"Most small businesses...pay more than the minimum wage. I hate to see small business portrayed as being on the bandwagon against a minimum wage increase." Scott Hauge, Legislative Director, 125,000-member California Small Business Association. Prop. 210 won't change the wages most small businesses already pay. Low wage businesses oppose every minimum wage increase. But businesses and jobs keep growing.
Because of inflation, the minimum wage sank in 1996 to its lowest value in 40 years.
Prop. 210 makes work more rewarding than welfare and brings minimum-wage families up to the poverty line.
The current minimum wage is so low that minimum wage workers often earn less income than people on welfare. Increasing the minimum wage will reward work by making it more profitable than welfare.
Salaries for corporate executive have more than doubled over the last eight years. Corporate profits have skyrocketed. The governor and legislature have gotten big pay raises. But the minimum wage did not increase from 1988 through September 1996.
A family of three earning the current minimum wage is living below the poverty line. Prop. 210 brings this family much closer to the poverty line.
The federal increase is too small. The federal minimum wage still leaves a family of three $2300 below the poverty line. Because of high housing costs, California workers need a little more.
Californians need a living wage.
The League of Women Voters of California, California Labor Federation and Children's Advocacy Institute recommend YES ON PROP. 210.
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