US House votes Federal minimum wage increase

January 11, 2007

The US House of Representatives voted today to increase the from 5.15 per hour to US$7.25 per hour as Democrats moved to fulfill their promise to pass legislation on a host of issues within the first 100 legislative hours of the newly elected congress.

The final vote in the House was 315–116, with 82 Republicans joining Democrats to vote the bill into law. The bill will now go to the Senate, where a debate on whether it should be bundled with tax cuts for small businesses is expected.

The last increase was in 1997 when President Clinton encouraged the Republican controlled Congress to vote in favor of the bill.