Capitol Report
By State Representative, Leon D. Young
Leon D. Young
In last week’s column, we touched upon the widening pay gap between corporate CEOs and their rank-in-file workers. Some companies have even tried to down play the income disparity by arguing that stock and option grants are paid out over time, not all in one year, shewing pay figures higher for their chief executives.
Back in February, President Obama released his 2015 Economic Report which focused squarely on the challenges of rising income inequality and stagnant wages for average working families.
This problem is compounded even further by the current minimum wage.
The federal minimum wage is supposed to provide “a meaningful standard for the nation’s lowest-paid workers throughout the United States, regardless of where a worker is employed.”
But since 2009, the federal minimum wage of just $7.25 falls far short the adequate wage floor the national economy needs and workers deserve.
That is especially true in the 21 states where minimum wage is stuck at the $7.25 federal minimum.
Responding to this disparity, Senator Patty Murray (WA) and Representative Robert C. “Bobby” Scott (VA) introduced the Raise the Wage Act earlier this year.
If passed, this bill would gradually raise the federal minimum wage to $12 by 2020, index it thereafter to median wage growth, and eventually phase out the $2.13 subminimum wage for tipped workers.
In the 21 states where the minimum wage is stuck at $7.25, the Raise the Wage Act would benefit more than 15 million workers by 2020.
These 15 million workers represent 11 percent of all U.S. wage earners projected for 2020, and constitute 43.5 percent of the 35 million workers across the country whose wages would increase from the Raise the Wage Act.
Twenty-nine states plus the District of Columbia currently have minimum wages higher than the federal minimum.
Fourteen states, plus D.C., approved minimum wage increases in 2014.
Moreover, some of the nation’s larger cities, such as Seattle, San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and Kansas City, Missouri, have enacted local minimum wage levels that are higher than their states’ rates. In 2014, Seattle and San Francisco passed legislation that increased their respective minimum wages to $15 an hour.
Los Angeles followed suit in 2015 and became the largest city in the country to adopt $15 as its minimum wage standard.
Democratic presidential candidate Bernie Sanders has been a loud proponent of lifting the minimum wage for workers across the country.
He has introduced a bill in the U.S. Senate to raise the federal minimum wage from $7.25 per hour to $15.
Not surprisingly, Republican presidential hopeful Carly Fiorina says raising the minimum wage would lead to less opportunity. Ms. Fiorina, the former Hewlett-Packard (HP) CEO, has also advanced the argument that raising the minimum wage is a state, not a federal, decision.
Moreover, her insensitivity on this subject is easy to understand. As the CEO of HP, Carly Fiorina laid off 30,000 workers, shipped jobs to China and tripled her own salary; she also bought a $1 million yacht and five corporate jets.
There is something terribly with a nation where the top one-tenth of 1 percent owns almost as much wealth as the bottom 90 percent, where almost 20 percent our children are living in poverty and 40 percent of African-American children are living well below the poverty line.
It’s a complete and utter disgrace.