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Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007

Date: Jan. 10, 2007
Location: Washington, DC
Issues: Unemployed and Low-Income


FAIR MINIMUM WAGE ACT OF 2007

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Ms. DeLAURO. Mr. Speaker, it has been 10 years since this Congress last approved an increase in the minimum wage. In that time, increasing numbers of families have fallen out of the middle class, victims of economic pressures from rising health care and college tuition costs to gas prices, and an economic policy from an administration that has always seemed to push working families aside.

Raising the Federal minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 an hour is so important so the fundamentals of our economy remain strong. But that barely masks the troubles that families face. Household incomes are down nearly $1,300 from 2000, employee compensation at its lowest level in 40 years. This economy is not producing rising living standards for most families. Today we can expect to have the first sustained period of economic growth since World War II that fails to offer a comparable increase in wages for workers.

Raising the minimum wage is not about handouts or making political statements but rather raising the earnings floor for workers in this country. Indeed, today a full-time minimum wage worker still earns only $10,700 a year. My colleagues on the other side of the aisle, we make almost $163,000 a year, and we are opposed to $2 in a raise for working families? My friends, walk in the shoes of people who work every single day for a living. This Congress in the last session barely worked 2 days a week here for $163,000 a year. Take heed. Raising the minimum wage has big consequences.

You know, 4 years after the last minimum wage increase, the American economy experienced its strongest growth in over three decades. Between 1997 and 2003, small business employment grew in States that had a higher minimum wage than those with a Federal minimum wage.

Mr. Speaker, it comes down to priorities. It is long past time here that this Congress recognize that we have an obligation to work to raise the standard of living in America for every single family, not just for the few at the top of the heap. That is what this legislation is about, and I am proud to support it.

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