RAISING MINIMUM WAGE WOULD REDUCE SAFETY NET COSTS

The federal minimum wage, now $7.25 per hour, has been raised so infrequently since the late 1960s that today’s minimum-wage workers make roughly 25% less in inflation-adjusted terms than their counterparts 45 years ago. A full-time, full-year minimum-wage worker with one child is paid so little that her paycheck leaves her below the federal poverty line. About half of all workers in the bottom 20% of wage earners (roughly anyone earning less than $10.10) receive public assistance through Medicaid and the six main means-tested safety programs, including SNAP and WIC. If the minimum wage were raised to $10.10, more than 1.7 million American workers could leave public assistance programs, and taxpayers would save $7.6 billion per year at a minimum. 

Source: Economic Policy Institute, 10/16/14, Minimum Wage