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The Pros And Cons Of Raising Minimum Wage

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The first national minimum wage was not set until the year 1938 during the presidency of Franklin Delano Roosevelt. As a piece of the New Deal legislation, the Fair Labor Standards Act set new requirements regarding labor and wages. This act affected many things including setting a national minimum wage for the first time. Until this point, different groups had tried to set minimum wages but had failed. Courts generally found minimum wages unconstitutional against the ideal of liberty of contract. The minimum wage was initially set at $0.25 an hour and has only risen since then. (Fair Labor Standards Act or FLSA)
Minimum wage has been a hot political issue since its institution and it has often caused rifts in the political system. Currently, …show more content…

After fighting strongly with Congress to try and pass a bill to raise the national minimum wage, President Obama had to use the power of the executive order to try and persuade Congress and the states that a raise in the national minimum wage is a necessity. His speech before signing the order outlined some important specifications such as making sure only the most competent and honorable companies receive government contracts. There were many advantages to raising the wage such as increased economic stimulus and keeping up with inflation however there were also many disadvantages such as loss of jobs due to higher employment costs and eventual inflation. Like other attempts at raising the minimum wage in history, this legislation was met with great opposition, but it still was put into place. However, the difference about this raise is that it was enacted by executive order when most other increases in the national minimum wage are bills passed by Congress and approved by the President. It will be interesting as a new President takes office in the year 2016 to see if this executive order is modified or even completely revoked as a new President with possibly different ideals is voted into

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The federal minimum wage has been increased twenty-two times since President Franklin Delano Roosevelt signed the bill into law in 1938. President Roosevelt was an avid supporter of a federal minimum wage as he says that “no business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country.” Raising the federal minimum wage has many pros and cons, but is a necessity to thrive in society. People have argued that raising the minimum wage will cause inflation, but it will create various economical benefits, income benefits, production benefits, and improve racial justice.

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The current federal minimum wage is set at seven dollars and twenty-five cents. Many workers across the country are complaining that the purchasing power of the minimum wage is currently low, meaning one cannot buy as much while living off of the minimum wage. Moreover, citizens are work full time, while earning the minimum wage, are living, on average, several thousand dollars below the poverty line. However, an increase in the federal minimum wage may do more harm than good. It is likely that an immediate increase in the federal minimum wage will lead to an increase in high school drop outs, a large cut in the workforce, mass amounts of inflation, as well as a large amount of jobs being outsourced.

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Minimum Wage Since 1938 Until 1938, there was no such thing as a minimum wage that was set by the government. All workers got paid based on whatever the boss of the workplace was willing to give them. Then the United States government passed a bill that set a federal minimum wage in 1938, which changed how people got paid. The wage started out at 25 cents. However, a wage of 25 cents in 1938 doesn’t equal the same amount in money during the present day.

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During this time period, the unemployment rate went up 25% and eventually employers took an advantage of the workers’ needs, and decided to pay their workers at a very low wage. To prevent these employers from giving their workers this type of unfair treatment, the government stepped into the dilemma and set a standard of federal minimum wage. This federal rate was put in place to protect the rights of the workers, during the Great Depression along with futuristic purposes, through the Fair Labor Standards Act of 1938. Minimum wage at that time sat at 25 cents, and since then up until 2009 the minimum wage has been raised a total of seven dollars. If the federal minimum wage was not put in place, employers would have continued to pay workers less and less, and eventually would have caused an imbalance of power between the employers and the low-wage workers.

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784 Words | 4 Pages

A. Minimum wage was established in 1938 to prevent exploitation, during the Great Depression people were desperate for work so employers to advantage and paid very little. 1. The federal minimum wage have been around for over a hundred years. 2. The article “Why a $15 minimum Wage Is a Good Economics” was written by Jared Bernstein and Ben Spielberg.

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According to the Economic Policy Institute, raising the minimum wage to $12 an hour would boost the incomes of over 35 million Americans which would allow people to not have to live in poverty or rely on government assistance to make ends meet. More than 600 economists, including 7 nobel prize winners wrote a letter to President Obama endorsing an increase in the federal minimum wage, stating that evidence shows that an increase in minimum wage shows no negative effect on job growth, and in fact increases consumer spending and therefore would increase demand and job growth, which disputes the idea that an increase in the minimum wage will lead to higher unemployment and helps to further the argument that a minimum wage increase is not only necessary, but actually healthy for the economy. Furthermore, according to NPR, the 13 states who raised their state mandated minimum wage at the beginning of 2014 all added jobs to their economy at a faster rate than states that did not raise their state mandated minimum wage. This fact disputes the claim made by the Congressional Budget Office in its report in 2014 that stated that raising the minimum wage, even to $10.10 would cost the U.S. economy arond 500,000 jobs. Economic research conducted by the United States Department of Labor and the Center for Economic Policy Research shows that increases in minimum wage sharply reduces employee turnover

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Rex Huppke, in the article, talks about why he is for the raise, and says what strikes him most is thinking about the diversity of minimum wage earners, some could be teens with first time jobs, then it could be older workers supplementing their income, and some who are truly struggling to make ends

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Abstract In 1938 President Franklin Roosevelt signed into law The Fair Labor Standards Act, which among many things established a minimum wage; the law was created as a way to help the poorest in the US during the Great Depression. Then and now there are strong opinions on both sides of this issue, and without an automatic cost of living adjustment built into the law; any increase requires a bill passed by both houses of Congress and the President’s signature to make it law. In the following essay I will be analyzing two articles that outline both the for raising minimum wage side and the side that opposes raising it; by examining their claims, and the evidence that they use to support their claim of why raising the minimum wage is a good

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The United States’ minimum wage has changed multiple times. In 1938, the minimum wage was first passed, in the Fair Labor Standards Act, by President Roosevelt. It was set to a mere $0.25. Over the years, it has changed at least 22 times. With this act in place, as well as multiple poverty prevention plans, the poverty numbers should be close to zero.

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869 Words | 4 Pages

In 20014 President Obama had raised the fact that minimum wage should be raised from $7 to about $10, but republicans continued to disagree (Driscoll, Sally Grant, Richard A, 2017). Currently New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle have the highest paying minimum wage, which is around fifteen dollars an hour but only in large businesses’. After the discussion of minimum wage being raised in certain states, eleven other states have decided to raise their minimum wage to almost double of what it used to be (Driscoll, Sally Grant, Richard A,

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370 Words | 2 Pages

The Minimum wage was inserted into law to counteract working forty plus hours a week and child labor. In today’s times the only thing minimum wage is doing is hurting young workers to get a job and keeping smaller business from growing. With the minimum wage in place it doesn’t guarantee a living, it guarantees

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1586 Words | 7 Pages

History of Minimum Wage There has been much debate over the years about raising the federal minimum wage. Because of lack of action by congress, some states have taken it upon themselves to set higher minimum wages than the federal minimum wage. The minimum wage was put into place by President Franklin D. Roosevelt during the Great Depression. According to Jonathan Grossman, Historian for the U.S. Department of Labor, “On May 24, 1937, President Roosevelt sent the bill to Congress with a message that America should be able to give “all our able-bodied working men and women a fair day’s pay for a fair day’s work.” He continued: “A self-supporting and self-respecting democracy can plead no justification for the existence of child labor, no economic reason for chiseling worker’s wages or stretching workers’ hours.”

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800 Words | 4 Pages

Roosevelt created the federal minimum wage, he established a federal minimum wage of 25 cents per hour, the federal minimum wage took place during the great depression in 1938. He created the federal minimum wage because to keep America's workers out of poverty and increase consumer purchasing power in order to stimulate the economy. People who have small amounts of money during their minimum wage job feel that they don't have enough money. For example, workers don't have enough money for buying food, going on transportation, housing, and healthcare. This also causes poverty across the country.

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465 Words | 2 Pages

In the 1800s, America went through the Industrial Revolution. A push for laws to protect workers erupted due to dangerous working conditions. Soon after in the 1890s, Australia and New Zealand became the first countries to mount national minimum wage laws. The United States set forth its minimum wage laws in 1938 (Grossman). These laws were passed by President Roosevelt in the Fair Labor Standards Act, which set a minimum wage of twenty five cents per hour and established a 44 hour workweek (Is federal minimum).

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Regarding The Wall Street Journal, “Push for $15 Minimum Wage Heats up” 2016, authors Eric Morath, Erica Olden, and Alejandro Lazo, explain how California and New York strive to be the first states to raise minimum wage to $15. “We want to pay people a wage that allows them to lead their life with dignity,” families should be able to be proud of the work they do and how much they get paid for it, people should be payed $15 an hour. The minimum wage today is $7.25 per hour, which in all fairness, isn’t much. Throughout the years, minimum wage has changed several times. When the federal minimum wage first became law in 1938, it was 25 cents.

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