Editorial
Moderate high-cost minimum wage

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Washington's upward-ratcheting minimum wage needs to be moderated. The Senate has voted out a reasonable reform that the House leadership ought to bring to a vote.

The problem with current law is that it raises wages when business is good and raises them when it is bad. The law was sponsored by unions and passed by voters with a 66 percent yes vote in 1998, when business was strong. The law raised the effective minimum in Washington from $5.15 (still the federal standard) to $6.50, and tied it to the Consumer Price Index for urban workers. As of Jan. 1, it is $7.16, the highest of any U.S. state.

The reform would stop the increases when the state unemployment rate is higher than the national rate — which it has been.

Supporters say it is unfair not to give raises to the people at the bottom. These are warm feelings. That is about all they are. The reality is that the higher the minimum wage, the more that certain workers have their hours cut back or will not be employed at all.

It is no coincidence that the states with the highest minimums — Washington, Oregon ($7.05) and Alaska ($7.15) — have recently had some of the highest unemployment rates.

Central Puget Sound families often think of a high minimum wage as progressive. They can afford to think that way because they are in the state's high-wage zone. In rural Washington, family incomes are sharply lower, and a high state minimum prices more of them out of work.

That division showed up in the Senate vote. It was along rural-urban lines, with the rural districts voting strongly to rein in the minimum wage.

The urban Democrats who hold the power in the House should give their rural colleagues a break. It is not progressive to price the people at the bottom out of work.

Copyright © 2004 The Seattle Times Company