Opinion: New John Edwards proposal

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It may have taken 10 years to achieve the minimum wage hike that President Bush signed into law recently, but John Edwards not only is impatient for more, he wants to make sure that less time elapses between increases.

On the campaign trail today, the Democratic presidential candidate is calling for the national minimum wage to rise to $9.50 an hour by 2012. Under the law that just took effect, the wage will increase from $5.15 to $5.85 on July 24, and to $7.25 in two years.

Edwards also calls for wages to go up every year, indexed to the increase in the nation’s average wage.

“No one who works full-time should have to live in poverty,’ Edwards said in a release put out by his campaign.

More so than the other White House contenders, Edwards has made fighting poverty a cornerstone of his candidacy. Of course, that’s partly why his now-infamous $400 haircut, details about the palatial home he built for his family in North Carolina and news that he worked for a hedge fund firm linked to lending practices that hurt the poor have had such resonance --- they undercut his message. As his proposal today illustrates, however, it is a message he intends to stick with, regardless of the brickbats directed his way.

-- Don Frederick