Connecticut Gov. Dannel Malloy just signed into law a measure that will make his state the first to raise its minimum wage to $10.10, the national standard sought by President Barak Obama and Democrats. And it won't be the last.
The push for a higher minimum wage, buoyed by a progressive resurgence and intense focus on income inequality nationwide, was given extra impetus last week when the president made it a women's issue: "Raising the full minimum wage...will help reduce poverty among women and their families, as well as make progress toward closing the gender pay gap," said a new White House report.
As women representing two of New York's "big five" cities, we know firsthand that a raise in the minimum wage would bring real relief to our constituents and their families. From Buffalo to Yonkers, we see working women unable to support their families while working for the current minimum wage — even if they work full time.
Statewide, for the 856,000 women making the meager minimum wage of $8 an hour, wages are not an abstract economic issue. Unfortunately, their situations belie an implicit American promise — that hard work shouldn't result in a life in poverty. In fast-food restaurants, laundromats and retail giants across the state, women are hard at work without any prospect of a raise. Nearly 30 percent of New York's women support their families on a salary of less than $19,000 a year. Not only does this reduce these women's opportunities to climb to the middle class, but it has a direct and significant impact on their children, more than a million of whom live in poverty.
As commendable as it is that Connecticut passed this measure, it is disappointing that it was Connecticut, and not our great state — New York — that was the first to raise the minimum wage to $10.10. The women's rights movement made its storied home in New York. Before there was ever a women's rights movement, there was Elizabeth Cady Stanton and the Seneca Falls Convention. Before the 19th Amendment was enacted, granting women the right to vote, there was the historic election of Ida Sammis and Mary Lilly, the first women elected to the New York state Legislature. Before Rosa Parks heroically sparked the Alabama bus boycott, there was Claudette Colvin of the Bronx, the first person to be arrested for refusing the indignity of segregation on one of those same Montgomery buses.
Now, without action from our leaders in Albany to pass RaiseUpNY, a bill that would empower cities like ours to raise the minimum wage in their community to levels that work for them, we risk betraying that great legacy. New York's diverse economies require a tailored approach to growth. RaiseUpNY is the single best way our leaders in Albany can lift millions into the middle class, empower women and put us on a path to a more stable, healthy economy.
Connecticut's historic step reminds us that raising the minimum wage is an essential part of the fight for gender and income equality. It is only a matter of time before other states adopt similar raises to build a more stable ladder to the middle class. Before it's too late, New York should move quickly to embrace its role as a pioneer in these historic struggles and make real for millions of women the promise of the American dream.
Shelley Mayer, D-Yonkers, and Crystal Peoples-Stokes, D-Buffalo, are members of the state Assembly.