Democratic lawmakers introduced legislation Wednesday to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour, more than double the current rate of $7.25. The legislation had the endorsement of top Democratic leaders who had endorsed a $12 rate in the last Congress.
“A $15 minimum wage is about dignity in the workplace & making sure American workers can provide for their families. #raisethewage,” tweeted Senate Democratic Leader. Chuck Schumer, D-N.Y.
“As hard as President Trump tries to stack the deck against workers — we need to keep fighting back & supporting working families #RaiseTheWage,” tweeted Sen. Patty Murray, D-Wash., the assistant Democratic leader. Murray had sponsored $12 legislation in the previous Congress.
Raise the Wage Act of 2017 was co-sponsored by Murray and Sen. Bernie Sanders, I-Vt., and a House version was offered by Reps. Bobby Scott, D-Va., and Keith Ellison, D-Minn. The minimum wage would be increased in phases and reach $15 by 2024.
At a Capitol Hill rally, activists cheered the lawmakers’ drive to raise the wage even higher than they proposed last year. “Now the whole party is behind the fight for $15,” said Rabbi Jason Kimmelman-Block, director of the activist group Bend the Arc.
The legislation is unlikely to go anywhere in the Republican-controlled Congress, although an increase short of the $15 level is possible. President Trump called for raising the federal rate to as high as $10 during the presidential campaign, though at other times his comments suggested he would leave it untouched. Several speakers at the rally called on Trump to live up to rhetoric.
Most economists believe raising the rate to the level the activists want would have a severe impact on jobs. The American Action Forum, a Washington think tank, is set to release a study Thursday that will argue the increase to $15 an hour in California and New York will cost them 65,000 and 109,000 jobs, respectively.
“Recent studies have shown dramatic increases to the minimum wage could have a damaging effect on local economies and result in overall job losses. As the second-largest private-sector employer in the country, we are committed to protecting restaurant jobs and the millions of small businesses that make up the restaurant industry. We need policies that help restaurants create more jobs, not less,” said Cicely Simpson, the National Restaurant Association’s executive vice president of government affairs.
Liberal groups dispute this contention, arguing that the increase would help the economy. “If we raised it to $15 by 2024, for the first time ever, the minimum wage would no longer be a poverty wage. Tens of millions of workers, mostly adults who provide more than sixty percent of their family’s income, would benefit from going to $15. This would, in turn, benefit their communities,” said David Cooper, senior analyst for liberal Economic Policy Institute.
