Let Justice Roll Resources

Updated / Summary
  • The federal minimum wage was enacted during the Great Depression to promote economic recovery.
  • The long-term fall in worker buying power is a key reason we are in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
  • Raising the minimum wage boosts consumer purchasing power and economic recovery.
  • Raising the minimum wage does not increase unemployment in good times or bad.
  • Raise the floor to lift the economy.
  • Updated
    Raising the minimum wage does not increase unemployment in good times or bad.

    Extensive research refutes the claim that increasing the minimum wage causes increased unemployment and business closures.

    Summary

    • Recent minimum wage raises are too little, too late.
    • The minimum wage is a poverty wage instead of an anti-poverty wage.
    • The minimum wage sets the wage floor. A low minimum wage institutionalizes an increasingly low-wage workforce.
    • A low minimum wage reinforces a growing gap between haves and have-nots.
    • Workers are also consumers. The long-term fall in worker buying power is one reason we are in the worst economic crisis since the Great Depression.
    • Raising the minimum wage lifts workers, business and the economy.
    • $10 in 2010 will break the cycle of too little, too late raises.
    • $10 in 2010 will make up ground lost in minimum wage buying power since 1968.
    • $10 in 2010 will bring us closer to the Fair Labor Standards Act “minimum standard of living necessary for health, efficiency and general well-being of workers.”
    • $10 in 2010 will strengthen the eroded foundation under our families, communities and economy.
    • A job should keep you out of poverty, not keep you in it.

    A chart of all the states and cities with a minimum wage above the current federal minimum wage.
    Resources for Living Wage Worship Services and Community Events, 3rd edition, is a comprehensive tool kit for congregations and community organizations. Contents include:
    • Steps for organizing a living wage service or community event
    • Organizing/advocacy tools for minimum wage and living wage
    • Readings, prayers and handouts from various faith traditions
    • Working Family testimonials and Business Voices
    • Sample Op-Eds and Letters to the Editor
    • Fact sheets, charts, quotable quotes and much more

    Makes a powerful economic and ethical case for raising the minimum wage and moving the United States from a low-road economy to the high road. Counters all the arguments against raising the minimum and offers vital insight into why the minimum wage is so important.