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122241434
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Minimum Wage
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122241434
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Minimum Wage
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Records of the Office of the Chief of Staff (Clinton Administration)
George Stephanopoulos's Subject Files
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42-t-2641926-20160531F-004-007-2018
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FOIA Number: 2016-0531-F
FOIA
MARKER
This is not a textual record. This is used as an
administrative marker by the William J. Clinton
Presidential Library Staff.
Collection/Record Group:
Clinton Presidential Records
Subgroup/Office of Origin:
Chief of Staff
Series/Staff Member:
George Stephanopoulos
Subseries:
OA/ID Number:
8028
FolderID:
Folder Title:
Minimum Wage
Stack:
Row:
Section:
Shelf:
Position:
S
22
2
9
3
SENATOR DOLE AND THE MINIMUM WAGE:
WHAT A DIFFERENCE 7 YEARS MAKES
Yesterday, Senator Robert Dole -- in his first official act as the Republican
presidential nominee -- blocked a vote to increase the minimum wage and provide a pay raise
for 10 million hard-working Americans. As Congress continues to delay, the real value of the
minimum wage continues to fall toward its lowest level in 40 years.
With the five-year anniversary of the last minimum wage increase next Monday, now
is the time to put politics aside, raise the minimum wage, and help lift the lives of 10 million
workers. Sixty percent of these workers are adults and many are trying to raise their children
Inflation
on $4.25 an hour. President Clinton's proposal to raise the minimum wage is the same one
supported by Senator Dole in 1989 -- a 90-cent increase in two equal steps over two years.
This proposal would provide an additional $1,800 in earnings -- enough money for the
average American family to buy groceries for seven months.
1989:
Congress passes a 90-cent increase in the minimum wage -- in two equal steps
over two years -- with overwhelming, bipartisan support.
NOW:
President Clinton proposes to increase the minimum wage by 90-cents, in two
equal steps over two years.
1989:
Senator Dole votes for a 90-cent increase in the minimum wage.
NOW:
Senator Dole calls current 90-cent minimum wage increase "very
controversial" and said "there are going to be a lot of young people who lose
their jobs, and a lot of them will be black teenagers." [Source: Elizabeth Shogren. "Dole
Gains Upper Hand, Avoids Vote on Raising Minimum Wage." Los Angeles Times. March 27. 1996; and Adam Clymer.
"Dole Blocks Move To Vote On A Rise For Minimum Wage," The New York Times, March 27, 1996..]
1989:
Senator Bob Dole, said in 1989: "Unfortunately, some Democrats would rather
score a penny's worth of political points instead of giving working men and
women the healthy 90-cent (an hour) increase President Bush has been trying
to give them." [Source: Robert Green. "House Fails To Override Bush's Veto Of Minimum Wage Hike, The
Reuter Business Report, June 14, 1989.]
NOW:
Senator Dole will not allow a vote on President Clinton's proposal to give
working men and women a healthy 90-cent an hour pay increase "today, not
tomorrow, and not next week." [Source: Adam Clymer, "Dole Blocks Move To Vote On A Rise For
Minimum Wage," The New York Times, March 27. 1996.]
1989:
Senator Bob Dole: "[T]his is not an issue where we ought to be standing and
holding up anybody's getting a 30 to 40 cents an hour pay increase, at the same
time that we're talking about capital gains." [Source: Congressional Quarterly Almanac 1989]
NOW:
Senator Dole is talking about a capital gains tax cut. Indeed, he voted for a
budget plan that included one that cost $77 billion over ten years, 75 percent of
which goes to people with six-figure salaries. Yet, Senator Dole is "standing
and holding up" 10 million workers earning less $5.15 an hour from getting a
pay raise.
1989:
Senator Bob Dole: "I never thought the Republican Party should stand for
squeezing every last nickel from the minimum wage. [Source: Congressional Quarterly
Almanac 1989]
NOW:
Senator Bob Dole "blocks move to vote on a rise for minimum wage" as the
last nickel is squeezed from the real value of the minimum wage and it
approaches a 40-year low. [Source: Adam Clymer, "Dole Blocks Move To Vote On A Rise For Minimum
Wage," The New York Times. March 27, 1996.]
1989:
The real value of the minimum wage is at its lowest level since 1955.
NOW:
If it is not increased this year, the real value of the minimum wage will hit its
lowest level since 1955.
1989:
The majority of recent studies show that a modest minimum wage increase --
like a 90-cent raise -- would cost jobs.
NOW:
The majority of recent studies show that a modest minimum wage increase --
like a 90-cent raise -- would not cost jobs. In fact, in the fall of 1995, 101
economists -- including 3 Nobel Prize winners -- signed a statement of support
for a minimum wage increase that said: "[T]he evidence from recent economic
studies of the effects of increases in federal and state minimum wages at the
end of the 1980s and in the early 1990s -- as well as updates of the traditional
time-series studies -- suggests that the employment effects were negligible or
small."