ShareThisBy ANYA SOSTEK
Tuesday, November 21, 2006
Before Tuesday's election, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi said that if she were to become speaker of the House of Representatives, she immediately planned to introduce legislation to raise the federal minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25.
With Democrats now poised to take control of the House in January, even some conservatives agree that America's lowest-paid workers probably will be getting a raise _ their first since 1996.
"You can almost bank on it," said Kevin Hassett, director of economic policy studies for the conservative-leaning American Enterprise Institute.
But beyond a minimum wage increase, the economic effects of a Democratic majority in the House _ and possibly the Senate _ are less clear-cut.
Dozens of the newly elected Democrats campaigned vigorously on what they called "fair trade" _ opposition to free trade agreements that they argue cause American jobs to be sent overseas.
"We're going to see major trade fights in both houses," said Sherrod Brown, a Democratic House member from Ohio who won a Senate seat Tuesday.
Specifically, newly elected Democrats are gearing up for a fight on the reauthorization of President Bush's fast-track trade promotion authority, which allows Congress only an "up or down" vote on trade agreements.
The fast-track authority, which passed the House by just one vote in 2001, expires in July 2007.
"The White House is going to understand they can't come to us with a prototypical fast-track agreement that's going to give all the power to the executive branch," Brown said. "I don't think they're up for that kind of battle, because they will lose."
Greater ambitions held by some Democrats of repealing or significantly modifying the North American and Central American Free Trade agreements will meet stiffer opposition _ both from Republicans as well as members of their own party.
In addition to trade policy, Democrats also face internal divides on immigration.
"It's not clear that either party has a strong enough majority within itself that believes the same thing," Hassett said of immigration reform.
And although Democrats have made noise in previous campaigns about repealing President Bush's tax cuts, Rep. Charles Rangel, D-N.Y., who is in line to head the House Ways and Means Committee, has indicated that he would not take any immediate action on taxes.
But Democrats are not likely to wait long to act on the minimum wage, motivated in part by voters in six states who decided Tuesday to take matters into their own hands and raise the minimum wage in their states.
"States are just getting tired of waiting for the federal government to act, and voters are getting tired of waiting for their state Legislatures to act," said Liana Fox, economic analyst for the left-leaning Economic Policy Institute.
Including the six states from this election, 28 states and the District of Columbia will now have minimum wages that exceed the federal minimum.
Fox said that even if the federal minimum wage increase were to pass, the state laws would not be irrelevant. Some cover workers in small businesses or farms not covered by the federal regulation, while others tie wages to inflation or set minimums above $7.25.
"We're seeing a lot of action," she said, "and I don't think it's going to stop."
