Minimum wageShould state pick up where Congress failed?
In the nine years since the nation’s minimum wage was last raised, the salary of Congressional members’ take-home pay rose by more than double the amount the working poor could hope to earn. At $5.15 an hour, and a 40-hour work week, a minimum wage earner would gross $10,712. For a single mother with one child, that’s $2,000 below poverty.
Senate members who voted this week to deny raising the minimum wage, have seen their own incomes grow $28,000 a year since 1996 – the last time the minimum wage was hiked. Is there any question that the gap between the poor and well-off has widened?
Senate Democrats hoped to tie an increase to the minimum wage with passage of a bankruptcy bill. The amendment was misplaced, although the argument that it is past time to bump up pay for struggling families is not. Democrats had wanted a $2.10 raise over the next 26 months. Republicans countered with a $1.10 increase over 18 months. Neither passed. It’s doubtful that another chance will arise anytime soon.
State Sen. Christine M. Tartaglione reasons that if Congress won’t act, Pennsylvania ought to. She shoots down critics who claim minimum-wage earners are “suburban teens in pizza shops.” Instead, Tartaglione said, one-third of adults earning minimum wage are parents of young children.
She faces a difficult challenge bringing her bill before the state Senate. The same arguments will be trotted out by Republicans that jobs will be lost, rather than created; businesses will suffer; consumers will pay more, just so some pimply-faced teens have a few extra bucks to buy video games. Little mention will be made of state legislators’ built-in cost-of-living raises that they enjoy each year. Or of the growing disparity between wages paid to corporate executives and blue-collar workers.
Our circulation area in Fayette and Greene is considered to be home to a high concentration of people living at or below poverty. We know people are holding down a couple minimum-wage jobs just to survive.
We’d like to hear from them. Would $2 more an hour make much of a difference in your life? If you’re working two jobs, would you be able to cut back and spend more time raising your children?
And we’d like to hear from employers. Would $2 more an hour pose a substantial hardship? Cause you to employ fewer people?
Write to us.
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