ask him or her to vote YES on A-2162! Be sure to click on the "New Jersey" tab to find your STATE Representative (Assemblymember).

When connected, please tell your Assemblymember's office:

• Your name, where you are from, and that you are a constituent.
• Please tell _____________ that I strongly urge him/her to give hardworking New Jerseyans a raise by voting YES on A-2162. Thank you.

This bill would mean an extra $2,500 each year for many New Jersey women and their families. Read more »