Raising the Minimum Wage

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Recommended: Positive effects of raising the minimum wage

A family of four is on government welfare, has no health or car insurance, and lives from paycheck to paycheck because both parents make minimum wage. Parents cannot provide for a family because they barely make enough money to pay the bills. According to Driscoll, it is proven that a “family of three all making minimum wage, still falls below the poverty level.” President Obama has proposed raising the minimum wage to $9.00 but no actions have been made on his behalf. So congress needs to raise the minimum wage in order to help the general well being of the people.
Minimum wage is the least amount of money than an employer can pay its workers per hour. For example, the minimum wage in Virginia is $7.25 per hour. Ford points out in his article on raising the minimum wage, “The minimum wage rose to $5.85 in the summer of 2007 and to $6.55 in the summer of 2008 with plans for a final value of $7.25 in the summer of 2009.” However, different states have different minimum wages. For instance, Washington has the highest minimum wage at $9.19 per hour and Georgia has the lowest rate with $5.15 per hour. But according to the National Employment Wage Project, “if the United States would have kept up with inflation over the past 40 years, the minimum wage would be $10.74 an hour.” That is $3.49 more than the minimum wage is now, which would be $7,259.20 more a year (before taxes).
By raising the minimum wage, it would stimulate the economy in many ways. It would “increase the purchasing power of many workers whose wages would also go up” according to the article Raising the minimum wage: Guide to Critical Analysis. Another way that it would help the economy is that it would decrease the amount of people that would need government welfar...

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... Oct. 2013. .
Jacobs, W.E.Hoagland, Steve. "Counterpoint: Minimum Wages Are Unwarranted Economic Interference." Points Of View: Raising The Minimum Wage (2013): 2. Points of View Reference Center. Web. 8 Nov. 2013.
Jacobs, W.E.Hoagland, Steve. "Counterpoint: Minimum Wages Are Unwarranted Economic Interference." Points Of View: Raising The Minimum Wage (2013): 2. Points of View Reference Center. Web. 8 Nov. 2013.
"Raising The Minimum Wage: Guide To Critical Analysis." Points Of View: Raising The Minimum Wage (2013): 4.Points of View Reference Center. Web. 28 Oct. 2013.
"Rebuilding an Economy That Works for All of Us." Facts. NELP, n.d. Web. 11 Nov. 2013.
Sperling, Gene, and Alan Krueger. "The White House Blog." Raising the Minimum Wage Is Good for the Economy. The White House, 24 July 2013. Web. 28 Oct. 2013.

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