Victory: House passes historic $15 minimum wage bill

Victory! Thanks to more than 54,000 CREDO members, as well as our allies in the workers’ rights movement, organized labor and dozens of progressive groups, the House recently passed historic legislation to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour, despite six corporate Democrats and nearly all Republicans voting against the bill.

If enacted into law, the Raise the Wage Act of 2019 would immediately bump the minimum wage, and gradually raise it to $15, while ending the sub-minimum wage for tipped workers. Preschool teachers, fast-food workers, bank tellers and working parents – millions of Americans would benefit immediately, some by as much as $3,500 a year. 

And no one would benefit more from raising the minimum wage than women, and people of color, who disproportionately hold low-wage jobs due to institutional sexism and racism. Forty percent of Black workers and 34% of Latinx workers would see a pay increase under this legislation. And nearly 56% who would get a raise are women.

Despite this, six Democrats – Reps. Anthony Brindisi, Joe Cunningham, Kendra Horn, Ben McAdams, Kurt Schrader and Xochitl Torres Small – sided with Donald Trump and the vast majority of Republicans by voting against working people.