In 2007, a full-time minimum wage worker earned $10,712 – nearly 40% below the poverty line for a family of three. Restoring the minimum wage to half of the average wage – as it was during the 1950s and 1960s – will benefit 4.5 million poor workers and nearly 9 million other low-income workers, and lift 1.7 million people out of poverty.
A press release from the Congressional Progressive Caucus, chaired by Rep. Lynn Woolsey (D-CA) and Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) announced the expanded caucus’ priorities for the next session. Among the top issues the caucus will take up is “reducing poverty and promoting economic fairness, including raising the minimum wage to a livable level” and “creating millions of ‘green’ jobs.”
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By Peter B. Edelman, Mark H. Greenberg, and Harry J. Holzer in the Washington Post
As policymakers struggle to respond to the global financial meltdown, most analysts suggest that our economy is entering a fairly serious and lengthy recession, with perhaps the highest unemployment rates in a generation. If true, this would inflict economic pain on most Americans — but the most severe effects will be felt by disadvantaged adults, youths and their families.
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Lisa Donner, the Executive Director of Half in Ten, contributes to Politico’s “Dear 44: Ideas for the Next President” series:
What should the 44th president do about poverty in our great nation? He should make cutting poverty a clear goal of his administration and prioritize a set of initiatives that will make the most significant contributions to meeting it. We can — and should — cut poverty in half in the next 10 years.
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By the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights’ Alexander Botting
With high gas prices and a faltering economy, low-wage American workers are finding it increasingly difficult to meet their every day needs. On July 31, the House Committee on Education and Labor held a hearing to discuss the growing income gap between the American middle class and top income earners, and hear experts’ views on proposed policy solutions.
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By the Leadership Conference on Civil Rights’ Jon Jackson
The federal minimum wage rose to $6.55 on July 24, giving more than 2 million workers a few more dollars in their paychecks.
The wage increase is the second part of the three-phase Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007. The final increase will be next year, when the minimum wage goes up again to $7.25 an hour.
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Dozens of grassroots community organizations gathered at the Hartford Boys and Girls Club, along with Hartford Mayor Eddie Perez, Secretary of State Susan Bysiewicz, and a number of state legislators. Over 120 people attended a roundtable discussion and press conference in support of an increase in the Connecticut minimum wage – recently raised by the state legislature, which overrode Governor Jodi Rell’s veto. Later in the day in Bridgeport, over 250 residents and local elected officials took part in an event at the site of a new residential development, highlighting the need for more affordable housing in the area. Speaking to reporters, Marilyn Ondrasik, the executive director of the Bridgeport Child Advocacy Coalition, said that, “Addressing poverty needs to start right here, right now.”
Minimum wage activists joined together on July 11 in Newark to help launch New Jersey’s Raise the Wage campaign. The state’s Minimum Wage Advisory Commission led by Governor Jon Corzine’s labor commissioner has called for substantially increasing New Jersey’s minimum wage and adjusting each year based on the cost of living so that it does not fall in value again. The Raise the Wage coalition, led by the National Employment Law Project and New Jersey Policy Perspective and made up of over 20 advocacy groups, community organizations, and workers groups, echoed the Advisory Commission’s recommendations. It is calling for increasing New Jersey’s minimum wage to at least $8.50 per hour and adjusting it each year so that it keeps up with the rapidly rising cost of food, gas and necessities.
Speaking before activists and community leaders at North
Philadelphia’s Thankful Baptist Church, Senator John Edwards launched
the Half in Ten campaign by calling on Congress, the presidential
candidates, and all Americans to make the fight against poverty a
priority.
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