As Individuals grapple with the stiffest inflation in 40 years, many employees could ponder one other milestone right now: It has been precisely 13 years for the reason that final time the U.S. raised the federal minimal wage.
That is the longest time the baseline wage has stayed flat for the reason that nation first carried out a minimal wage through the Nice Melancholy.
"Right now is a tragic anniversary in the USA," the Patriotic Millionaires, a bunch in favor of progressive taxes, mentioned in an announcement. "Lawmakers have turned their backs on America's tens of thousands and thousands of low-wage employees and revealed themselves to be beholden to the short-sighted pursuits of a few of their ultra-rich donors."
Since 2009, when the federal minimal rose to $7.25 an hour, it is misplaced greater than one-fourth of its buying energy. When factoring in inflation, right now's minimal wage hasn't been value this little for the reason that Fifties, in accordance with calculation from the Financial Coverage Institute.
"Since 2009, employees have endured the Nice Recession, a worldwide pandemic, historic inflation and big modifications in the price of dwelling," the Patriotic Millionaires mentioned, calling the $7.25 hourly wage "deplorable."
At that price, a full-time employee makes $15,080 in a yr, simply above the federal poverty line.
Within the absence of federal motion, many cities and states have hiked their very own minimal wages — a few of them to double the federal baseline. However 20 states, most of them within the South, nonetheless observe the federal minimal right now.
The Congressional Funds Workplace has estimated that elevating the minimal wage to $15 an hour would give a pay bump to as many as 27 million employees, or one-sixth of the U.S. labor power.
If the minimal wage had risen together with employees' productiveness for the reason that Nineteen Seventies, it might at the moment be set at almost $26 an hour, in accordance with the Middle for Financial and Coverage Analysis.