Minimum Wage Archives - Public Seminar

Economy

Why Adam Smith & Karl Marx Would Both Think $15 Isn’t Enough

Because the minimum wage is a subsistence wage, the left must aim higher

March 4, 2021 • by Peter J. Verovšek

_____ With the inauguration of the Biden administration, raising the federal minimum wage from its egregiously low level of $7.25 an hour is back on the political agenda in Washington, D.C. In recent years, activists across the county have convinced some cities and other jurisdictions to approve a higher minimum wage ...

Why Adam Smith & Karl Marx Would Both Think $15 Isn’t Enough

Past Present

Minimum Wage and the Fight for $15

Past Present Podcast, Episode 269

March 2, 2021 • by Nicole Hemmer, Natalia Mehlman Petrzela and Neil J. Young

Here are some links and references mentioned during this week’s show: House Democrats have proposed a federally guaranteed fifteen-dollar an hour minimum wage as part of their coronavirus relief bill. Niki drew on this New York Times piece about the effective minimum wage, and Neil referenced this New Yorker article about ...

Economy

The Truth About the Minimum Wage

How to take the word “freedom” away from the GOP

February 25, 2021 • by John Stoehr

" Bernie Sanders, still talks about it as if he can’t quite escape the economic framing conservatives established a long time ago. To be sure, he talks about fairness."...

Labor

Will the US Pandemic Response Strengthen Workers?

Worker protections and collective bargaining must be part of any economic recovery plan

March 30, 2020 • by Teresa Ghilarducci

But this rare moment of bipartisanship will turn out to have been a missed opportunity if it does not also reverse the long decline of worker protections and collective-bargaining power in the United States. As Lawrence H. Summers of Harvard University and many others have shown, this trend has contributed significantly to the ...

Will the US Pandemic Response Strengthen Workers?

New York City

Local Governments Can Afford To Pay a $15 Minimum Wage

November 7, 2019 • by James Parrott

In contrast to this Congressional stalemate, there’s been a growing push in many states for higher minimum wages. Over the past decade, 29 states and the District of Columbia have raised their minimum wages above the federal floor. In the spring, Maryland and Connecticut joined New Jersey, Illinois, New York, ...