California made headlines this week as lawmakers there announced a deal to slowly raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour.
But here in Virginia, that number is still $7.25, tied to the federal level -- and that's not likely to change anytime soon.
This year, Virginia Democrats proposed a higher minimum wage, anywhere from $8 to $15 an hour. Another idea was more limited -- a higher minimum that would only affect workers over 25 who work for businesses with more than 15 employees.
There was also a suggestion to simply study the effects of raising wages.
But those ideas were all quickly tabled in Virginia’s General Assembly, in favor of continuing to follow Congress’ lead.
“I think it is likely that Virginia will continue to be dependent on federal action for setting our base labor standards,” says Laura Goren with The Commonwealth Institute, a progressive think-tank in Richmond.
Virginia’s minimum wage is legally tied to the federal minimum wage, so it will raise only if Congress opts to raise the number nationwide.
But Goren says Virginia, where workers make an average of $25 an hour, can afford to have a higher minimum wage.
“It’s interesting, Virginia is a relatively well-off state, typical wages are pretty high in Virginia compared to a lot of states, and yet we lag a lot of other states in terms of our minimum wage,” says Goren.
29 other states have higher minimum wages than Virginia -- including West Virginia, Maryland and D.C.
