PHILADELPHIA, (PRNewswire) – Thousands of Pennsylvanians
earning the minimum hourly wage will finally get a pay raise with Governor
Edward G. Rendell’s signing of Senate Bill 1090, the minimum wage increase, into law today.
“Too many Pennsylvanians have been working full-time and still living well below the poverty level at today’s federal minimum wage,” Governor Rendell said during a ceremony at Sharon Baptist Church in Philadelphia.
“Minimum wage workers in Pennsylvania haven’t seen a pay raise in nearly nine years, while the cost of food, heat, clothing, shelter and other basic necessities have increased steadily.
“This bill provides a fairer wage for more than 420,000 hardworking Pennsylvanians who deserve a raise.”
Sponsored by Senator Christine Tartaglione (D-Philadelphia), SB 1090 increases Pennsylvania’s minimum wage to $6.25 an hour on Jan. 1, 2007, and to $7.15 an hour on July 1, 2007.
Employers with 10 or fewer full-time employees will follow a delayed implementation schedule, increasing the minimum wage to $5.65 on Jan. 1, 2007; $6.65 on July 1, 2007 and $7.15 on July 1, 2008.
The new law also provides for a 60-day training wage, based on the federal $5.15-per-hour training wage, for employees under 20 years of age.
Upon hiring, employers must notify workers of both the training wage and the workers’ right to receive the Pennsylvania minimum wage after 60 calendar days of employment. The law also makes it clear that other workers may not be displaced to allow hiring of training-wage workers.
In 1997, the minimum wage level was federally mandated at $5.15 an hour. Pennsylvania now joins 19 other states – Alaska, California, Connecticut, Delaware, Florida, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, New Jersey, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, Washington and Wisconsin, plus the District of Columbia – that currently have minimum wage levels above $5.15 an hour.
The last time Pennsylvania’s General Assembly increased the minimum wage was in 1988.