Posted on January 12, 2014
VICTORY: Maryland raises the minimum wage
At just $7.25 an hour, Maryland’s minimum wage left a family of three stuck below the poverty line. Like workers being paid the minimum wage in the other 49 states, Maryland workers couldn’t even afford to pay for an average two-bedroom apartment by working a standard 40-hour work week. The minimum wage in Maryland hadn’t been raised since 2009, despite inflation. The real value of the federal minimum wage was actually a few dollars lower than it was in 1968.
Activism, including about 2,000 CREDO signatures, prompted the Maryland General Assembly pass legislation that raised the state’s minimum wage to $10.10 an hour.