Obama thinks you deserve a raise, in 2015

By Catholic Online (NEWS CONSORTIUM)
2/13/2013
Catholic Online (www.catholic.org)

Congress just got a raise of 1.1 percent.

There's good news and bad for minimum wage workers following President Obama's State of the Union address. President Obama has pledged to raise the federal minimum wage to $9 per hour in 2015, and index it to inflation. While it could mean relief for many workers, it could also mean less work.

Pennies to the dollar, Congress may begrudge workers.

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LOS ANGELES, CA (Catholic Online) - Obama said, "Tonight, let's declare that in the wealthiest nation on Earth, no one who works full-time should have to live in poverty. This single step would raise the incomes of millions of working families ... For businesses across the country, it would mean customers with more money in their pockets."

Obama is correct. Raising the minimum wage would help about 3.8 million minimum-wage workers, raising their full-time income to about $18,000 per year. However, that amount of money remains below the poverty level for a family of four.

Raising the minimum wage typically boosts the economy by putting more money into the pockets of consumers. Minimum-wage consumers are also much more likely to spend that money than others. This has a stimulus effect on the economy.

However employers tend to balk. Employers who survive on low margins can hardly afford to pay more when they are barely earning only a few pennies of profit per dollar. Estimates suggest that as many as 500,000 jobs could be lost if minimum wage is raised to $9.

However, something should be done. Since 1968, the federal minimum wage has lost at least a third of its purchasing power. The minimum wage was designed to ensure that a worker can support himself without government assistance. However, this is not happening, with many minimum wage workers often needing public assistance at some point.

Ultimately, we are paying the higher rate, be it through wages or taxes for social services.

If minimum wage is increased, businesses can also be expected to raise prices to compensate. Still, workers deserve a fair wage for their labor, which is a basic teaching of the Church. If a person works full-time, but cannot provide for themselves, then they are not being paid enough by our standards.

The minimum wage has been raised multiple times throughout the past few decades and some states have higher than federal minimum wages. Washington, for example, pays the highest at $9.19 per hour.

Despite these increases, workers still manage to remain employed and businesses manage to stay open, despite the claims to the contrary made by lobbyists and politicos beforehand. However, prices do go up, and profit margins shrink, at least in the short term.

In some states, it should also be noted that workers may earn below federal minimum wage in certain industries. Farm laborers and restaurant workers are among those most typically and legally paid below minimum wage.

Obama pledged to raise the minimum wage in 2008, however he did not meet that pledge. In recent years, bills to raise the wages have been quickly stopped in Congress. Congress got their most recent pay raise on January 1, when Obama gave them a 1.1 percent increase.

Congressional representatives now earn $174,000 per year while the average American worker earns under $40,000. The average minimum wage worker maxes out around $14,500 for a year of hard work.

� 2013, Distributed by NEWS CONSORTIUM.

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Pope Benedict XVI's Prayer Intentions for January 2013
General Intention: The Faith of Christians. That in this Year of Faith Christians may deepen their knowledge of the mystery of Christ and witness joyfully to the gift of faith in him.
Missionary Intention: Middle Eastern Christians. That the Christian communities of the Middle East, often discriminated against, may receive from the Holy Spirit the strength of fidelity and perseverance.

Keywords: Pay, Congressional pay, minimum wage, increase, federal minimum wage, jobs

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1 - 4 of 4 Comments

eithena
3 months ago
WEll AMERICA YOU VOTED FOR HIM SUCH A NICE MAN CARES FOR EVERYONE YA AND IF WE FOLLOW THE YELLOW BRICK ROAD HE MIGHT GIVE US A BRAIN OR A HEART SAID IT BEFORE WHAT WHERE YOUS THINKING this aint a movie we get once chance
vance
4 months ago
This is another Marxist Democrat "We will give you something for nothing" appeal to further deceive the masses. This is another way to create more poverty to get more people dependent on government to get closer to their Marxist Utopia. Obama and the Marxist Democrat Party knows well that this is an economy buster.
Jerry N
4 months ago
"Washington, for example, pays the highest at $9.19 per hour..."

The state of Washington does not "pay the highest (minimum wage)". It forces private businesses to pay the highest minimum wage. No business will pay a wage to a worker if they deem that worker not worth the wage paid, thus all a minimum wage accomplishes is to set the production bar higher for someone seeking an entry level job. Ergo, fewer entry level jobs become available. This is common sense, and has been proven true by jobs being lost each and every time a minimum wage is forced higher by idiotic government fiats.

Who benefits from higher minimum wage? Not the minimum wage worker, because they will be expected to either produce more in less time, or be fired, whenever the business is forced by government to raise their pay. Not the higher paid workers either because the the mundane tasks normally done by entry level workers will be added to their work load. Not the public treasury, because higher minimum wage laws reduce employment and thus reduce tax receipts.

The only ones who benefit from higher minimum wage laws are class-warfare politicians like Obama, who have not the first clue or concern about what it takes to operate a business. He thinks that businesses exist only to pay Democrat-voting union workers. Obama believes that when businesses refuse to pay workers more than they are worth, then they are just being "greedy" capitalists who need to be severely punished by an always-virtuous government overseer. Unfortunately, we seem to have reached the point in the history of America where Obama-style class warfare and "hate the rich" rhetoric works at election time.
Alice Roddy
4 months ago
Can people start at the top of the ladder? The minimum wage is the starting wage, the apprentice wage, the wage for the unskilled whose employers will train them and help them achieve the ability for their labor to be worth more.

I don't remember the statistics but very few earning the minimum wage are attempting to support a family, most are young in their first job or others supplementing a family income. Most will not be earning the minimum wage in a year because they will have earned a raise.

In days past people understood that one began as an apprentice (who may have earned only food and lodging), progressed to being a journeyman (who could support him or herself), and finally to a master craftsman (who could support a family).

If the minimum wage is to equal the master wage, where is the apprentice to begin?

If we want our outcomes to be as good and godly as our intentions, we must think things through.

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