SUBSCRIBE TO OUR FREE NEWSLETTER
Daily news & progressive opinion—funded by the people, not the corporations—delivered straight to your inbox.
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
5
#000000
#FFFFFF
national employment law project
U.S. House Approves Historic $15/hour One Fair Wage
Bill would nearly double federal wage floor after decade of stagnancy at $7.25
Jul 18, 2019
The U.S. House of Representatives voted today to pass the historic Raise the Wage Act (RTWA), which will increase the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025 and eliminate the subminimum-wages for tipped and youth workers and workers with disabilities. After passing with 233 votes (including 3 Republicans), the bill is now in the hands of the U.S. Senate, where the Republican majority will face strong and sustained pressure from workers, advocates, progressive lawmakers, and constituents to increase the minimum wage after the longest period in U.S. history without a raise.
"Today's House vote for a $15 minimum wage reflects the will of the people: Raising the minimum wage is long overdue, and it's popular with voters in every state, and across all demographics including political affiliation," said Christine Owens, executive director of the National Employment Law Project. "We applaud the House for doing its job. Now there's no other moral choice but for the Senate to take up the Raise the Wage Act and move it forward."
By passing the RTWA, the House sets an unprecedented standard for minimum wage policy. In addition to gradually nearly doubling the minimum wage from $7.25, the RTWA will eliminate the subminimum wage for young workers under age 20, workers with disabilities, and tipped workers, whose outdated wage has been frozen at an insulting $2.13 since 1991. The bill will also be indexed to keep workers' wages at pace with all other wages in the growing economy, which is projected to decrease income inequality, particularly for women and workers of color.
Finally heeding the demands that originated with fast-food workers in the Fight for $15, the vote in favor of $15 mirrors national polling: The majority of U.S. voters support $15, including two thirds of voters in battleground congressional districts. More than 360 organizations signed onto a letter in support of the Raise the Wage Act when it was introduced in January.
"We have a federal minimum wage because workers everywhere in this country should be paid enough to meet their needs and live with dignity. A federal minimum wage that has been stuck at a poverty-level $7.25 defeats its own purpose--it suppresses workers' wages instead of lifting them," Owens said. "Finally the House has affirmed what we've known for years: $15 an hour is the bare minimum needed to get by in this country."
Rep. Bobby Scott (D-VA) introduced the RTWA, with additional leadership from Rep. Mark Pocan (D-WI), Rep. Stephanie Murphy (D-FL), Rep. Donald Norcross (D-NJ), Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA), and Sen. Bernie Sanders (I-VT). The Congressional Budget Office (CBO) found the bill would lift pay for 27 million workers earning at or near the minimum wage and it will reduce the number of people living in poverty by 1.3 million.
Progressive and conservative economists alike agree there is a new consensus among economists favoring an increase to the minimum wage. The majority of research finds increasing the minimum wage leads to little or no job loss. And a recent study from UC Berkeley's Center on Wage and Employment Dynamics found that a $15 minimum wage is viable even in low-cost states like Alabama and Mississippi.
Owens further noted: "This victory is only possible thanks to the bravery and resolve of all the workers who have stood up over the past six years and stopped asking only for the crumbs they thought were politically palatable, and instead, demanded what they deserve. We are proud to stand with all of them, the real leaders of this movement."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Trump USDA to Allow Faster Poultry Line Speeds, Ignoring Danger to Workers and Consumers
Oct 04, 2018
Following is a statement from Debbie Berkowitz, program director for worker safety and health with the National Employment Law Project, and former senior official with the Occupational Safety and Health Administration:
"In a stunning announcement, with no notice requesting comments from the public, the Trump administration's Department of Agriculture (USDA) has declared that it will start a new program to allow chicken plants to increase their line speeds, despite increasing evidence that this will endanger vulnerable workers, public health, and animal welfare.
"The USDA had already studied whether to increase poultry line speeds, and it adopted a rule in 2014, with enormous public input, that rejected any line speed increases in order to best protect public and worker health. Yet, with no additional evidence or data provided, the administration has now decided to bend all the rules to benefit rich corporations at the expense of the well-being and safety of workers and consumers.
"Poultry workers suffer staggeringly high rates of work-related injury and illnesses--rates 60 percent higher than the average worker. Overwhelming evidence supports the conclusion that allowing poultry processing plants to operate with faster line speeds than allowable by law is inconsistent with the USDA's waiver regulation, undermines the rulemaking process, violates the Administrative Procedure Act, and most of all, endangers both workers and consumers."
Keep ReadingShow Less
Report: Mississippi Workers Are Dying on the Job at One of the Highest Rates in the Nation
Workers in Mississippi suffer high numbers of severe work-related injuries, and they face one of the highest workplace fatality rates in the nation, yet the government systems that are supposed to protect these injured workers are among the nation's worst,
Dec 14, 2017
Workers in Mississippi suffer high numbers of severe work-related injuries, and they face one of the highest workplace fatality rates in the nation, yet the government systems that are supposed to protect these injured workers are among the nation's worst, according to a report released today by the National Employment Law Project and the Mississippi Workers' Center for Human Rights.
In fact, Mississippi has one of the highest on-the-job fatality rates of any state in the union. Yet workers face a state workers' compensation system where benefits are the lowest in the nation, putting Mississippi workers who suffer a work-related injury at risk of falling into poverty.
"The findings in the report present disturbing facts about Mississippi's lack of adequate safety and health protections for its workers and the alarming rates of workplace injuries and fatalities occurring every year," said Jaribu Hill, executive director of the Mississippi Workers' Center for Human Rights. "More must be done to ensure that workers do not continue to be victims of preventable hazards on the job.
"All workers have a right to a safe workplace, yet the protections afforded workers in Mississippi are out of step with every other state in the nation," said Deborah Berkowitz, senior fellow for worker safety and health with National Employment Law Project. "The result is that workers, their families, and their communities are shouldering the costs of work-related injuries--not the employer."
The report's findings include the following:
- Despite a law requiring safe workplaces being on the books for more than 40 years, workers in Mississippi are getting killed on the job at the fourth highest rate of any state in the nation.
- More than 200 workers a year in Mississippi suffer a work injury so severe that it results in an amputation or hospitalization. That's close to four workers every week.
- The most dangerous industries include food processing, wood products, construction, auto manufacturing and ship building.
- From January through October 1, 2017, the Occupational Safety and Health Administration, which is charged with assuring that workplaces prevent injuries by complying with safety standards, reduced the number of inspections of Mississippi workplaces by one-third when compared to the same period a year ago.
- Mississippi workers' compensation, the state-run system designed to take care of injured workers and provide medical care and wage replacement for seriously injured workers, has the lowest benefits in the nation for the most severely injured workers.
- Mississippi provides the least number of weeks of benefits of any state in the nation when a worker suffers a total permanent disability (only 450 weeks).
- Mississippi provides the lowest dollar amount of benefits to workers who face a temporary total disability.
The report's recommendations include the following:
- Mississippi should raise the cap on the number of weeks of benefits for temporary and permanently disabled workers.
- Mississippi should provide common-sense anti-retaliation language that prohibits workers from being discharged or retaliated against for filing a workers compensation claim.
- Mississippi should participate in the collection of work-related injury and illness date by the Bureau of Labor Statistic (it's one of nine states that do not participate).
- Federal OSHA should increase the number of inspectors to assure the office is fully staffed with a minimum of 11 inspectors (2016/2017 appropriated levels).
DOWNLOAD THE REPORT:
Dying on the Job in Mississippi: Lack of Adequate Protection for Injured Workers Hurts Families and Communities
Keep ReadingShow Less
New NELP Report: Fight for $15's Four-Year Impact: $62 Billion in Raises for America's Workers
More than 12 times amount of last federal minimum wage increase in 2007
Nov 29, 2016
As the Fight for $15 marks its fourth anniversary Tuesday with a wave of strikes, protests and civil disobedience from coast to coast, a new report from the National Employment Law Project shows that America's workers have won nearly $62 billion in raises since the movement kicked off in New York City in 2012.
The raises won by the movement that started when 200 McDonald's, Wendy's and Burger King workers walked off their jobs four years ago demanding $15 and union rights are more than 12 times the $5 billion raise workers got in all 50 states after the last federal minimum wage increase, approved by Congress in 2007.
"The Fight for $15's impact towers over past congressional action because it has been propelled by what workers need - not what moderate compromise might allow," said Christine Owens, executive director of the National Employment Law Project. "As a result, workers have been fighting for and winning much bigger raises for much more of the workforce than ever before."
The NELP analysis quantifies for the first time the impact of the Fight for $15 on workers across the country. Key findings include:
- Since the Fight for $15 launched in 2012, underpaid workers have won $61.5 billion in raises from a combination of state and local minimum wage increases from New York to California and action by employers ranging from McDonald's to Walmart to raise their companies' minimum pay scales. (Figure represents the total additional annual income that workers will receive after the approved increases fully phase in.)
- Of the $61.5 billion in additional income, two-thirds is the result of landmark $15 minimum wage laws that the Fight for $15 won in California, New York, Los Angeles, San Francisco, Seattle, SeaTac and Washington, D.C.
- At least 19 million workers nationwide will benefit from raises sparked by the Fight for $15.
- 2.1 million of those workers won raises this month when voters approved minimum wage ballot initiatives in Arizona ($12 by 2020), Colorado ($12 by 2020), Maine ($12 by 2020), Washington State ($13.50 by 2020), and Flagstaff, AZ ($15 by 2021).
The raises sparked by the Fight for $15 are slowly beginning to reverse decades of wage declines that have resulted in 43% of the workforce, or 60 million workers, being paid less than $15/hour. Across the U.S., the median wage rose 5.6% last year, the largest increase since at least the 1960s.
"The Fight for $15 movement has recast the national conversation on wages, setting $15 as the new benchmark for a strong minimum wage around the country," Owens said. "By speaking out and sticking together, the courageous workers at the heart of the Fight for $15 movement have delivered meaningful, life-changing wage increases for 19 million low-wage workers and their families around the country."
Download the full NELP report here
Keep ReadingShow Less
Most Popular