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What Happened to the Minimum Wage? Nothing in a long time …

4/7/2007, 8:43 am

The anticipated increase to the Minimum Wage promised by the Democrats has not yet happened. Nor does it appear to be on the immediate horizon. In fact, the last increase in the Minimum Wage occurred in 1997 when it was increased from $4.75 to $5.15 per hour.

Using the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis’ Consumer Price Index Calculator it’s obvious the minimum wage has failed to keep pace with the government’s own data about what it costs to live in the US. Just to keep up with the cost of living, the minimum wage should currently be $6.10. However, ten years since the last increase, the Minimum Wage is still only $5.15 or 15.6% less than it would need to be to have kept pace with the cost of living.

In general terms, this means a person earning the minimum wage today can only buy 84.4% of the food, clothing, housing, etc. that a person could have purchased 10 years ago. But lets look at it in practical terms, a person working full time (2,080 hours) will earn only $10,712 per year. And that’s before deductions and reductions.

Now, take a look at pay of Congress, the body which sets the Federal Minimum Wage. The pay raises members of the US Congress have voted for themselves during the last 10 years are more than 3 times the total annual salary of a person earning minimum wage! Members of the US Congress have voted themselves pay raises of $34,400 during the nearly 10 years that have passed since they last voted an increase to the minimum wage in the US.

If you think there’s something wrong with this picture, you may want to contact your elected officials.

Contact US Representatives: http://www.house.gov/house/MemberWWW.shtml
Contact US Senators: http://www.senate.gov/general/contact_information/senators_cfm.cfm

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And these are the sites used to find this data:
http://minneapolisfed.org/research/data/us/calc/
http://www.dixonlibrary.com/salary-1996.htm
http://www.dol.gov/esa/minwage/chart.htm
http://usgovinfo.about.com/library/weekly/aa031200a.htm

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