Texas’ House Joint Resolution 26, which would have allowed for a state-wide referendum on increasing the state minimum wage to $10.10, was defeated by Republicans in the Texas House on May 14, 2015.
As the fight for an increased minimum wage spreads from state to state, workers in Texas were just denied the ability to vote on an amendment to the Texas Constitution that would have increased bottom line wages to $10.10 an hour if passed. House Joint Resolution 26 was filed by House Member Trey Martinez (D) on November 10, 2014 with strong support from organized labor and workers rights advocates such as the Center for Public Policy Priorities and the Workers Defense Project.
According to the Center for American Progress’s Half in Ten Education Fund, Texas had an overall poverty rate of 18% and a 24.5% poverty rate for children, placing them 38th in the nation compared to other states in 2014, well below the national average. Those existing at or below the poverty line are families of four with a combined income of $23,834 or less annually, and are primarily comprised of minorities and women.
African Americans in Texas make up 24.9% of those in poverty, while Latinos and Asian Americans both compromise over 25%, respectively. Combined, minorities in the Lone Star State represent 89% of the poor. Texas is also near the bottom for working age women at 17.8%, again well below the national average coming in at a disappointing 33rd.
As far as hunger and food insecurity are concerned, Texas ranks at an appalling 49th. While free market purists and pro-business Republicans keep pushing the “Texas Miracle” talking point, there are an estimated 2.4 million workers who are wondering how they were denied a minimum wage increase.
Opponents of increasing minimum wages nationally argue that an increase doesn’t necessarily mean that people would be brought out of poverty, that business and the economy generally would be effected negatively, and that there would be a loss of jobs and/or number of hours worked, and any increase in wages would be directly related to an increase Consumer Price Index (i.e. headline inflation) and decrease in purchasing power, thus keeping people exactly where they started.
This is not so. In fact, most doctorate-wielding economists not bought and paid for agree that increasing minimum wages would decrease poverty rates proportionally. According to a peer-reviewed paper titled “Minimum Wages and the Distribution of Family Incomes” published by UMass Amherst Economics Professor Arindrajit Dube, increasing the minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 would bring approximately 4.6 million Americans out of poverty and significantly increase the quality of life for those living right above that line.
That argument is supported, too, by a report issued by the Congressional Budget Office in 2014 that analyzed the effects of a national increase to $10.10. Here the CBO projected that real income for impoverished workers would rise collectively by approximately $17 billion by 2016, but this increase would be offset by a decrease in the same amount of real incomes by affluent families making $150,000 a year or more. Holding all things equal, there would be an estimated net increase in real wages across the board of $2 billion, which is a net positive effect for the economy.
As for the loss of jobs due to an increase in minimum wage, again, empirical evidence offers a counter-example to anti-worker Republicans who voted down HJR 26 in Texas. There’s an overwhelming body of literature addressing the effects of wages on employment levels. The Center for Economic Policy and Research breaks it down for us in a report released in 2009, pointing out that the vast majority of researched conducted since the 1990s “concludes that the minimum wage has little or no discernible effect on the employment prospects of low-wage workers.”
Republicans have failed miserably to attract the working poor, young, and minority voters, targets in an effort to rebuild a dwindling GOP base as the old guard dies off. Yet a measure that would benefit these attractive voting demographics failed 92-50 along party lines. A statewide poll in 2014 showed that at least 55% of registered voters support an increased wage in the state with the highest number of minimum wage workers nationally.
The “Texas Miracle” is really a Texas disaster for those struggling to survive. But don't tell the elite in Texas, they already know it and are fighting to sustain one of the most exploitative economies in the nation by cutting taxes for business even lower than they are now.
Texas AFL-CIO President Becky Moeller called the failed bill what it was; "..a cruel move with far-reaching consequences. “Today’s short-sighted vote by the Texas House on the minimum wage proposal will leave millions of Texas workers in poverty,” she warned. Maybe that’s exactly where Republicans want them.