Minimum Wage: A Case Study

Ira Knight, who is an author of article “Let’s Make the Minimum Wage a Living Wage”, expresses an opinion that increasing the minimum wage would help all struggling workers and at the same time improve U.S economy. On the other side, Janice Steele in her article “Keep the Minimum Wage Where It Is” argues that raising the minimum wage would have bad effects on workers, consumers and small businesses. Ira Knight’s article seems to be the stronger of the two positions because her arguments are based on several recent studies, and last but not least, she had a personal experience with the minimum wage job.

The minimum wage is not suitable for society because it is too low and due to this, employees tend to overwork with more than one job, which leads them to not be available for their families enough, and they are unable to make progress with this wage

The United States has a history of changes to the minimum wage law. “Early in the administration of the FLSA (Fair labor Standards Act); it became apparent that application of the statutory minimum wage was likely to produce undesirable effects upon the economies of Puerto Rico and the Virgin islands .In 1949, the minimum wage was raised from 40 cents and hours to 75 cents an hour for all workers. A 1955 amendment increased the minimum wage to $1.00 an hour with no changes in coverage. The minimum wage increased to $2.00 an hour in 1974, and $2.10 in 1975, and $

The minimum wage was established in the United States by the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 at 25 cents per hour. These laws are broadly supported by the public. Congress enacted these rules to combat “labor conditions detrimental to the maintenance of the minimum standard of living necessary for health, efficiency, and the general well-being of the workers” (Sharp, 2013 p. 71). The purpose and intent of

The selling point that has brought people to the United States for centuries is the American dream: Prosperity, Luxury, Opportunity, and so on. Unfortunately for many, this dream has been squandered by the receding economy of an indebted country. As inflation runs rampant, the value of the U.S. dollar decreases, lowering the value of household and business incomes. This economic recession has led many, especially those who only earn the minimum wage, to poverty. According to the United States Department of Labor, “The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour” (“Wage and Hour Division”). Some people believe that a solution to this problem is to raise the minimum wage; however, doing so would ultimately result in a negative effect on the

In 1938, the first national minimum wage laws in the United States were passed as part of the Fair Labor Standards Act, which served as “a floor below wages,” to reduce poverty and to ensure that economic growth is shared across the workforce. Today, many people who work for companies that pay at or near the minimum wage and remain near or below the poverty level rely on government health and food security and income programs to supplement their living expenses. Since 1938, there have been many additional policies to the Fair Labor Standards Act that have changed many things, such as increasing the national minimum wage numerous times to the currently salary level, which was set in 1997. The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007 was a policy to change the federal minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 in three additions, which began in July of 2009. (http://www.dol.gov/whd/regs/compliance/posters/minwagebwp.pdf)

The federal minimum wage laws were first created on June 25, 1938 through the Department of Labor and signed by President Franklin Roosevelt in the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). This enacted the first $0.25

In the United States, the minimum wage is the lowest hourly rate that employers may legally pay to workers. It is a price floor. The forbearer to the minimum wage can be traced to medieval England. In 1348, the Black Plague decimated the English people. This caused a serious labor shortage and caused wages to sky rocket. King Edward III was inclined to set a wage ceiling contained in the Ordinance of Labourers (1349). Mihm, S. (2013, September 5). How the Black Death Spawned the Minimum Wage. The laws were eventually used to set a living wage. In the U.S., mandatory minimum wages were first introduced nationally in 1938. Department of Labor (2014, April 17) Grossman, Jonathan. "Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938: Maximum Struggle for a Minimum Wage". Many states also have

Texans pride themselves on working hard and being self-sufficient. However not many workers and their families earn enough to stay above poverty. Texas ranks near the worst states for working families, with 38 % earning less than $47,000 per year for a family of four. If we want to live in a state where hard work means real self-sufficiency, then we need to raise the minimum wage in Texas. The Center for Public Policy Priorities conducted new analysis to identify the Texans who would benefit from raising the current federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour to a new statewide minimum wage of $10.10 per hour in 2016. Nearly 2.4 million Texans, or 1 in 4 for-profit and non-profit workers, would receive a pay increase if the state adopted a minimum

In the United States alone, the amount of people in poverty is 14.5%. That equates to 45.3 million people in 2013. In a country like America, one of the world’s superpowers, it’s embarrassing to admit. But the main issue is to fix issues like these with the minimum wage and welfare. The minimum wage applies to workers who got a job whether because they were in school or because they had not gone to college and had no other option. Most of the country lives off as minimum wage workers as only 1% of the world’s population has a college degree. Minimum wage needs to be adjusted to modern inflation. But the minimum wage allegedly does not affect poverty at all says a large demographic and does not need to be adjusted. The minimum wage makes up a lot of the country and should be adjusted or modified to today’s standard of living.

Even though there are 21.4 million children that would see their quality of life improve if their parent had a higher wage, the percentage is a nation average and is worse in some states while better in others. Mississippi at 36.7 percent of children, Oklahoma at 35.6 percent, Georgia at 33.9 percent, and Idaho at 33.7 percent (Lewit, Terman, Behrman) are four of the states with the highest rates of poverty in the United States and could largely benefit from a higher minimum wage. Young children do not understand the situation that they are in, and why they only get a certain amount of food every once in awhile. They are collateral damage that was completely unintended but is definitely a factor in the effect of the wages of American workers. Poorer children and teens are also at greater risk for several negative outcomes such as poor academic achievement, school dropout, abuse and neglect, behavioral and socioemotional problems, physical health problems, and developmental delays (Effects of Poverty). Allowing the future generations of our nation to be exposed to things such as these would cause our country in later years to be of a lower stature than it is now because many of the American citizens will have some type of negative behavior caused by something that could have been avoided while they were a mere

The first minimum wage laws dated back from 1912 and these laws covered women and children. During the U.S. Supreme Court case of Adkins v. Children’s Hospital in 1923, the “minimum wage law violated the right of contract under the due process clause of the Fifth Amendment” (Thies, 1991 para. 1). The Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938 provided the legal minimum wage standards and the first wage was 25 cents per hour as of October 24, 1938 (Douty, 1967). Additionally, this act intention was to transfer employment from children to jobless adults (Kocin, 1967). It is amazing that the first minimum wage only allowed certain groups of employees to receive the hourly minimum rate and was focused on interstate commerce. For example in 1967 the large farm employees were established as $1 per hour and prior to this, there was no standard. This was directly responsible because of the amendments to the Fair Labor Standards Act in 1961 and 1966.

In 1938, the first national minimum wage laws in the United States were passed as part of the Fair Labor Standards Act, which served as “a floor below wages,” to reduce poverty and to ensure that economic growth is shared across the workforce. Today, many people who work for companies that pay at or near the minimum wage and remain near or below the poverty level rely on government health and food security and income programs to supplement their living expenses. Since 1938, there have been many additional policies to the Fair Labor Standards Act that have changed many things, such as increasing the national minimum wage numerous times to the currently salary level, which was set in 1997. The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, from the United States Department of Labor Wage and Hour Division, was a policy to change the federal minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25 in three additions, which began in July of 2009. (U.S., 2009).

As a single mother working in the conditions outlined by the author, I would propose changing the current structure of the labor work force in terms of creating a basic framework to uplifting a person’s economic status with the tools of the government, local communities, etc. While perhaps raising the minimum wage may increase an individual’s economic situation, it wouldn’t necessary solve the problem. In order to address this wage inequality issue, we must first understand why it’s very difficult for single mothers to uplift her family to a better economic situation. Lack of higher education is a growing problem in the United States, especially for those who are in the low socioeconomic class. Investing in education is a key initiative that

“Paying your employees well is not only the right thing to do, but it makes for good business”-Jim Sinegal, CEO of Costco. Many of America’s employees are not being paid well, however, for the annual income of a full-time employee who works year-round is less than $16,000 (about $15, 080) according to the current federal minimum wage (Rebuilding). To put into retrospect how out-dated the federal minimum wage is, consider that the minimum wage of 1956 amounted to exactly $7.93 in 2009 (Henderson). How progressive is it that our nation’s workers being paid less today than workers from the 50’s? The federal minimum wage should be raised in order to assist families out of poverty, to ensure the effort and loyalty of workers, and