FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Thursday, March 3, 2005 Contact: Rep. LaMar Lemmons Jr.Phone: (517) 373-0106
LANSING -- Endorsing a bill under consideration in the U.S. Senate today to raise the federal minimum wage to $7.25 per hour, State Rep. LaMar Lemmons Jr. (D-Detroit) urged federal lawmakers on both sides of the aisle to support the measure for working families.
"The federal government hasn't raised the minimum wage in eight years," Rep. Lemmons said. "This is why I introduced legislation to raise our state's minimum wage. We don't want to wait for Washington to act, but we're hopeful they're going to do the right thing."
The debate in the U.S. Senate is on how much, if at all, to boost the nation's minimum hourly wage, which currently stands at $5.15. Democrats at the federal level are pushing for an increase of more than $2 per hour. Those Republicans favoring an increase at all generally support a smaller hike.
Lemmons is joined in support for the legislation by his son, State Rep. LaMar Lemmons III (D-Detroit).
"In today's economy, hard-working men and women are struggling to make ends meet because their earnings have failed to keep up with inflation," Lemmons III said. "We need to end that cycle of poverty by paying a fair wage so all workers can contribute to our local communities."
In an effort to offset Washington's failure to raise the federal minimum wage, Democrats in the Michigan House and Senate earlier this year proposed raising the state's minimum wage to $7.15 per hour, calling the measure "bottom-up economic stimulus to boost the economy."
Raising the minimum wage by two dollars per hour would directly benefit at least 464,000 Michigan workers or nearly 1 in 6 hourly workers statewide, according to the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics' monthly magazine. In addition, evidence indicates that there would be a ripple effect that would lead to better wages for significantly more workers.