Poverty Awareness Week: Help Raise Minimum Wage

This week, EMU students have had the chance to engage themselves in a wide variety of activities launched as part of Poverty Awareness Week (PAW).

Activities ranged from the coffee house forum held last Thursday to discuss the intersection of the environment and poverty, to Jim Wallis speaking about his book God's Politics: Why the Right Gets it Wrong and the Left Doesn't Get It and why we as Christians need to recognize our moral obligation to address poverty in the political arena.

Politics Day, one of several themes for each day of PAW, appeared to be the appropriate segue for Wallis's visit to EMU. Politics Day was originally scheduled for Monday but was rescheduled to Tuesday because of Presidents' Day. The change made it possible for students to contact their state representatives about issues related to poverty on Politics Day. One of these issues was the current standard minimum wage and what this would need to be in order to keep those in the United States. above the poverty level.

According to the Ethical Trading Initiative, the federal minimum wage is set at $5.15 per hour, while the living wage varies from $6.25 to $11.42. It is cruelly ironic that minimum wage is set below the living wage needed to keep people above the poverty level. In view of this, the purpose behind calling representatives was the key element of the Living Wage Campaign, which was co-organized by SGA and several of Terry Jantzi's students. The event, held in the Campus Center on Tuesday, had phones set up enabling students and faculty to call legislators to urge them to reintroduce and support the Fair Wage Act.

This act was introduced as a bill to the Senate last term but was not passed. The main goal of the bill was to improve the quality of life and possibly even environmental conditions in the United States by raising the standard minimum wage. The idea was to establish and maintain conditions that recognized the rights and responsibilities of the general public towards poverty. This included poverty in the sense of both absolute deprivation and relative deprivation. It also took into account job security, family security, the ratio of job applicants to job openings in the United States., employment, unemployment and economic insecurity data, health, life and activity expectancy, as well as disability in the United States.

This bill proposed improvements that are relevant to the Harrisonburg community. Roughly 25 people called their representatives on Tuesday, contributing their voice in supporting this bill. Also, many people who didn't do any calling were still informed on the topic and were able to participate in discussion surrounding the issue of minimum wage. One organizer revealed a feeling of satisfaction that this event created instructive dialogue among participants.

Not all participants responded to the campaign in the same way. One event organizer noted that after hearing what the campaign was about, an unidentified person decided not to call their representative because it did not seem worthwhile to support a bill that was not currently on the table.

The campaign was held to raise awareness and educate students and staff on what solutions to the issue are being introduced to concerned citizens. Hopefully Politics Day, as well as other PAW events, accomplished their goals; to raise awareness about poverty in both domestic and global contexts.

Every citizen impacts poverty each day. What we should take away from this week is that we can raise awareness of how our impact occurs, and that individuals can make a contribution to the fight against poverty.