By Carolyn M. Brown
Black Enterprise, August 1, 2012

It’s been three years now since there was a national minimum wage increase. The current federal minimum wage was raised from $6.55 to $7.25 per hour as of July 24, 2009. At $7.25 an hour, that comes to just $15,080 a year for full-time work—a figure still below the official poverty line. Small business owners, congressional leaders, and advocates across the country are calling for renewed focus on sub-poverty earnings that millions of Americans are expected to get by on. ...

Holy Sklar, director of the...

By Tim Gallen
Phoenix Business Journal, July 28, 2012 

As Washington begins to debate new legislation that would bump the federal minimum wage to $9.80 an hour within the next few years, business leaders in Arizona are weighing in on the potential benefits and negatives such an increase would have on businesses and the economy. ...

Even though an increase in the federal minimum wage would not directly affect his organization, Apollo Group’s founder and Executive Chairman John Sperling likens an increased minimum wage to the old adage that “a rising tide raises all boats.”...

By Larry Hicks
York Dispatch (PA), July 25, 2012 

Excerpt: "The Business for Shared Prosperity ... believes it's time to increase the federal minimum wage again. ...

Anyway, I'm reading this email, and I'm thinking how unusual and surprising it is for business owners to be promoting an increase in the minimum wage. Their reason? Well, they're saying they think an increase 'would be good for business and the economy.'"

Read more:

http://www.yorkdispatch.com/food/ci_21154196/hicks-businesses-push-minimum-wage-hike

Op-Ed By Margot Dorfman, CEO, U.S. Women's Chamber of Commerce
The Hill, July 24, 2012
Distributed nationally by American Forum 

The U.S. Women’s Chamber of Commerce supported the last increase in the federal minimum wage on July 24, 2009 and we believe another raise is overdue. The business owners I talk with every day say that, far from hurting their businesses, raising the minimum wage in fact helps small businesses and the broader economy.

Read more:

http://thehill.com/blogs/congress-blog/economy-a-budget/239705-raising-minimum-wage-is-good-for-main-street-

Op-Ed By Holly Sklar
Distributed by McClatchy-Tribune News Service, July 20, 2012

Time flies when you're moving backward. With the federal minimum wage stuck at $7.25 an hour since July 24, 2009, workers now have less buying power than they did in 1997 at the start of the longest period in history without a raise.

It took 10 years, from 1997 until 2007, to raise the minimum wage above $5.15. A worker would need $7.36 today to match the buying power of the $5.15 minimum wage in 1997.

If you picture raising minimum wage as...

By Ellen Freilich
Reuters, July 24, 2012

Bucking the usual tune of private sector lobbyists, a group called Business for a Fair Minimum Wage is calling for a hike in the minimum wage, saying it would boost business and the economy.

Read more:

http://blogs.reuters.com/macroscope/2012/07/24/three-years-after-last-increase-business-group-calls-for-u-s-minimum-wage-hike/

By Craig Smith
Pittsburgh Tribune Review, July 24, 2012

Excerpt: Tuesday marks the anniversary of the last federal minimum wage hike in 2009. ...

Some small business owners believe the raise is overdue.Today's minimum-wage workers have far less buying power than their counterparts in 1968 when the minimum wage was at its highest value of $10.55 adjusted for inflation, according to Business for a Fair Minimum Wage, a national network of business owners and executives. 

http://triblive.com/home/2257027-74/wage-minimum-workers-policy-increase-bill-business-institute-jobs-pittsburgh 

Alaska Business Monthly, July 2012

http://www.akbizmag.com/Alaska-Business-Monthly/July-2012/Sm-Biz-Owners-Say-Raise-Minimum-Wage-As-July-24-Marks-Anniversary-of-Last-Increase/

Op-Ed By Mark S. Jaffe
President and CEO, Greater New York Chamber of Commerce
Distributed by American Forum, June 2012

Our mission at the Greater New York Chamber of Commerce is to improve the business climate and quality of life in New York. And raising the minimum wage will do just that.

That’s right – a minimum wage increase will improve our business climate, not hurt it. It will help local businesses grow and prosper. And it will improve the quality of life for New Yorkers.

The Greater New York Chamber serves 25,000 business and...

By Margot Dorfman, CEO, U.S. Women's Chamber of Commerce
Albany Times Union, June 9, 2012

While some portray debate over the minimum wage as a fight between business and workers, raising the minimum wage is in reality good for both. The business owners I talk with every day believe that, far from hurting their businesses, raising the minimum wage in fact helps small businesses and the broader economy.

The number one problem for our member businesses is that the recovery is slow because sales are still weak. Too many of their customers have been out of...

Op-Ed By Jonathon Welch

Buffalo News, June 6, 2012

The best way for state legislators in New York to support small businesses is to help us get our customers back.

Unfortunately, many policy-makers in Albany are trying to support small businesses by blocking policies needed to boost consumer demand. A case in point is the current proposal to raise the state minimum wage, which the Republican leadership in the State Senate has refused to consider even after the Assembly approved an increase.

Read more:

http://www.buffalonews.com/editorial-page/from-our-readers/another-voice/article889908.ece

Cover Story By Laura Nahmias
City & State, June 4, 2012 

Five days a week Michelle Dawkins wakes up at 2:30 a.m. and drives from her Bronx apartment to begin her shift at JFK Airport, ferrying wheelchair-bound passengers among the airport’s eight terminals. From 4:30 a.m. to 12:30 p.m., Dawkins—whom her co-workers affectionately call “Mother Love”—will make $7.25 an hour, or $58 for the day. If Dawkins, 42, doesn’t require an unpaid sick day, and if the airport needs her for 40 hours each week—which is not always a certainty during the lean fall and winter...

By John Golden
Westchester County and Fairfield County Business Journals, June 1, 2012

Support for increasing New York’s minimum wage has grown among business advocacy groups and business owners and executives statewide in the closing weeks of a legislative session in Albany ...

In Westchester County, the wage hike has not been a high-priority issue for the two largest business groups here, The Business Council of Westchester and Westchester County Association. Neither has taken a position on the bill passed by the Democrat-controlled Assembly in May, which would raise the state’s minimum hourly wage from...

By Andrew Wilkes
Huffington Post, June 1, 2012

Governor Cuomo has an opportunity to exercise economic leadership on behalf of the Empire State's most vulnerable families. Despite his characterizations, raising the state's minimum wage from $7.25 to $8.50 can and should be done. According to a recent Siena College poll, 79 percent of New York State voters share this sentiment. Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver champions an increased minimum wage. Senate Majority Leader Dean Skelos opposes it. Governor Cuomo, then, is the difference maker. Given his political capital, deal-making abilit, and high approval rating, Albany's chief...

By Rod Watson
Buffalo News, May 31, 2012

From the “you can’t make this stuff up” department:

The State Senate’s Republican leader opposes hiking New York’s minimum wage because paying workers more means they’d lose some government benefits.

Really. That’s among Majority Leader Dean Skelos’ objections to the idea that New Yorkers be able to lift themselves out of poverty by working hard. ...

The public knows that, as evidenced by Wednesday’s Quinnipiac University poll showing wide support for the higher wage floor. Some Buffalo entrepreneurs know it, too.

Business issues are “much bigger than...