Can America Handle a $30 Minimum Wage?
In 2012, in what The New York Times called “the biggest wave of job actions in the history of America’s fast-food industry,” workers in New York City walked off their jobs and held a protest demanding a $15 minimum wage. The so-called Fight for $15 was born, and over the next few years workers in cities around the country joined the protests, while the federal minimum wage continued to languish at $7.25 an hour, where it had been since 2009.
It’s still stuck at $7.25, but 30 states and Washington, D.C., have since raised their own minimum wages—from $8.75 in West Virginia to $17.95 in D.C.—and 68 cities and counties have increased their minimums above their states’. There remain plenty of foot-draggers—20 states still abide by the federal minimum of $7.25—but the Fight for $15 continues to win converts: In Pennsylvania on Tuesday, the state House passed a bill to raise the minimum to that very amount.
To some activists, though, a $15 minimum is old news. At a rally last week in Oakland, California, workers and activists aligned with One Fair Wage, a nonprofit group that supports restaurant employees, launched a campaign for a $30 minimum wage in Alameda County, which includes Oakland and Berkeley. Workers have launched similar campaigns around the country, including those for $30 in Hawaii, New York City, and Los Angeles, and $25 in Washington, D.C., and Maryland.
