126 Raising Minimum Wage Quotes
Following is our list of raising minimum wage quotations and slogans full of insightful wisdom and perspective about why minimum wage should be raised.
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Famous Raising Minimum Wage Quotes
The minimum wage has not kept pace with rising costs. This legislation is overdue and will help families that are struggling in this harsh economy. — Jerry Brown
By tying minimum wage to money supply, the poor's income would rise and fall with the rise and fall in money supply. — Max Keiser
So what are the effects of increasing minimum wages? Any Econ 101 student can tell you the answer: The higher wage reduces the quantity of labor demanded, and hence leads to unemployment. — Paul Krugman
It was a Conservative government that in 2016 introduced the national living wage, giving Britain's lowest-paid workers the biggest pay rise in 20 years. — Rishi Sunak
Even a wizard would have a great deal of difficulty repealing the economic law that higher minimum wages reduce employment. Since politicians are not wizards, they should not try. — Gary Becker
The real minimum wage is zero. — Thomas Sowell
A minimum-wage law is, in reality, a law that makes it illegal for an employer to hire a person with limited skills. — Milton Friedman
A job should lift workers out of poverty, not keep them in it. — Bernie Sanders
Wages ought not to be insufficient to support a frugal and well-behaved wage-earner. — Pope Leo XIII
Remember that the minimum wage law provides no jobs; it only outlaws them; and outlawed jobs are the inevitable result. — Murray Rothbard
We've always been in favor of improved wages for workers. When you have a strong middle class, they want to buy more stuff at Costco. — James Sinegal
There is nothing but a lack of social vision to prevent us from paying an adequate wage to every American citizen whether he be a hospital worker, laundry worker, maid or day laborer — Martin Luther King, Jr.
An industry that cannot pay its workers a decent living wage has no right to exist. — Fiorello H. La Guardia
They have ruined our lives and driven down our wages tenfold. Therefore, we should not be surprised that they are leaving us 45 percent poor and 10 percent extreme poverty. — Javier Milei
Like all other contracts, wages should be left to the fair and free competition of themarket, and should never be controlled by the interference of the legislature. — David Ricardo
Short Raising Minimum Wage Quotes
- Unemployment benefits are creating jobs faster than practically any other program — Nancy Pelosi
- a labor victory must be economic and it must be revolutionizing. — Elizabeth Gurley Flynn
- A heavy progressive or graduated income tax. — Karl Marx
- Join the union, girls, and together say Equal Pay for Equal Work. — Susan B. Anthony
- It's time to make our government work for all of us... and not just the 1%. — Bernie Sanders
- We always strive to be the best in the wage package. — James Sinegal
Raising Minimum Wage Image Quotes
Not Raising Minimum Wage Quotes
To everyone in this Congress who still refuses to raise the minimum wage, I say this: If you truly believe you could work full-time and support a family on less than $15,000 a year, go try it. If not, vote to give millions of the hardest-working people in America a raise. — Sayings
Congress has not raised the minimum wage since 1997. The minimum wage is now at its lowest level in 50 years adjusted for inflation. — Russ Carnahan
Raising the minimum wage a lot across the board would make a big difference. It's not the only thing, but it's an indispensable part of solving the problem. — Nick Hanauer
The American people want to raise the minimum wage. Every poll tells us that. That bill will not get to the floor of the Senate. The American people want to ask the rich to pay more in taxes. But the legislation that will get to the floor is tax breaks for billionaires. — Bernie Sanders
I do not support raising the minimum wage, and the reason is as follows. When the minimum wage is raised, workers are priced out of the market. That is the economic reality that seems, at least so far, to be missing from this discussion. — John Sununu
Fixing a broken immigration system. Protecting our kids from gun violence. Equal pay for equal work, paid leave, raising the minimum wage. All these things still matter to hardworking families; they are still the right thing to do; and I will not let up until they get done. — Barack Obama
If Democrats are not showing up in those [rural] places even if you're not gonna win right away but if you're not in there at least making an argument that, "Hey, you know what? It's the Democrats who are trying to raise your minimum wage." — Barack Obama
I want us to raise the national minimum wage, because people who live in poverty should not - who work full-time should not still be in poverty. — Hillary Clinton
Regulate the banks, get money out of elections; raise the minimum wage, environmental issues. They're all very important and the Occupy movement made a difference. It shifted not only the discourse but to some extent, action on these issues. — Noam Chomsky
Raising the minimum wage may poll well, but having a job that pays $10 an hour is not the American Dream. And our current government programs, offer at best only a partial solution. They help people deal with poverty, but they do not help them escape it. — Marco Rubio
Minimum Wage Quotes
Look for the enemies of Medicare, of higher minimum wages, of Social Security, of federal aid to education and there you will find the enemy of the Negro, the coalition of Dixiecrats and reactionary Republicans that seek to dominate the Congress. — A. Philip Randolph
I heard Russell Simmons say that, 'people have million dollar dreams with a minimum wage work ethic.' Basically, everybody wanna be rich but don't nobody wanna work for it. — Yo Gotti
No business which depends for existence on paying less than living wages to its workers has any right to continue in this country... By living wages I mean more than a bare subsistence level - I mean the wages of decent living. — Franklin D. Roosevelt
Minimum wage law is the 'People's Fed.' Tie minimum wage to money supply. If there is pushback against this idea, then shut down the Fed and its ability to distort the economy, penalizing labor, or make the Fed's distortions available to all businesses and all workers. — Max Keiser
I'm against having a Fed. It's socialism in its worst form. But until the Fed is gotten rid of, the only economic variable the poor have to counteract the injustices of the Fed is the minimum wage law. — Max Keiser
It was the labor movement that helped secure so much of what we take for granted today. The 40-hour work week, the minimum wage, family leave, health insurance, Social Security, Medicare, retirement plans. The cornerstones of the middle-class security all bear the union label. — Barack Obama
In my view, we need a massive federal jobs program which puts millions of our people back to work. We must end our disastrous trade policies. We need to raise the minimum wage to a living wage. And we have to fight for pay equity for women. — Bernie Sanders
I was making almost minimum wage on 'The Young and the Restless.' But it was my first job, so I accepted my first quote. I had a great time on it, and it obviously led me to better things. — Eva Longoria
I think the minimum wage will be the centerpiece of the State of Union. I think it should be the centerpiece of the State of the Union. And it should be very focused on that because, as you said, Republicans in the rest of the country are for it. — Robert Gibbs
You can't have a million dollar dream with a minimum wage work ethic. — Zig Ziglar
Living Wage Quotes
I don't give a damn what queers do, and don't give a damn what Christians do. Just get the hell out of my way because I want to live my life and I don't want the government sucking 60% of my wages off my ass. — Alex Jones
The farmer and manufacturer can no more live without profit than the labourer without wages. — David Ricardo
The Living-Wage Campaign at Harvard is like a Boston winter: you know it's going to strike, but wonder only when and how hard. — Vivek Ramaswamy
I love how Mother Theresa said she wouldn't attend an anti-war rally but if there was a peace rally to call her. So I realized it's not about waging a war against everybody's disease and diagnosis but rather about helping them live. — Bernie Siegel
By bourgeoisie is meant the class of modern capitalists, owners of the means of social production and employers of wage labor. By proletariat, the class of modern wage laborers who, having no means of production of their own, are reduced to selling their labor power in order to live. — Friedrich Engels
Profits are better than wages. Wages make you a living; profits make you a fortune. — Jim Rohn
Everyone can have health care. Everyone can earn a living wage. We can educate all our kids - well. But none of that happens unless there's a political revolution. And it's not going to happen unless we deal with corporate control of the media. — Bernie Sanders
The union miner cannot agree to the acceptance of a wage principle which will permit his annual earnings and his living standards to be determined by the hungriest unfortunates whom the non-union operators can employ. — John L. Lewis
Almost all people suffer some form of intense inner pain at some times in their lives. The suffering might be depression, anxiety, substance abuse, or suicidal thoughts and it results from the battles we wage against our thoughts as we futilely try to get rid of our historie. — Steven C. Hayes
Capitalism, though it may not always give the scientific worker a living wage, will always protect him, as being one of the geese which produce golden eggs for its table. — John B. S. Haldane
Fair Wage Quotes
I had watched for many years and seen how a few rich families held much of Argentina's wealth and power in their hands. So Peron and the government brought in an eight hour working day , sickness pay and fair wages to give poor workers a fair go . — Evita Peron
When I visited coffee farms in Ethiopia, the farmers could not believe we spend a week's wages in their country on a cup of coffee in ours, because they see so little of the profits. Oxfam's fair trade campaign helps right this wrong. — Colin Firth
The difference between the very wealthy and the working poor has grown. We raise that minimum wage and we move forward with the vision of this president that we have, which is everyone pays their fair share. — Barbara Boxer
A fair day's wages for a fair day's work. — Thomas Carlyle
American workers won't be able to compete fairly for jobs until companies have to pay higher wages in countries like China and India. — Andy Stern
We have to get very militant with some of these employers to say there's no shortcuts, our people have a right to a fair day's wage for a fair day's pay, and we've got to get that done. And that's going to happen. — James P. Hoffa
I was advocating for world peace, but I was waging a violent war against my own body. I was speaking about poverty and starvation, but I was eating more than my fair share. I was a hypocrite. — Bryant H. McGill
Saying I want to pay women a fair wage is doing something and saying young black people deserve not to be called super predators but to be engaged from an economic standpoint that gives them an equal opportunity says doing something.I`m tired of talking. — Killer Mike
I hold it to be our duty to see that the wage-worker, the small producer, the ordinary consumer, shall get their fair share of business prosperity. But it either is or ought to be evident to everyone that business has to prosper before anybody can get any benefit from it. — Theodore Roosevelt
The social relations of capitalism have penetrated slowly into all spheres of life to make wage labour the general condition of existence only in fairly recent times. — David Harvey
Wage Quotes
Some jobs pay better, some jobs smell better, and some jobs have no business being treated like careers. But work is never the enemy, regardless of the wage. Because somewhere between the job and the paycheck, there’s still a thing called opportunity, and that’s what people need to pursue. — Mike Rowe
Let us wage a moral and political war against the billionaires and corporate leaders, on Wall Street and elsewhere, whose policies and greed are destroying the middle class of America. — Bernie Sanders
Masonic labor is purely a labor of love. He who seeks to draw Masonic wages in gold and silver will be disappointed. The wages of a Mason are in the dealings with one another; sympathy begets sympathy, kindness begets kindness, helpfulness begets helpfulness, and these are the wages of a Mason. — Benjamin Franklin
The lowest stage of humanity is experienced when the individual must labour for a small pittance of wages from others. — Robert Owen
Men Wanted for Dangerous Expedition: Low Wages for Long Hours of Arduous Labour under Brutal Conditions; Months of Continual Darkness and Extreme Cold; Great Risk to Life and Limb from Disease, Accidents and Other Hazards; Small Chance of Fame in Case of Success. — Ernest Shackleton
NAFTA recognizes the reality of today's economy - globalization and technology. Our future is not in competing at the low-level wage job; it is in creating high-wage, new technology jobs based on our skills and our productivity. — John F. Kerry
If you do not condemn colonialism, if you do not side with the colonial people, what kind of revolution are you waging? — Ho Chi Minh
War, once declared, must be waged offensively, aggressively. The enemy must not be fended off; but smitten down. You may then spare him every exaction, relinquish every gain, but „til then he must be struck incessantly and remorselessly. — Alfred Thayer Mahan
It is not the employer who pays the wages. Employers only handle the money. It is the customer who pays the wages. — Henry Ford
Blame is a lazy man's wages. — Danish proverb
Low Wage Quotes
I pay low wages. I can take advantage of that. We're going to be successful, but the basis is a very low-wage, low-benefit model of employment. — Sam Walton
The theoretically unrestricted right to develop power, to wage war against other states, is antisocial and is doubly dangerous, because the state as a mass entity represents a low moral and intellectual level. — Christian Lous Lange
People understand that the economy is rigged. They're working longer hours for low wages. All new income and wealth, almost all, is going to the people on top. — Bernie Sanders
It has now been over 7 years since Congress last raised the minimum wage to its current level of $5.15 per hour. Since that last increase, Congress's failure to adjust the wage for inflation has reduced the purchasing power of the minimum wage to record low levels. — Jon Corzine
Most poor people earn more than minimum wage when they are working; their problem is not low wages. The problem comes when they are not working. — Joseph Stiglitz
Dad said I would always be "high minded and low waged" from reading too much Ralph Waldo Emerson. Maybe he was right. — Jim Harrison
I will tell you is the antidote to [Donald] Trump is a very strong progressive agenda that says, yes, I know you`re angry. And you know what? You should be angry because you`re working longer hours for low wages. You have a right to be bitter and you have a right to be that. — Bernie Sanders
Every three weeks before an election the TV ads expressing great concern about our trade policy and the loss of jobs to China and other low-wage countries. And then it's forgotten about the day after the election. — Bernie Sanders
The minimum wage law very cleverly is misnamed. The real minimum wage is zero. That is what many inexperienced and low skilled people receive as a result of legislation that makes it illegal to pay them what they are currently worth to an employer. — Thomas Sowell
Certainly other things we can do, we gotta promote after-school employment, give kids an opportunity, raising the minimum wage was part of that, we can't expect that young people are going to feel they can make a living out there for such low wages. — Matt Gonzalez
People Writing About Raising Minimum Wage
More Raising Minimum Wage Quotes
I want to applaud those workers rallying to raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour. I believe strongly that a great nation will not survive when so few have so much and so many have so little. Every worker in America should be given respect, dignity and the wages and benefits they need to take care of their family. — Bernie Sanders
Every single thing I`ve done, from the Affordable Care Act to pushing to raise the minimum wage, to making sure that young people are able to go to college and get good job training, to what we`re pushing now in terms of sick paid leave,everything I do has been focused on how do we make sure the middle class is getting a fair deal. — Barack Obama
The typical minimum wage earner is a provider and a breadwinner - most likely a woman - responsible for paying bills, running a household and raising children. — Thomas Perez
If I thought that raising the minimum wage was the best way to help people increase their pay, I would be all for it, but it isn't. If you raise the minimum wage, you're going to make people more expensive than a machine. And that means all this automation that's replacing jobs and people is only going to be accelerated. — Marco Rubio
I have not heard almost anybody suggest that raising the minimum wage to the level we have in Vermont has been an impediment to our economy which is doing reasonably well ... If somebody is going to work that person has got to receive at least a wage that they can go out and live with dignity on. That's an extremely important point. — Bernie Sanders
Raising the minimum wage means raising the living wage - and that's good news for Ohio. — Sherrod Brown
Working-class Americans have waited too long, close to a decade in fact, for an increase in the minimum wage. This has been the second longest period without a pay raise since the Federal minimum wage law was first enacted in 1938. — Bill Pascrell
The bottom line is that five million low-income Americans working full time for minimum wage, deserve a raise. — Jim Clyburn
We have to make the economy fairer. That starts with raising the national minimum wage and also guarantee, finally, equal pay for women's work. — Hillary Clinton
If you raise the minimum wage, you're going to make people more expensive than a machine. — Marco Rubio
Yet it ought to be clear that a minimum wage law is, at best, a limited weapon for combatting the evil of low wages, and that the possible good to be achieved by such a law can exceed the possible harm only in proportion as its aims are mode. — Henry Hazlitt
There are many major crises facing our country. At the top of the list is the need to overturn Citizens United. If billionaires are able to buy elections and elect right-wing candidates, there is no way we will ever address climate change, college education, affordability, job creation, raising the minimum wage and taking on Wall Street. — Bernie Sanders
[A]s we celebrate 75 years of the minimum wage, we must also recognize that it is no longer achieving its potential impact in our economy or for America's working families. Every American deserves the chance to build a better life for his or her family - and raising the minimum wage will provide that opportunity. — Tom Harkin
I have been dealing with the minimum wage issue for the last 28 years that I have been in elective office. And when you raise the price of employment, guess what happens? You get less of it. At a time when the American people are still asking the question, where are the jobs, why would we want to make it harder for small employers to hire people? — John Boehner
I want us to invest in you. I want us to invest in your future. That means jobs in infrastructure, in advanced manufacturing, innovation and technology, clean, renewable energy, and small business, because most of the new jobs will come from small business. We also have to make the economy fairer. That starts with raising the national minimum wage and also guarantee, finally, equal pay for women's work. — Hillary Clinton
The fact is, yes, statistically, African Americans and Latinos are getting hit harder, but it`s something that we can have real solidarity across racial lines on, to raise the minimum wage, to lower the cost of going to college, to make sure there`s real consumer protection. — Keith Ellison
Now, why would my supporters be supporting somebody who doesn't want to raise the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, a starvation wage, doesn't want to do that. Why would anybody that supports me support a candidate like Trump who wants to throw millions and millions of people off of health insurance? We need to guarantee health care to all people as a right, not throw millions of people off health insurance as Trump wants to do. — Bernie Sanders
I would favor three policies: raising the minimum wage to $12, closing the tax loophole where persons only pay a 15% income tax on long term capital gains (tax it at the full tax rate), and institute a progressive tax moving the highest tax rate from 39.6% to 45%. I would favor implementing these three policies in that order, starting with raising the minimum wage, but not stopping there. — Philip Kotler
President [Barack] Obama - he was unsuccessful in his efforts to raise the federal minimum wage, but he still used the Labor Department in other ways to try to boost paychecks for American workers. — Rachel Martin
I want to break up the Wall Street banks. Hillary Clinton doesn't. I want to raise the minimum wage to 15 bucks an hour. She wants $12 an hour. I voted against the War in Iraq. She voted for the War in Iraq. I believe we should ban fracking. She does not. I believe we should have tax on carbon and deal aggressively with climate change. That is not her position. — Bernie Sanders
In my first 100 days, I'll work with both parties to make the biggest investment in good-paying jobs in decades. We'll also raise the minimum wage - a big deal for the nearly two-thirds of minimum-wageworkers who are women. And we'll give women the tools they need to fight for equal pay. This isn't just a "women's issue"т - it's an issue every American should care about, no matter their gender. — Hillary Clinton
The conversation should've been about middle class people. The conversation should've been about how to raise the minimum wage and strengthen Social Security. But then we started talking about this whole email stuff again. And now the outcome is that, you know, Donald Trump has somebody who he's looking at to put on his Cabinet who's a lobbyist to privatize Social Security. — Keith Ellison
On the basis of capitalism, victories like raising the minimum wage are only temporary. — Kshama Sawant
We should raise the national minimum wage. — Hillary Clinton
Mike Pence, when he was in Congress, voted against raising the minimum wage above $5.15. And he has been a one-man bulwark against minimum wage increases in Indiana. — Tim Kaine
Let's also, my friends, let's raise the minimum wage and support the 5 for 15 so you don't live in poverty. — Hillary Clinton
Anyone who supported Bernie Sanders who thinks we should raise the minimum wage, who thinks that we should have universal health care coverage, who thinks that the wealthy have not paid their fair share, and I could go on and on, would certainly not find that Donald Trump's views are in line with theirs. — Hillary Clinton
Raising the federal minimum wage won't just put more money in the pocket of low-income families - it also means they spend more money at the businesses in their neighborhoods. [Donald] Trump's against that as well. — Hillary Clinton
If you're fighting against a minimum wage increase, you're fighting an uphill battle, because most Americans, even most Republicans, are okay with raising the minimum wage. — Frank Luntz
A September 2015 poll found that, by a 3-1 margin, voters are more likely to support political candidates who favor raising the minimum wage. — David Rolf
I think, when the African-American community understands my record on criminal justice, my record on economics, the agenda we're bringing forth, raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour, dealing with the fact that we have more people in jail, shamefully, than any other country on Earth, that I am against the death penalty, Secretary Clinton is not, I think, as people become familiar with my ideas, we are going to do better and better. — Bernie Sanders
I believe in raising the minimum wage and equal pay for work. — Hillary Clinton
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