Now is not the time to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour.
That’s not to say the current rate of $7.25 is adequate — far from it. But saddling President Joe Biden’s relief bill with a new minimum wage does neither justice, and risks their ultimate demise.
By a narrow vote, 219-212, the House passed the $1.9 trillion package in the wee hours of Saturday, and with it the wage hike.
Two things make that impossible to replicate in the Senate.
First, the Senate parliamentarian, a non-elected official whose job is to review chamber actions, has said attaching the minimum wage hike to the coronavirus relief package does not meet the Senate’s strict requirements of reconciliation, the fast-track process Democrats are using to pass the bill with a simple 51-vote majority.
Democrats decided not to protest — at least for too long — that decision because of their bigger problem: Democrats Joe Manchin of West Virginia and Kirstyn Sinema of Arizona have said they would not support it.
BIDEN ACCEPTS the reality. Losing a battle doesn’t mean you’ve lost the war.
He’s also right to keep his focus on the goal of getting the stimulus package passed before millions of Americans lose their enhanced unemployment benefits, set to expire on March 14.
Under the president’s American Rescue Plan, the unemployed would receive enhanced benefits of $400 a week up through August.
The plan also includes funds for a new round of $1,400 stimulus checks to individuals making less than $75,000, $130 billion for schools, $350 billion for state and local governments, an expanded child tax credit, food assistance and rental relief, and tens of billions of dollars for vaccine distribution and more testing.
Too much?
No way.
A year into the pandemic, only half the jobs lost have returned.
As for the minimum wage, it will be back on the front burner in no time.
It’s been since 2009 that the base wage has been raised. Since then, the rising cost of living has eroded its value by more than 25%. One in 10 children experience food insecurity because their parents are either unemployed or under-employed.
Even so, it’s unlikely Congress will agree to stair-stepping to $15 over the next four years, as has been proposed. Because while $15 an hour may be easy to swing in New York or California, it’s a hard sell in the poorer states in the South and Midwest.
The Congressional Budget Office has estimated the wage increase would lift up 17 million workers, but eliminate 1.4 million jobs, or less than 1% of the job market, primarily affecting the young and less educated.
The answer?
A bipartisan discussion that arrives at compromise. Manchin says West Virginia could swing $11 an hour; Sens. Mitt Romney of Utah and Tom Cotton of Arkansas say $10 is the right amount.
