$10 an Hour? Senate Democrats Propose Boosting the Minimum Wage

Iowa's minimum wage would jump to $10 by 2013 under a proposal advanced Thursday by Senate Democrats.

The 38 percent increase would come in increments. The current wage, $7.25 would jump to $8.75 in July and go to $10 in January, as originally reported by Lynn Campbell of IowaPolitics.com.

Iowa's last increase came in July 2009 when the hourly rate was increased from $6.55.

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 One senator told IowaPolitics.com:

“We raise the minimum wage and it’s economic development, because this money is spent … it’s either saved for tuition or put back immediately into the economy," said Sen. Dick Dearden, D-Des Moines. "It goes back on Main Street. It does good for local businesses.”

But following the 2009 increase, more than 500,000 jobs were lost, said John Gilliland, senior vice president for government relations for the Iowa Association of Business and Industry, the state’s largest business trade group representing 1,400 Iowa businesses that employ more than 300,000 Iowans, as reported by IowaPolitics.com.

Sen. Wally Horn, D-Cedar Rapids, told the Mason City Globe Gazette that he does not believe there is enough support to pass a minimum wage increase and doesn't plan to bring it to the Senate Labor Committee, which he chairs.

And KCCI said that House Speaker Kraig Paulsen wouldn't allow debate in the GOP controlled house.