Democrats Cheer Wage Hike
2007-07-25
Source: Washington Post
For workers at the bottom of the U.S. economy, paychecks got a little fatter yesterday.
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rss feedOn Capitol Hill, Democrats celebrated their achievement in pushing through the first increases in the federal minimum wage in a decade. Under a law that they championed and that President Bush signed in May, the minimum wage jumped 70 cents, to $5.85 an hour. The hike ended the longest stretch without an increase since the federal minimum wage was enacted in 1938.
The wage will increase another 70 cents in each of the next two summers to reach $7.25 an hour in July 2009, a 41 percent increase over the $5.15 wage that had been in place since 1997. An estimated 5.3 million workers earn less than $7.25 an hour, according to the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington research group.
"Welcome to pay raise day of 2007," Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) said yesterday at a rally of union and activist groups on Capitol Hill.
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