After six months of primarily internal Democratic Party wrangling, on July 18, 2019 the House of Representatives passed the Raise the Wage Act, which, if it became law, would progressively increase the federal minimum wage to $15.00 per hour over a six-year period. The House passage of the Bill comes at a time when an increasing number of states and local jurisdictions already have enacted minimum wage laws well above the federal minimum, which has been set at $7.25 per hour for a decade. Currently, more than half of the States have minimum wage rates higher than the federal minimum.
Despite House passage of the Act, the Bill almost certainly will not be passed by the Republican-controlled Senate, if it even comes up for a vote. Likewise, there is no expectation that President Trump would sign the Bill into law even if it Congress passed it.
