Minimum Wage Should Be Legal - 1307 Words

The concept of minimum wage has been a huge issue among Americans and has really become a large discussion point among a lot of the political debates as well as the Internet recently. According to the United States Department of Labor, â€Å"The federal minimum wage is $7.25 per hour effective July 24, 2009. Many states also have minimum wage laws. Some state laws provide greater employee protections; employers must comply with both†. Regardless of the constant debates that occur on whether or not minimum wage should be a livable wage or merely a segway job for teenagers, a majority of these workers are older than 25 years old. As reported by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2014, of the 77,207, 61,883 of them are 25 years of age are†¦show more content†¦In 1938, President Franklin D. Roosevelt signed into effect the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA). Among other things it banned child labor, limited the workweek to 44 hours, and set the national minimum wage at 25 cents an hour (United States Department of Labor). This is one of 121 bills put forth by Roosevelt after Congress had adjourned. The purpose of the bill is associated with the Great Depression. For the purpose of assisting the nation back onto its feet after the Great Depression, this solution has succeeded, but unfortunately the issue had evolved and this one act could not sustain the growth of a nation. So technically this is no longer a solution for this very important issue. There has been a somewhat steady increase in wages through adjustments of the act, up to the current solution, but according to the Pew Research Center and the Economist, the set wages are actually less than what they use to be due to inflation: â€Å"Adjusted for inflation, the federal minimum wage peaked in 1968 at $8.54 (in 2014 dollars). Since it was last raised in 2009, to the current $7.25 per hour, the federal minimum has lost about 8.1% of its purchasing power to inflation†. This c lear disconnect proves that the previous solution(s) is no longer working and therefore needs to be adjusted to meet America’s ever growing economy. As previously stated, in 2009 a adjustment to the Fair Labor Standards Act (FLSA) was added. This