Minimum Wage

“Money can’t buy happiness, but it does quiet the nerves,” this quote hits hard to a lot of American families who wish to have more money. Most families work hard everyday to earn a living for themselves, however, when workers in the families aren’t able to get a high paying job for one reason or another, they are forced to work at minimum wage. Yet, when working at minimum wage they aren’t able to earn enough money to keep their families above the poverty line. I believe that the minimum wage in America should be increased. The poverty line was established in the 1960’s and was calculated by multiplying the cost of feeding a family of three, under the assumption that families spend of average, one third of their income on food. At the moment, a family of five, with a full time, minimum wage worker, that receives food stamps, and refundable tax credits, will still be $1,139 below the poverty line. By increasing the minimum wage we can insure that families whose parents work at minimum wage, can live above the poverty level. If nothing is done to change the amount of minimum wage and inflation starts to erode the wage values again, the minimum wage families will fall back below the poverty line by 2015. Also by raising the minimum wage we can reduce the amount of money our country is putting towards welfare programs and things such as WIC. By having less money being wasted toward welfare, in which some people take advantage of it, they can work and earn all of their money, and make enough that will help fully support themselves and families. Also, 40 municipalities have passed the living wage policy, this is an organized effort to base wages more on ‘need,’ rather than ‘skill.’ This has helped a variety of families out. Many people who are not in favor of