House Approves 90-Cent Increase in Minimum Wage

Performing an election-year pirouette, the Republican-led House voted Thursday to give more than 9 million minimum-wage workers a 90-cent raise, to $5.15 per hour, over the next two years.

The lopsided 281-144 vote came after the House, in a closer vote, rejected a Republican-backed bill to exempt very small employers from all federal minimum-wage and overtime laws. That vote was 229 to 196.

The measure now moves to the Senate along with a companion bill, passed Wednesday, that would provide about $7 billion in tax breaks over eight years to small businesses, which have complained that they would bear an unfair share of the burden of the higher minimum wage. Senate Democrats are predicting approval in that chamber, but only after a tough fight.

President Clinton, who is pledging as part of his reelection campaign to try to put more money in American workers’ pockets, said he would sign the legislation into law--provided it does not carry an exemption for small businesses or other extraneous legislation.

The bill would raise the federal minimum wage by 50 cents on July 1 and another 40 cents in 1997. The increase would be the first in the federally mandated minimum hourly wage since 1991, when it was raised from $3.80 to $4.25 as the second step of a two-tier increase that Congress approved by a large margin in 1989.

Since the last hike, the minimum wage had fallen to a 40-year low as a measurement of buying power, supporters of an increase said.

House passage occurred after more than two months of heated debate, during which enough moderate Republicans joined with Democrats to beat back opposition from House GOP leaders and the conservative wing of the party. Voting in favor of the bill were 187 Democrats, 93 Republicans and one independent. Six Democrats and 138 Republicans voted against it.

Across Capitol Hill, Democrats, who lost control of Congress in the 1994 midterm elections, hailed passage as a “major victory” over House leaders, including Speaker Newt Gingrich (R-Ga.).

“No wonder 60% of the American Congress say this Gingrich Congress is too extreme,” said House Minority Whip David E. Bonior (D-Mich.). “The American people don’t want to see a return to sweatshops. They want us to raise wages, not roll them back.”

Echoing that view, Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) said: “It’s time to end the Republican war on hard-working American families. I’m confident the Senate will also reject any Republican scheme to roll back the minimum wage.”

Sen. Paul Wellstone (D-Minn.) told reporters that even though Republicans control the House, they had to bend to the will of the public. Polls show overwhelming support for raising the minimum wage. “People are saying to all of us that raising the minimum wage is a matter of fundamental economic justice,” he said, predicting a similar result in the Senate.

During remarks offered Thursday at a news conference in Milwaukee, Clinton reiterated his willingness to sign the minimum-wage bill and repeated his offer to accept the bill in exchange for approving a Republican proposal to repeal a 1993 increase in the federal gasoline tax of 4.3 cents a gallon.

“If the Congress would pass a clean minimum wage that was tied to the gas tax, I would sign that,” Clinton said.

Some moderate Republicans joined in the celebration. “The House worked its will and America will get a raise,” said Rep. Jack Quinn (R-N.Y.).

Final action was comparatively anticlimactic after the bitter struggle over the proposed exemption for small businesses. The proposal, offered by Rep. Bill Goodling (R-Pa.), would have made companies with gross revenues of less than $500,000 a year exempt from minimum wage and overtime laws.

Defeat of the Goodling amendment brought House Democrats to their feet in cheers and applause. Democrats said the exemption would have turned many supporters of the wage increase against the bill.

“The Goodling amendment wasn’t just a poison pill, it was a poison horse pill,” said Senate Minority Leader Tom Daschle (D-S.D.). “It would actually have decreased the number of American workers with minimum-wage protection.”

Such comments drew a sharp rebuke from Goodling, who said Democrats were engaging in “big lie” politics to scare away support. “If you tell the big lie often enough, some people will begin to believe it,” Goodling told reporters before the vote. “What you’re hearing out there is fiction. It has nothing to do with fact.”

Defeated Republican leaders predicted problems ahead for low-wage workers, who might not find jobs because employers will be unable to afford to hire as many people at the new, higher wage floor.

Majority Leader Dick Armey (R-Texas) drew on his former life as a college economics professor to point out the folly of raising wages at the cost of jobs. “If a college freshman doesn’t grasp this, he’s not likely to pass the course,” Armey said at a news conference.

Rep. Dave Weldon (R-Fla.) complained during floor debate that Democrats lacked concern for poor people who would not be able to get jobs.

“They don’t have compassion for all of the people they’re going to unemploy because of the minimum wage going up,” he thundered. “I don’t think you care about them losing their jobs. You care about getting reelected.”