Minimum Wage

...at the Capital Beat.

It sucks that the General Assembly can't get a minimum wage increase passed even though most people want it and each house seems to be able to pass it on their own. And it sucks that someone would steal Old Fort's fireworks display.

“In North Carolina, the state Democratic Party complained that Rep. Charles Taylor (R-N.C.), "one of the richest members of Congress, ... cares little for those at the bottom of the economic ladder." Taylor voted against raising the minimum wage as a member of the House Appropriations Committee on two occasions.”(Chicago Tribune, June 22, 2006)

Friends, I wanted to write to you today to make sure you heard that within the past week Charles Taylor voted twice against raising the federal minimum wage.

Since the last minimum wage increase, over nine years ago, Congress has seen its salaries RISE by nearly $35,000. That’s more than what a person working full time at minimum wage makes in three years…in RAISES ALONE!

promoted and slightly edited - RP

This was posted @ The on line site for the Asheville Citizen - Times today.

RALEIGH — The state House last week approved legislation to raise the state’s minimum wage to $6.15 an hour, an increase of $1. The state Senate previously approved an increase as part of that chamber’s budget proposal. Here’s how House representatives from WNC voted:

Yes

• Rep. Bob England, D-Rutherford

• Rep Susan Fisher, D-Buncombe

• Rep. Bruce Goforth, D-Buncombe

• Rep. Phil Haire, D-Jackson

• Rep. Ray Rapp, D-Madison

The minimum wage in this state might just be going up here soon. According to a post on the Capital Beat blog at the Greensboro News & Record, both the North Carolina Senate and House passed legislative measures containing an increase in the minimum wage to $6.15 an hour.

The House and the Senate both voted to raise the state’s minimum wage to $6.15 an hour today, but both in different ways.

This morning, Senators gave final approval to their version of the budget, which has a minimum wage increase tacked onto it.

Hey folks, I’m enjoying taking a look a everyone’s comments and decided to take a few of them to heart. Our office is doing a big “news event” regarding the minimum wage on Monday, May 15th at 2pm. You can get more information at www.ncjustice.orgwww.ncjustice.org. It will take place at the Legislative Building on Jones Street (likely just right out in front – we thought we might do it inside).

John Edwards, Treasurer Richard Moore, and ubiquitous “other public officials” will be speaking.

Anyone who’d like to come would be more than welcome. The more people, the better.

When is an increase in the minimum wage not a victory for low wage workers? When it makes business compliance all but voluntary. Tennessee is set to implement a one dollar increase, but special interests got a hold of the process and removed any enforcement mechanism. This means that it's up to a worker earning less than $6.15 an hour to bring a civil lawsuit for enforcement. This absolutely must not happen here. We'll have to be on the lookout: a special interest victor in Tennessee will lead to the application of the same tactics here.

When it comes to a minimum wage increase, pro-business (anti-family) conservatives like to trot out phrases like "simple supply and demand." "The price of labor goes up," they say, "and a business has to buy less of it, and the wage increase ends up actually hurting the poor." It sounds reasonable, but it isn't true.

Below I'll lay out four facts that will come in handy as you talk about the minimum wage increase proposals that are now before the NC General Assembly. Not all conservatives are allergic to facts, and it's possible that you can inject a tone of common sense into the discussion.

Asheville Citizen-Times: "Gov. Mike Easley today proposed an $18.9 billion budget for the next fiscal year that would use a historic surplus for 8 percent teacher raises, a quarter-penny decrease in the sales tax and nearly $90 million to accelerate mental health reform."

Ah, fiscal sanity. Can you dig it?

Show me one Republican who's going to stand against raising teacher's pay and cutting taxes? I love this proposal.

Also, as a mental health professional, it's a relief to see that the governor gets it on mental health reform. The current reform is underfunding area programs and cutting services that no one else performs.

Sorry for the title, but this is just about the dumbest argument against a minimum wage increase that I've ever heard:

He says the higher the wage, the more likely minimum-wage jobs will attract people into the work force who haven't been seeking jobs in the past. Who are those people? Teenagers from wealthy families. Those teens begin to crowd out other teens and adults for minimum-wage jobs, so the higher minimum wage actually makes it harder for a low-income adult to find a job to support his family.

Right. Chase and Brittany, who would rather hang out at the club than flip burgers at $5.15 an hour are going to be beating down the doors to do that same job at $6.00 an hour.