As Congress Stalls, States Build Momentum to Raise Wages of Lowest-Paid Workers
Frustrated by failed legislative attempts and nine years of Congressional inaction, AFL-CIO working families helped deliver the signatures required to put the minimum wage issue on the state ballot in Arizona and Montana this November, giving voters a chance to correct the gross inadequacy of the current federal minimum wage of $5.15 an hour. The filings come on top of AFL-CIO legislative activity and ballot initiatives in 19 states.
The “Raise Montana” coalition announced in Helena last Friday that labor, interfaith and low-income group volunteers had gathered more than 42,000 signatures in support of a $1.00 increase with indexing for inflation (22,000 were required). Arizona AFL-CIO President and Chair of the Arizona Minimum Wage Coalition, Rebekah Friend, announced Monday that the coalition had gathered 209,000 signatures, far surpassing the 123,000 needed to qualify the measure for the November ballot. Arizona’s ballot initiative would lift the state minimum to $6.75 an hour and include an annual cost of living adjustment.
“This has been the most popular petition on the street and in the community,” Friend said in a statement on Monday. “Voters want hard work to be rewarded, something the Republican legislature in our state has failed to do not only this year, but for the past four years.”
As part of the national “America Needs a Raise” campaign, AFL-CIO members helped deliver more than double the signatures required to put minimum wage on the ballot in Missouri this May, and are still gathering signatures in their workplaces and neighborhoods in Colorado and Ohio.
Union members in Clayton, Missouri protested for a minimum wage increase during President Bush’s visit there this week, and Ohio union members are joining forces with community and faith leaders next week for a rally in Cincinnati to mobilize volunteers for a final signature gathering push before the August 9 deadline.
Building on the momentum of ballot initiatives and state legislative work, the National AFL-CIO continues to press for a clean vote in Congress on a $2.10 federal minimum wage increase, and AFL-CIO e-activists have sent nearly 100,000 emails to congressional leaders calling for immediate action to increase the federal minimum wage.
“In addition to providing the economic relief low-wage workers so badly need, increasing the minimum wage is a statement about how we as a society value hard work.” said AFL-CIO President John Sweeney. “Congress cannot, in good conscience, award itself its ninth consecutive pay raise when 7 million workers have been waiting for their raise for nearly ten years.”
Contact Gabrielle Coppola 202-637-5018
