During that time, the members of the Congress have voted to give themselves salary increases of almost $30,000; but they refuse to give the working poor an increase a in the federal minimum wage.

While the average hourly earnings of America's manufacturing work force have increased from $12.50 in 1997 to $15.80 in 2005, minimum wage workers - doing responsible and important jobs like day care, nursing home care, teaching assistants - have been stuck at $5.15/hour.

Additionally, the value of the minimum wage is at its second lowest level in the last 45 years. The Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2005 would increase the federal minimum wage to $7.25/hour by 2007.clearly, by any standard, a modest increase over a reasonable period of time. Such an increase would help approximately 7 million working Americans feed their families, pay their rent, or continue their schooling.

And, in spite of all the rhetoric from business interests who reflexively oppose increasing the minimum wage, never in the history of minimum wage increases - a period of 67 years - has anyone or any statistic been able to show economic damage from modest, periodic increases in the minimum wage.

The Campaign for a Fair Minimum Wage, a project of Americans for Democratic Action (ADA), is a coalition of church, labor, and social welfare organizations whose public policy agendas include support for an overdue increase in the federal minimum wage. With more than 200 organizations in its ranks, the Campaign supports the efforts of Sen. Ted Kennedy (D-MA) and Congressman George Miller (D-CA), chief sponsors of the minimum wage legislation, to bring a tangible benefit to the families of lower wage working Americans.

Without the passage of the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2005, minimum wage workers will fall further and further down the income scale; with each passing year, the purchasing power of the $5.15/hour minimum wage declines. Failure to pass this legislation in this Congress would condemn a large segment of the working population to a continuing decline in their living standard.

"The Congress must ask itself: how long can we as a society support the reality of people who work hard every day earning a wage that keeps them in poverty?" decried Jane O'Grady, Executive Director.

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