Advocates for increasing the minimum wage are lauding New York’s U.S. senators for signing on to a bill that would increase the federal minimum wage to $9.80, a move that comes after the effort to increase it in New York to $8.50 failed.

“Seeing our US Senators get it so right on the need to raise the minimum wage makes it all the more frustrating that our State Senators have got it so wrong,” said Dan Cantor, Executive Director of the Working Families Party.

Sens. Chuck Schumer and Kirsten Gillibrand signed on to the measure, which would boost the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to nearly $10.

New York’s minimum wage is currently the federal minimum, $7.25. The last time the federal minimum wage was increased was in 2007, when a $2.10 increase was phased in over two years.

If the measure were to pass — and given the Washington gridlock of late and Republicans controlling the House of Representatives, it’s very unlikely to — New York’s wage would automatically increase.

In a news release the National Employment Law Project refers to state proposal to increase the minimum wage to $8.50 and then tie future increases to the rate of inflation a “more modest proposal” — which is probably news to Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver, the main backer of the bill since January.

Though the measure on the state level is backed by Silver and broad support from voters according to polls, Gov. Andrew Cuomo said increasing it this year would be far too difficult to pass the Republican-led Senate.

Cuomo, a persuasive politician who has engineered numerous legislative victories in the last 18 months, told reporters that passing the minimum wage bill through the GOP-controlled Senate would be harder than passing same-sex marriage.

Cuomo has also denied that he could use his power to unilaterally raise the state’s minimum wage through a little-known state board, as some liberal advocates have maintained he could do.

State Senate Republicans say increasing the state’s minimum wage now would hinder job growth at a crucial time during the economic recovery.

 

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