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Should Minimum Wage Be Raised

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Should Minimum Wage Be Raised
I. Minimum wage is supposed to be a minimum hourly rate of pay that is necessary to live. Minimum wage was not a thing until 1938 when it was created by the Fair Labor Standards Act (“Minimum Wage”). This was supposed to allow people to make the minimum amount of money they needed to provide for themselves and their families, and for a while it probably did. Flash forward to today, and due to inflation, minimum wage is not allowing people to make enough money to support their families. This defeats the whole purpose of having a minimum wage in the first place. Today, the federal minimum wage value is $7.25 an hour (Ornstein). This amount is not enough for people to make a living. Minimum wage should be raised because it would help those earning it be able to support their families better, help the economy, and save the government money.
II. If minimum wage is raised, people earning minimum wage will be able to support their families.
A.
…show more content…
If a person earns minimum wage, they will earn around $15,080 a year. This amount is only if the person takes no days off and works 40 hours a week every week for a year (Ornstein).
1. This amount actually is around $13,926 because of FICA deductions (Ornstein).
2. A full time pay of a minimum wage worker is “almost 20 percent below the poverty line for a family of three” (“Minimal Wages”).
III. Raising minimum wage will also help the economy because more people will have money to spend.
A. In order for an economy to thrive, people need to be buying things (Sklar).
1. According to Sklar, “Consumer spending makes up about 70% of our economy.”
2. Raising the minimum wage will have different effects depending on the state. Things tend to be more expensive in the North and cheaper in the South (Ferdman).
IV. The government will also save money if the minimum wage is

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