Supporters call it a 45-foot long “anti-poverty billboard.” And for good reason: It’s a 16-ton, shrink-wrapped bus with calls to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 per hour. The wage issue is gaining more attention as the country deals with an income gap.
Last week, a day after the U.S. Senate rejected a bill to raise the hourly wage to that amount, the “Give America a Raise” bus stopped in Atlanta, one of 20 states on its scheduled tour to draw attention to the plight of working families and stagnant wages, Americans United for Change, which is supporting the effort, said.
Labor leaders joined Democratic lawmakers and community organizers in front of the blue-and-yellow bus to say the federal minimum wage of $7.25 per hour is not enough for families to pay their housing, food, medical and other monthly costs.
“Those mothers that are the heads of households deserve the dignity to not live in poverty when they work so hard every week,” Helen Butler, executive director of the Coalition for the People’s Agenda, said in a statement.
Georgia supporters of a wage increase point to MIT’s “Living Wage Calculator,” which says a single person in Atlanta needs to earn $10.10 per hour to be sufficient for a month. They also point to a Center for American Progress Action Fund study that says a $10.10 hourly wage would benefit 571,000 workers in Georgia.
“The minimum wage has stayed the same since 2009. But what hasn’t is the price of food, gas, utilities and basic necessities,” William Flippin, Jr., the 3rd vice president of the Georgia NAACP, said in a statement.
The minimum wage remains a hotly-contested policy issue. Last week, Republicans in the U.S. Senate said the financial burden for employers would be too high and cost jobs. They cited a Congressional Budget Office report, saying that 500,000 jobs nationwide would be lost if the hourly wage increases to $10.10, according to The Associated Press.
The report also said more than 16 million low-wage earners would benefit from an increase.
Among the groups that oppose a wage increase are the National Restaurant Association and the National Council of Chain Restaurants.
