fgarvey

Members of the Platform Committee, I want to thank you for the opportunity to submit testimony regarding an increase in the minimum wage.

My name is Frank Garvey, I’m an organizer with Time for a Raise, an advocacy project of Ralph Nader’s Center for Study of Responsive Law that advocates for a $15 minimum wage at the federal, state and local levels.

It is time that the DNC take a bold progressive stance and adopt a plank supporting a $15 minimum wage.

A $15 will help to address the growing wage gap that exists in this country. Imagine McDonald’s, where an employee can make $8.25 an hour, while their CEO makes $2000.00 an hour.

Over the past forty years, the minimum wage has lost one-third of its purchasing power. If it had kept up with inflation since 1968, it would be $10.93 today. If the minimum wage was even raised to just $15, it would provide a much needed raise to over fifty-one million Americans.

Raising the minimum wage has broad public support. A poll from 2015 by Hart Research found that 63% of Americans would support raising the minimum wage to $15.00 an hour and 82% support tying it to the rate of inflation.

Moreover, raising the minimum wage would have a sizable positive impact on public assistance programs in the United States. The Center for American Progress estimates that raising the minimum wage to $10.10 an hour would cause a 6 percent decrease in people enrolled in SNAP programs, saving taxpayers forty-six billion dollars over the next decade. Since many of the people forced to rely on public assistance programs are, in fact, employed and receiving sub-standard wages from some of our biggest corporations such as Wal-Mart, Burger King, […]

Members of City Council, good morning. My name is Frank Garvey, I am an organizer with Time for a Raise, a project of the Center for Study of Responsive Law that advocates for a higher minimum wage at the federal, state and local level. I am glad to sit here today in favor of a raise.

For far too long, the District of Columbia has become too expensive for working class families. Since 2000, the median housing price has tripled, the Consumer Price Index has increased 42% and the minimum wage has stayed too low.

Even with the planned hike to $11.50 this summer, it simply is not enough. I know that I could not survive on the $24,000 annually that would provide, and I doubt that many in this room could.

Raising the minimum wage will have tremendous economic benefits for DC residents. A recent study from the Economic Policy Institute found that raising the minimum wage will provide a raise to 114,000 working people in the DC metro area.

This creates a ripple effect. With 114,000 people earning more, they spend more, For every dollar an hour that a person’s wages are raised, they will earn an extra $2,900 an hour. This is money that is spent in the community, at small businesses, grocery stores and restaurants all throughout the District, creating an economic stimulus of $329 million.

This wage increase wouldn’t just be an increase for DC’s teenage population. 98% of all minimum wage earners in the District are over the age of 20 and who, on average, are their family’s primary source of income. To increase the minimum wage would put more money in the pockets of 80,000 parents.

There are people who will claim that […]