Pennsylvania State Senator Introduces Legislation for $20 Minimum Wage, Highest in Nation

A Pennsylvania state senator introduced legislation to increase the state’s minimum wage to $20, the highest in the nation.

State Sen. Christine Tartaglione (D) introduced Senate Bill 1186 (SB 1186), which would raise the minimum wage in Pennsylvania from $7.25, the current federal minimum wage, to $20. Tartaglione described Pennsylvania’s “current minimum wage of $7.25” as being “inadequate” amid high inflation rates.

Under SB 1186, the minimum wage would be raised to $20 by July 1, 2024, according to a press release from May.

Currently, Washington, DC, has the highest minimum wage of $17 an hour, while the state of Washington comes in second with a minimum wage of $16.28. California is a close third with a minimum wage of $16 an hour.

“The current minimum wage of $7.25 is inadequate and, in the midst of inflationary pressure, it is immoral to continue with this baseline rate of pay,” Tartaglione wrote in a memo from June 2023. “In 2022, 63,000 Pennsylvanians survived on the bare minimum and an additional 417,000 Pennsylvanians relied on hourly wages between $7.26 and $12.”

Tartaglione added that people working full-time in “childcare, home health, retail,” and in the hospitality industry while only making minimum wage “only earn $15,080/year.”

Pennsylvania State Senator Christine W. Tartaglione during hearing by Pennsylvania Democratic Senators on December 6, 2021. (Ben Hasty/MediaNews Group/Reading Eagle via Getty Images)

“These are some of the most fundamental jobs in our Commonwealth, yet the compensation for the hard work done by minimum and near-minimum wage earns is not sufficient to afford basic necessities such as rent, transportation, food, and prescriptions,” Tartaglione said. “Many are forced to rely on public assistance to get by.”

Pennsylvania’s minimum wage has rested at $7.25 since 2006 when former Gov. Rendell (D) approved an increase of the minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.15, according to Whyy News.

After the federal government raised the minimum wage to $7.25 in 2009, Pennsylvania also inched up its minimum wage.

Tartaglione added in an April memo that after “two decades of inaction,” even a $15 minimum wage is “no longer adequate.”

The Pennsylvania Department of Health and Human Services poverty guidelines shows that the poverty wage in the state is set at $7.24, according to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Living Wage Calculator.

One adult with no children in the state would need a living wage of $21.95 in order to survive, while two adults with no children and one person working would need a living wage of $30.67. A living wage for two adults working with no children would be $15.33, according to the data.

“You shouldn’t have to work four or five jobs in order to be able to put food on the table and pay rent or have to make a choice,” Tartaglione said in a statement to Fox43.