There are still two days left for the Senate to call and vote on the minimum wage bill this year.

My hope was to get people thinking that most stores they drive by employ people who would benefit HB 5291. That’d be $10 more each week to spend on food, doctor visit co-pays, health insurance…money stimulating the local economy right away.

Not that most people need convincing: 70% of voters in a new Quinnipiac University Poll support an even larger hike than the one proposed.  The Q Poll also reports that people fear the measure will result in fewer jobs, but economists have shown that’s not the case.

Call your Senator today!

“All of our state legislators, urban and suburban, should strongly support HB 5291, the minimum wage bill. It is urgent that this legislation get called for a vote in the state Senate and passed before the end of the legislative session next week.

“HB 5291 will not significantly jeopardize job creation in Connecticut. In fact, it will create jobs because all low-wage earners who are the main beneficiaries of this legislation will use the approximately $520 per year (25 cents per hour, eight hours per day, five days per week, 52 weeks per year) to purchase food and other necessary household goods.

“The current minimum wage adjusted for inflation has not kept pace with the Consumer Price Index. Raising the minimum wage will prevent low-wage earners from falling further into poverty and will reduce, however slightly, the income inequality gap in Connecticut, which is the highest in the nation.

“Bridgeport and other cities need the minimum-wage increase to prevent a further erosion of its tax base. If Bridgeport residents are being asked to pay more in taxes to support quality education reforms, they must have some assistance in this effort.

“We cannot kick this can down the road for another two years. Please contact your state representatives and ask them to call for a vote and support HB 5291, a no-risk solution to staving off greater income inequality in Connecticut for working families.”

“Every penny of wages that go to the working poor is returned to the economy quickly. Keeping people below poverty wages costs us more in the long run. Some jobs will be lost, but studies show it’s far, far less than opponents fear.”

WNPR’s Where We Live also featured a lively discussion this morning on the topic,  which is available here and will re-air tonight at 7 pm. Callers talked about what it’s like to live and pay off student loans on minimum wage.

Click here to find your Senator and call today to tell him or her you support increasing the minimum wage.

Efforts to increase Connecticut’s minimum wage are still alive and need your help.

The House of Representatives has approved a plan to increase minimum wage by 50 cents over two years.  The plan is a compromise that does not call for future increases to occur with inflation, but Governor Dannel Malloy has said he will sign it.

Please -Click here to find your Senator and call today to tell him or her you support increasing the minimum wage!

Research and experience shows that increasing the minimum wage helps the economy and does not result in job loss. It’s actually an economic stimulus, as people and families have more money to spend in their communities.

 The current $8.25 per hour is just not enough for anyone.  Now IS the time.

Click here to see if your State Representative voted in favor of increasing the minimum wage, and here to find out their contact information to thank them.  

More coverage is at CT News Junkie:Minimum wage Clears House, But Senate Could Pose Hurdle

When looking the numbers with a bit more detail, however, a different picture emerges. It turns out that job growth has been pretty decent on the private sector; in fact, faster than the dismal average during the previous decade. In the public sector, however, the picture looks much different (via):

While the private sector has been creating jobs at a steady clip, the public sector has been shedding workers at an unprecedented pace. Outside the short term boost of census hiring,   state and local governments have fired close to 600,000 workers in the last three years. Most of these jobs, incidentally, are on the education sector; we are not talking about bureaucrats, but teachers.

If the Federal government had provider more support to state and local governments (or at least enough to keep employment levels stable), unemployment would be below 8%. If government expansion would have followed the same clip as the one we had during the Clinton years (only natural, following population growth) we would be close to 7%.

The weird thing is, some people insist that what had a massive expansion of the size of government during these past three years. It is hard to see where they see it.

Consider:

• A new poll shows most Connecticut residents support increasing the minimum wage: 64% of all voters,  86% of Democrats, 54% of Independent voters and 45% of Republicans.
• Rachel Maddow reminds us that minimum wage is a winning issue. 76% of voters favored increasing the minimum wage in a referendum: “You can thank the minimum wage being on the ballot for putting Claire McCaskill over the top….common wisdom says economic populism does not win elections: Missouri has proved that wrong.”
• Connecticut’s minimum wage of $8.25 per hour is just not enough to live on – and we are asking people to do the impossible when we ask them to pay their bills and raise their kids with what they earn at minimum and low-wage jobs. The Permanent Commission on the Status of Women’s new Basic Economic Security Tables examines the actual costs of living to show that a true “BEST” wage is twice minimum wage.

Call Your Senators Toll Free: 1-877-698-8228* – You will be directed to the offices of your Senators
Call Your House Members: 202-225-3121 (Capitol Switchboard)

Urge your Members of Congress to speak out in support of SNAP at Committee hearings, caucus meetings, and on the floor of the House and Senate. Members of Congress must oppose any proposals that would change SNAP’s structure or reduce funding, restrict eligibility or reduce benefits. Members should also support SNAP improvements, including the President’s proposal to restore the cut in the ARRA boost. SNAP works – it is responding to increased need and must be strengthened, not weakened, in order to continue to provide critically-needed nutrition assistance.

This year marks the first for Connecticut’s EITC, which gives eligible filers a credit equal to 30% of the federal.

The Times reports that nationally one in five filers is claiming the EITC, “the country’s largest anti-poverty program.” Working families with incomes of up to $50,000 can qualify.

“As incomes among the country’s lowest wage earners continue to stagnate,” the story adds, “the credit has played a critical role in smoothing the hard edges of an unforgiving labor market for the country’s most vulnerable workers and helping stem the tide of income inequality that has been rising among Americans in recent decades.”

The story profiles Karen Spain, who used to earn $85,000 a year and who now counts on her EITC to pay back rent and bills. “We maintain, that’s all we do,” she said. “We are just trying to keep our heads above water.”

The story also cites a recent Brookings Institute study showing that most people get the EITC for a few years, then stop, and that one in two working families with chidlren got the the EITC once between 1989 and 2006.

Obama’s latest budget request updated the rule to have households earning at least $1 million pay a minimum effective tax of 30 percent. Since it was presented as principle rather than a formal tax proposal, it was Senator Sheldon Whitehouse who then wrote the proposal as separate legislation. The new alternative minimum income tax of 30 percent would impact around 210,000 people making at least $2 million annually, and would then phase in the higher rate for those earning at least $1 million. The Senate will vote around 5:30 this evening on a motion to proceed to this legislation.

The revenue from implementing the rule would bring in about $314 billion more than letting the Bush tax cuts for millionaires expire. When people who are most underserved are being turned away for home energy assistance, job training, child care, housing, and education, and devastating cuts are being proposed for SNAP (formerly food stamps, and eventually we can all just accept that it has a new name) Medicaid and Medicare, it seems only fair that millionaires and billionaires chip in their fair share.

If we take into account all three levels of taxation in the US, the system as a whole is far from progressive: what we have is, essentially, the world´s most convoluted flat tax in the planet. The Federal tax system, with all its loopholes, it is fairly progressive; the state and local taxes, however, are incredibly regressive almost everywhere in the country. Connecticut, despite having a progressive income tax, follows this pattern, due to the extremely nature our local property tax system.  Despite all the chatter about soaking the rich, the facts point out on the opposite direction.