Raise the Wage Act

Mr. Speaker, I rise today with my colleague and coanchor for the Congressional Black Caucus, Delegate Stacey Plaskett, on behalf of the Congressional Black Caucus for this Special Order hour where we can reflect on the priorities facing the American public.

This week, this body will be voting on the topic of raising the minimum wage and giving Americans a well-deserved raise and the impact that that would have not only on the workforce at large but, specifically, for Black workers and families across the United States.

Why is this so important as we touch on the issues of the day? According to the National Low Income Housing Coalition, there is no place in America where a full-time worker making the current minimum wage of $7.25 an hour can afford a modest two-bedroom apartment.

Additionally, many working people, particularly working women and Black workers, are still facing persistent and even, in some cases, worsening wage gaps since 2000. The wage gap between Black and White workers has grown significantly.

So for this hour, Mr. Speaker, we will discuss the issues affecting American workers and why it is imperative that this House take up the WAGE Act that we will be considering later this week.

I am honored to have with us here this evening several members of the Congressional Black Caucus who will share their thoughts, concerns, and priorities for this legislation.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from Michigan (Mrs. Lawrence).

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from Michigan for bringing forward her commitment and leadership on these important issues and sharing her support for the Raise the Wage Act, which this body will be considering later this week.

Just before we started this Special Order hour, one of my colleagues on the other side of the aisle came up and talked about the negative impact of raising the Federal minimum wage. It is so interesting that CEOs for the 350 largest U.S. companies on average were paid $18.9 million in 2017, which is a 17 percent increase from the previous year. Meanwhile, wages for the average U.S. worker grew by 0.2 percent during that time.

How is it okay that CEO pay can go up 17 percent, and the average CEO for the 350 largest U.S. companies can, on average, be paid $19 million, and we can't afford to give America a raise?

On average, controlling for age, gender, and education, Black workers are paid 16.2 percent less than White workers. According to the Census Bureau--which is why it is so important for people to participate in the Census, so that we have this vital data--in 2016, the average household income for a White family was $80,720. For a Black family, that number sat at $38,555, less than half of what an average White family took home.

That affects every aspect of that family's life, from their ability to afford housing to healthcare to being able to put food on the table and put gas in the car so that they can make it to their work.

We believe that one job should be enough and that people should be able to have a livable wage to take care of themselves and their families.

I urge my colleagues throughout this body, particularly those on the other side, that if they are going to come to this floor this week and oppose giving Americans a raise, then they have to be able to explain why they support CEO pay increasing more than 17 percent in one given year while U.S. worker wages grew at less than 0.2 percent during that same time.

Workers deserve a wage increase. Their wages have been stagnant for far too long. That is why we are encouraging this body to bring up the Raise the Wage Act.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from Pennsylvania (Mr. Evans), who is my good friend. He is a gentleman with whom I have the honor of serving on the Ways and Means Committee. The Representative likes to talk about the history of his great city, and I know he is here to also talk about why the constituents of that great city deserve a wage increase.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Pennsylvania and again thank him for his dedication and commitment on behalf of his constituents in Philadelphia, in bringing their voice to this process.

General Leave

Mr. Speaker, I ask unanimous consent that all Members may have 5 legislative days in which to revise and extend their remarks and include extraneous material on the subject of tonight's Special Order.

Mr. Speaker, we are led by a dynamic chair of the Congressional Black Caucus, the Representative from California, Congresswoman Karen Bass, and I had the honor of attending one of her congressional field hearings this week. The CBC is dedicated on a number of policy platforms, and this is among them.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from the U.S. Virgin Islands (Ms. Plaskett), my colleague, whom I am coanchored with this evening.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentlewoman from the U.S. Virgin Islands, and I appreciate, again, her work as a coanchor tonight and bringing not only the increasing issues of wages for American workers, but tying and connecting the point around housing and the ability to really afford to live.

As we have heard time and time again from our constituents, people are falling behind, and it is because they have seen stagnant wages for far too long. While the other side is giving corporate tax cuts to the wealthiest, 83 percent of the benefit of their $1.7 trillion tax going to benefit only the top 1 percent, it has done nothing to help the working poor and those who actually help build a strong economy.

For the past 40 years, Congress has failed to increase the minimum wage to keep up with inflation, making it the longest period of time in history without an increase. Today's minimum wage workers have less buying power than minimum wage workers had in the 1960s. In the past 40 years, the Federal minimum wage, stuck at $7.25 since 2009, has lost 30 percent of its value.

What does this mean? It means the minimum wage is worth less today than it was in 1960. The same wage can't buy you as much due to inflation and wages not being corrected to match for inflation.

The person who has been leading the charge as the chairman of the Education and Labor Committee, the person who has brought so much perspective on so many issues, from criminal justice reform to voting rights and now is making sure that this body considers the Raise the Wage Act this week, is none other than Congressman Bobby Scott.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman from the great State of Virginia (Mr. Scott).

Mr. Speaker, I thank the chairman from the Education and Labor Committee. It makes a big difference when he has the gavel and the priorities that he has set as the chairman of that committee and the fact that, as we have done from the beginning of this Congress, the For the People Agenda has been focused on making a difference in the lives of the American people that we represent.

The gentleman just pointed out that two-thirds of the minimum wage workers in this country are women and that two-fifths--in fact, 38 percent of African Americans and one-third, 33 percent of Latinos-- would get a raise when we pass the legislation and the Federal minimum wage is increased to $15 an hour.

It would also boost the economy. A 10 percent increase in the minimum wage would increase sales by around $2 billion each year.

Now, I want to just take on a couple of the myths that have been out there with this administration and my Republican colleagues who have opposed the efforts of the House Democrats to bring forward this wage increase.

One of the myths out there is around the Black unemployment rate in this country. We hear often the President say that, among certain racial groups, particularly African Americans, the unemployment rate is at an all-time low.

And while it is, in fact, true that the unemployment rate is down and it has been down and has been steadily falling since 2011, well before Trump was sworn into office, that rate of decline has not gained momentum since.

In fact, even at an annual rate of 6.6 percent, the Black unemployment rate is still more than double the White unemployment rate, which is at 3.2 percent.

What this says is that the Black unemployment rate has been about double the White unemployment rate for more than four decades, making this relationship more historically significant than any single unemployment rate.

So, Mr. President, if you want to take credit for the low unemployment rate among African Americans, then you need to be held accountable for keeping the rate down and to propose a plan to close the persistent 2-to-1 racial disparity that has existed for more than 40 years.

Another issue that I want to take on is the fact of the amount of jobs that have been created since this administration has taken over. We know that many of the jobs that have been created are, in fact, low- wage, low-paying jobs. Many of the jobs are in the gig economy, and those individuals are not getting paid the same amount as traditional workers.

We know that many employers are paying workers for less than full- time work, which means that they still cannot provide for their families, that they are not being afforded healthcare, and, in fact, the government is subsidizing many of these corporations--the same corporations that give their CEOs 17 percent pay increases but then want to tell the workers: ``You can't have a raise.''

And these are the myths that the other side wants to, again, put out there to distract from the House Democrats and our agenda in giving Americans a raise.

Now, I want to just touch on one specific point from my home State in Nevada. Recently, our Governor, Governor Steve Sisolak, the first Democratic Governor to be elected in Nevada in 20 years, signed into law a $12 minimum wage increase, following 10 years of wage stagnation for working-class families in Nevada.

In fact, the last time we raised the minimum wage in Nevada was when I was serving in the State Senate. So, elections do have consequences.

But, with the help of our legislative leaders, Speaker Jason Frierson and Senate Majority Leader Nicole Cannizzaro, the Nevada legislature increased the Nevada minimum wage to $12. But that raise won't go into effect until 2020, and, for now, one in five workers in Nevada are making under $12 an hour, less than $24,000 a year--$24,000 a year.

What is a family supposed to do? How are they supposed to make ends meet on $24,000 per year?

Mr. Speaker, $12 for Nevadans is a step in the right direction, but we need to be working to provide equitable wages for all Nevadans.

The Raise the Wage Act would work toward a $15 minimum wage by 2024, as the chairman from the Education and Labor Committee indicated.

A pay increase will benefit 127,000 workers in my district alone. Specifically, it will raise wages for 18,800 Black workers, more than any other congressional district in Nevada.

So, the Raise the Wage Act is an important measure. It would give up to 27 million workers a raise, lifting 1.3 million Americans out of poverty and boosting economic growth by putting money into the pockets of workers, who will spend that money in growing the economy, not like the corporate tax cut that was given to big corporations where they simply just bought up more shares of their own stock.

They didn't do anything to hire more workers or to help stimulate the economy. They just made themselves more rich.

All Americans who work hard deserve to be able to afford a middle- class life and opportunities to get ahead.

I believe that one job should be enough and that it is time that we set our children up for success by making sure that working families have the wages that they need to provide for themselves and their family.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentlewoman from the Virgin Islands (Ms. Plaskett).

Mr. Speaker, the gentlewoman was talking about the impact beyond just family incomes, which is important. And we want to give all Americans a raise.

While the priorities on the other side were about giving corporations and billionaires more wealth creation, we are laser-focused on putting more money in the pockets of hardworking Americans.

But the question I have is around the recent research with States that, following an increase in wages, we actually can see the rates of suicides fall, consumer spending rise, and a more productive workforce.

There is no place in America where a full-time worker making $7.25 an hour can support their entire family, let alone afford basic needs.

There is no place in America where a full-time worker making the current $7.25 an hour can support their entire family.

And, as I said, the productivity piece--which, again, my colleagues are always talking about the need to make America more competitive and more productive. Well, in one study, researchers tracked 10,000 workers at about 200 department stores and found that a dollar increase in the minimum wage led a typical employee to sell about 5.4 percent more per hour.

So, if we give workers the wage that they are deserving of, they will put that extra money to work for the American economy, unlike giving more tax breaks to the wealthy. For a worker earning the minimum wage, the increase could be almost 20 percent.

Now, again, I have underscored repeatedly the impacts to the economy, and we will take on that debate later this week when this bill comes to the floor.

But the point I just wanted to ask my colleague about is that human impact. You know, this is more than just numbers. This is the two- thirds of American workers who are women who are increasingly the head of their household.

So can the gentlewoman relate to that impact and the constituents that she serves and the stories that she has heard about the anxiety that they go through every day and not being able to make ends meet?

Mr. Speaker, I know the affected workers that I hear from in my district, they want this raise. This raise would provide on the order of about $3,000 a year. That is enough money to make a tremendous difference in the life of a preschool teacher, a bank teller. We have got fast-food workers who, today, struggle to get by on around $20,000 a year.

A $15 minimum wage by 2024 would generate $144 billion in higher wages for workers and would also benefit the communities in which they live.

So while corporate profits, as a share of our national income, are at an all-time high, wages are at a 65-year low. So if we are not going to give workers a raise now, when are we going to give it to them? They have been waiting for far too long.

I want to commend the leadership of our Speaker, of course; the chairwoman of the Congressional Black Caucus, the chairman of the Education and Labor Committee, it is because of their leadership, the chairman of the House Democratic Caucus, Hakeem Jeffries, and others, that this is part of the For the People Agenda.

This is why we are laser-focused. And we are laser-focused on a lot of priorities. We want to give workers a raise. We also want to address housing affordability. We want to address the issues around healthcare costs and the out-of-pocket expenses that so many Americans are dealing with.

We know that more entrepreneurs want to start a new business, and we want to give them the tools and the resources necessary for them to do so.

We want to repeal some of the unnecessary tax burdens on Americans, like the Cadillac tax on healthcare, which I know this body is also going to be considering.

So these are among the priorities of the House Democratic Caucus in the For the People Agenda that we are raising up and reminding people that we need to deal with this congressional session.

So, just to highlight, again, the Raise the Wage Act of 2019 would gradually raise the Federal minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2024; and here is how it would work.

As the chairman has indicated, it would raise the Federal minimum wage to $8.55 this year and increase it over the next 5 years until it reaches $15 an hour in 2024. After 2024, it would adjust the minimum wage each year to keep pace with growth in the typical worker's wages, something that we have not done for some time.

It would phase out the outdated sub-minimum wage for tip workers, which has been frozen at a meager $2.13 since 1991. And it would sunset the sub-minimum wages for workers with disabilities employed in sheltered workshops, and for workers under age 20.

This is a commonsense measure, something that American workers and our constituents have been demanding. In fact, 1 in 9 U.S. workers are paid wages that leave them in poverty today, even when working full- time and year round. And so that is why this bill is so important, the Raise the Wage Act.

I am looking forward to working with my colleagues to bring this measure to the floor later this week, and to debate with my colleagues on the other side where they stand and whether they will join with the House Democrats to pass this legislation over to the Senate so that they can also take action.

I also want to just touch on a point that my colleague was talking about, dealing with home ownership in the Black community. Today, The Wall Street Journal released a report that Black home ownership is at an all-time low. It has fallen 8.6 percentage points since its peak in 2004, hitting an all-time low in the first quarter of this year.

Homes and neighborhoods with a concentration of Black homeowners, on average, are worth less than 6 percent than they were in 2006. And in the second quarter of 2018, Black home ownership stood at 41.6 percent, down more than a full half percent from the first quarter rate.

Nationally, the Black home ownership rate is only 41.6 percent, virtually unchanged from 50 years ago when the Federal Fair Housing Act banned racial discrimination in housing. The national White home ownership rate, by comparison, is 71 percent.

So these are really dire statistics that I wanted to bring to the attention of this body. I know that the chairwoman of the Financial Services Committee, Maxine Waters, and her Subcommittee on Housing are working to tackle this problem as well.

But it is time that we address the 30 percent point gap in home ownership between Black and White Americans, which is at its highest point in the new millennium.

Why is this so important?

It is, because, for Black Americans, so much of our wealth is accumulated in the equity of home ownership. And again, this is central to the issue of giving workers a raise because they need that raise in order to afford the higher cost of housing, the higher cost of healthcare, the higher cost of food, the higher cost of gas. Everything is going up but their pay check, and that is what I hear from my constituents, from those who are earning a minimum wage.

Under the Raise the Wage Act, it would increase by almost 20 percent. So I am looking forward to, again, debating my colleagues on this important issue when we come to the floor later this week.

As we have talked about here tonight, the Congressional Black Caucus is laser-focused on making sure that Americans get a raise. We know that giving Americans a raise would give up to 27 million workers the benefit of increased take-home pay. It would lift 1.3 Americans out of poverty. And it would boost our economic growth by putting money where it belongs, in the pockets of workers who will spend that money in the economy.

Unlike what was done with the corporate tax cuts that were given, where 83 percent of the benefit of the $1.7 trillion tax cut went to benefit just the top 1 percent, we are focused on helping everyday Americans get the money they need in their pocket.

Now, I asked a question at the beginning of tonight's Special Order hour dealing with the 350 CEOs from the largest U.S. companies who earned an average pay, in 2017, of $1.89 million. That is a lot of money.

I have no beef with CEOs getting a fair pay, but that pay increase amounted to a 17 percent increase from the previous year. And just before we started the Special Order hour, one of my colleagues came to the floor and said that increasing the Federal minimum wage would be devastating to our economy.

Well, what does he say about the CEOs who are getting record pay and record bonuses, and the fact that all of the corporate tax cuts that they provided went to just buying more stocks in those companies?

Meanwhile, the wages for the average U.S. worker grew at .2 percent during that same time. This is a fundamental question that I honestly would like my colleagues to be able to answer, and I will seek them out during this week, because I want them to join with us to pass this bill.

This really should not be a partisan issue. Giving Americans a raise is something that we all should agree on benefits all of our workers. My colleagues on the other side have low-wage, low-paid workers in their district just like I have low-wage, low-paid workers in my district.

The Raise the Wage Act of 2019, which proposes raising the Federal minimum wage in six steps to $15 an hour by 2024, will result in a pay increase for 38.1 percent of all Black workers and 23.2 percent of all White workers.

This disproportional effect on Black workers comes not just because they are more often employed in jobs that currently pay less, as we have discussed tonight, than the proposed minimum wage, but also because they are less likely to work in States or localities that have passed a State minimum wage that is higher than the Federal minimum wage.

So that is why it is time for Federal policy to set the standard so, regardless, of where you live, you can earn a decent, livable wage to provide for yourself and your family.

We believe that one job should be enough. It should be enough to provide for you and your family. It should be enough to put a roof over your head. It should be enough to make sure that you can pay for the copays and the prescription drugs that you need in order to stay well.

It should be enough so that we can address food insecurity in this country; and it should be enough so that your children can be set up for success in their future.

I encourage each and every one of my colleagues this week to study this bill; to think about the constituents back home in their district; and to ask themselves, what were we sent here to do; to help the well- off and the well-connected, or to give voice to those who deserve to be heard in this body?

I am honored to be a Representative from Nevada's Fourth Congressional District; and I know my district is not exactly the same as every other district, but I have rural parts and I have urban parts of my district, covering 52,000 square miles.

The commonality in my district is that there are struggling people throughout every corner of my district. And so when I vote this week in favor of giving workers a raise, I will be voting to give a raise to every single worker throughout Nevada's Fourth, and throughout this great country.

I thank my colleague, the coanchor, Congresswoman Stacey Plaskett, the

chairman of the House Education and Labor Committee, Mr. Scott, and each and every one of my colleagues who have spoken here tonight.

I thank the Speaker for giving us this hour to bring about the issues that are important.

I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I rise for the purpose of inquiring of the majority leader the schedule for next week.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend, the gentleman from Maryland (Mr. Hoyer), the distinguished majority leader of the House.

Mr. Speaker, I truly appreciate the concern, support, and prayers that have been offered. Obviously, we are all praying for the people of south Louisiana as Tropical Storm Barry approaches. In the next 24 hours, we expect landfall. We are surely expecting heavy rain.

I know, as I have talked to local officials, from the Governor to the mayor of New Orleans and other elected officials on the ground, they are prepared. They have asked for different things, including the Governor had asked for an emergency declaration.

I spoke to President Trump yesterday, and he did, in fact, issue that emergency declaration. So, all of the Federal agencies, from FEMA to the Corps of Engineers, to other Federal agencies, are working well with State and local officials to make sure they have the tools they need.

Our first priority, of course, is the safety of the people of south Louisiana. As they protect their homes and protect their property, we just encourage them to listen to their local officials, and, if evacuation orders are issued, we ask those folks to heed those warnings because it is a serious storm. And it is a storm that we are preparing for, but, as they say, you prepare for the worst but hope for the best, and we are doing all of that.

I appreciate the gentleman's concerns.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to my friend.

Mr. Speaker, as we look at the calendar next week and, specifically, the bill dealing with the minimum wage, I would ask the gentleman if he has looked at some of the studies that have been done, as well as some of the other actions.

If you look at the city of Baltimore, they had proposed and actually passed a $15 minimum wage, and the Democratic mayor of Baltimore vetoed that, specifically citing the job losses that would come with that kind of change.

The CBO report that just came out a few days ago, as the majority leader knows, cited that you could have up to 3.7 million jobs lost in America if that bill were to pass.

Mr. Speaker, we have a growing economy, a robust, growing economy. We are the envy of the world right now with our economy. People at every income level are receiving the benefits of that in terms of higher wages and more jobs--in fact, more job openings today than there are Americans looking for work.

This is the kind of opportunity we want for all people. In fact, as we are seeing, people at even the lower income, entry-level job levels are the ones benefiting the most from the tax cuts and the growing economy we have as a result of it.

So why, I would ask, would we want to reverse course and pass legislation that not only studies estimate would devastate low-income people--literally, the entire State of Oklahoma, 3.7 million people, eviscerated job losses. That many job losses would come from this bill passing.

You don't need to just look at estimates. You can actually look at what happened in the city of Seattle.

Mr. Speaker, in 2014, the city of Seattle instituted a similar $15 minimum wage. So now, we have a few years of actual data to look at what happened in a city like Seattle.

Mr. Speaker, the University of Washington did a detailed study of that minimum wage increase. What they found were similarly devastating numbers for low-income workers, the same people who would be hurt by the bill that the majority is going to be bringing up next week.

In fact, what the University of Washington study found was that you had roughly 3 million work hours lost, 5,000 jobs lost. They, in fact, found that the cost to low-wage workers in Seattle outweighed the benefits by a margin of 3-to-1, devastating low-income workers the most.

If you look at not what might happen if we do this at the Federal level--where the estimates are we would lose 3.7 million jobs in America, mostly hurting lower income, entry-level jobs, those jobs where we want people to be able to get started to become part of the middle class, to become part of the American Dream, and taking that away from them--go look at what they did in Seattle when they actually did this, not when they talked about it, but when they did it, 3 years of data. The study showed it was devastating to low-income people.

I would hope that the gentleman has looked at some of this, the concerns that we have expressed along the way, and the recent CBO score that has underlined how bad and devastating this would be to low-income workers.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, I would first like to point out it is not we who are paying those wages. It is small businesses, small and medium-sized businesses that are paying those wages to workers.

What we have seen from the current economy, from cutting taxes, not from the government coming in and saying we are going to have some $15 minimum wage that has been proven in other places to eviscerate jobs, to kill jobs and hurt lower-income people, with our current economy, because of cutting taxes, lower income people are benefiting the most. They are seeing wages go up. They are actually seeing wages go up, and the data shows that.

That is why you are seeing such strong economic numbers right now, because the tax cuts are benefiting people at every income level, especially at the lower income levels.

When you talk about the jobs that would be lost, if we split it in the middle, if we go with the median of the study, that is 1.3 million jobs lost. Don't take my number. Don't take your number. Take the median number in the study, 1.3 million jobs. That is the entire State of Maine losing their jobs.

What we have also seen is that small businesses, as minimum wages go to a higher level, look at automating jobs, which means those jobs go away.

It is the low-income workers, the first job for many people, their first entry into opportunity where they can then become a homeowner, then become part of the American Dream, those are hit the hardest. In fact, the study shows that this bill would reduce family income by $9 billion.

I know we can look at it from different sides, but, again, if you just took the median, split the difference between your numbers and mine, you end up with 1.3 million jobs lost and devastation for a lot of people at the lower incomes.

The Seattle study shows not theory but what really did happen in a city like Seattle where they did this. By a 3-to-1 margin, low-income people were hit the hardest and hit very hard in a negative way.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, when we talk about the 27 million, let's keep in mind that, as you look at what they studied on the impacts, it is the lower income workers, as the wages might even go up.

And, by the way, wages are already going up today. Without this bill, wages, real wages, are going up and especially benefiting the lower income, the entry-level jobs.

What President Trump wanted to do to rebuild our middle class that was evaporating--it, literally, was going away. We were losing our middle class to foreign countries because we were not competitive as a nation. And now we are competitive--not only competitive, but the envy of the world, the economic leader of the world.

Again, why would we want to bring a bill that would devastate?

And so those 27 million people, if you look again at the Seattle study, what they showed was that the cost to low-wage workers in Seattle outweighed the benefits by a ratio of 3 to 1.

So even for those people who were getting a higher wage because other costs went up and their hours went down, the amount of time they were able to work was reduced, it actually had a devastating impact to those low-income workers.

So on one hand it might sound really good: Hey, you are going to get a higher wage; but, Oh, by the way, we are not going to be able to give you as many hours to work. And you saw that over and over again in the study, it showed millions of hours lost.

So somebody that is working two jobs, struggling to get by because they want to become part of the middle class, today they are actually seeing a wage increase if that was evaporated because of this.

Even for the people who would see a higher wage, the costs to them would be more devastating by a 3-to-1 margin if you go by what actually did happen in Seattle when they did it.

So that is why I just say that study would be important to look at, because it doesn't show just in theory, which the CBO has a lot of good underlying data to back up with, but then Seattle is where it really did happen and it was devastating to lower income workers.

If the gentleman had anything else on this, I would yield back. I did want to bring up another issue, though, but I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, maybe next week as this debate continues, we will see if I can be more persuasive with my friend, but likely not, but at least we ought to have that debate and at least get these sides out and aired.

Now, I do want to talk about something where I do think we have agreement but maybe a lack of understanding of a timeline, and that is the United States-Mexico-Canada trade agreement. And we have had many meetings. I know we were in a meeting together with the Prime Minister, Prime Minister Trudeau of Canada. We know our friends in Mexico want this. Our friends in Canada really want this. We want this, too.

With only 8 legislative days left before the August recess, could the gentleman give an indication if there is the ability to include USMCA on the calendar in these next 2 weeks that we have available?

And I yield to the gentleman.

I thank the gentleman, and I share the same sentiment that Ambassador Lighthizer has done a great job of working with Members on both sides to address questions, concerns, find ways to make sure that those concerns are addressed, whether they are already inside the agreement or if there are other things that can be done to double underscore and highlight those concerns.

But, in the meantime, hopefully, we can move beyond trying to get to yes and actually have a bill where we can whip that and get to yes. I know we have a whip team that I have put together on our side that is ready to go and, hopefully, your side will be able to get there.

It would be ideal if we can do that before we recess. Clearly, that is not the only way to get this done, but we do have to respect, as well, that the other countries, our friends, Mexico and Canada, have an interest in this, as well.

Canada has elections coming up. We don't want to have this jeopardized and become something that gets pushed behind their national elections. Ideally, we can get it done well in advance of their elections and respect the fact that they would like this done, as well, and the good will that is being created between our three countries.

So I am hopeful that we can get through these final issues, get a bill that we can bring to the floor, work together to pass, and then see the benefits in our economy, see an improved NAFTA, a bill that is better for American workers and opening up more access to markets in Canada and Mexico that right now are closed.

So I thank the gentleman for the encouragement, and I remain hopeful, as well, and would continue to encourage that we get this done as quickly as possible.

Finally, on the NDAA bill that we just finished, we had, of course, disagreement on a number of fronts in terms of the priorities of our military, but I would want to bring up one point, and that was the piece of legislation, the Military Surviving Spouses Equity Act by our colleague, Joe Wilson.

When you all took the majority, you created a new mechanism for Members to bring bills to the floor called the Consensus Calendar. This was the first bill that actually met that criteria, in fact, far exceeded the 290 signatures--he had 365 cosponsors, incredibly bipartisan--to address a real serious problem for spouses of men and women in uniform who died fighting for our country, to make sure that an inequity is corrected that we both agree needs to be fixed.

Here is a bill that can quickly get to the President's desk, and maybe it gets included in other pieces of legislation that might come months away, but here is a bill where a Member worked in good faith, under the rules that were created, and it was unfortunate that the rule to bring the NDAA bill to the floor turned off the Consenus Calendar specifically for that bill, that one bill which happened to be the first bill that met that requirement.

I would just ask if the gentleman could maybe look again at bringing that bill to the floor as a standalone bill in respect of the hard bipartisan work that Congressman Wilson made to address a serious problem for spouses, widows of our men and women who die in uniform.

Mr. Speaker, let's be crystal clear about what happened.

The chairman of the Armed Services Committee made this a political bill by putting poison pills in the bill that undermined our national security. That is not a partisan issue.

And so if you go back to the funding levels--I yield to my friend.

Mr. Speaker, I will absolutely be happy to specify what those are, but first of all, let's talk about funding levels.

It is not just about funding levels. If you have a funding level and then you put policy underneath it that limits our men and women in uniform's ability to train safely and to do their job safely and effectively, that is a poison pill approach.

It is a partisan approach. It should have never happened.

Mr. Speaker, it has been 58 years where Republicans and Democrats have worked alike together to pass a National Defense Authorization Act, not making it political, specifically in committee.

There is no Member of our Congress who works better with people on both sides of the aisle to support our men and women in uniform than Mac Thornberry. Mr. Thornberry worked overtime to try to heal this divide, to make sure a bill could come out of committee that was bipartisan, reflecting those 58 years.

In fact, the Senate did this, and I think the gentleman from Maryland knows this well. The Senate did not make it political. The Senate passed a bill with an 86-8 vote, with all the leadership of the Republican side and Democratic side voting together.

That was the approach we wanted to take, Mr. Speaker. If there was a better way, we should have done it together.

But the majority side went against even what Senate Democrats did and chose an approach, for example, that undermined our nuclear missile defense and that went against the AUMF agreement that, if your bill were to become law, would have made it harder for us to counter terrorism activities in the Middle East.

Why would we want to do that in legislation and hamstring our men and women in uniform? In fact, the bill that the majority just passed would undermine the gains we have made in enabling our men and women in uniform to train more safely.

Before we came up with the 2-year budget agreement that we got together, Republicans and Democrats, when we were in the majority, we were seeing our men and women in uniform die in training missions more than they were dying in combat. It was by a 5-to-1 margin that men and women in uniform were dying in training missions, planes falling out of the sky because they didn't have enough spare parts.

We finally started to address that. This bill undermines that, making our men and women in uniform less safe. That is not the approach we should be taking. If the gentleman wants to call that bipartisan, then go look at the fact that no Republicans voted for that bill and eight Democrats voted against it. It was a partisan approach. It was a bill that undermines our national security.

The Senate didn't do that. The Senate came together the right kind of way. It is the way we should have done it here.

If the gentleman wants to talk about the pay raise, let's be very clear and upfront about it. If we didn't even have this bill, our men and women in uniform get that pay raise. It is current law. It is like they are putting a provision in their bill saying the Sun is going to come up tomorrow, and then if it does, they take credit for it.

The pay raise was already going to happen, so they put it in the bill and say they gave the pay raise. It was already there. We got it into law when we were in the majority working with the Democrats. We didn't just say it was our way or the highway.

The NDAA bill, every year we were in the majority, was a bill that was worked on with Republicans and Democrats, and they didn't send it out of committee until they had complete agreement. That was an area where we didn't have political differences.

We are going to have political differences on minimum wage and some of these other issues, but we shouldn't have our men and women in uniform become part of the political divide in Washington. The Senate didn't do it. Our Members didn't do it and tried to work together.

If the chairman wanted to go his own way, that is not the approach we should be taking. It is not the approach we have taken for 58 years. It is not the approach that Senate Democrats took when they worked with Republicans to come up with a bill that put our men and women in uniform as a priority.

Mr. Speaker, the majority leader can look at the bill and talk about what is in it. I will tell the gentleman that is already current law anyway. I will also tell him what the Senate did to make sure that they didn't have those poison pill provisions.

They shouldn't have been in the bill. Ultimately, they are not going to be in anything that becomes law. The gentleman knows it, and I know it.

What happened today shouldn't have happened. Maybe it is a lesson that when we get beyond this and we see what the final product is going to be, it will be a bill where we come together.

Ultimately, we will come together to make sure our men and women in uniform have the tools that they need to train safely and defend our Nation safely, but the bill that came out of the House today did not achieve that. It fell very short of where this House should have been in representing our men and women in uniform.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman.

Mr. Speaker, as we continue this debate as the bill moves through the process, and we look at where the Senate started with a very large 86-8 vote, Republicans and Democrats working together and coming together, we can agree on funding levels. But if the underlying policy undermines the actual money that is being spent, undermines the mission, the ability for our men and women to train safely and defend our country safely, then the funding levels are not being spent properly.

It is about not just the money but how the money is being spent, the policies behind it that allow our men and women to train safely, to defend our country safely. That is an issue. We will continue debating that.

I would predict, in the end, a final product that goes to the President's desk is going to look a lot more like the Senate bill than the bill that came out of the House and, hopefully, addresses all of those problems that were identified earlier. We will continue that debate as well.

Mr. Speaker, I yield to the gentleman if he has anything else.

Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.

Mr. Speaker, I thank my friend for yielding.

Mr. Speaker, before I get into the schedule, I know that all of our thoughts are with my good friends in Louisiana and my good friend who represents Louisiana, his constituents, and the people of Louisiana as they brace for Tropical Storm Barry, expected to make landfall tomorrow.

This is a serious storm, and, when combined with the flooding we have already seen along the Mississippi, it poses a serious threat to the safety and welfare of many.

We hope everyone is safe and taking the necessary steps to get out of harm's way, and I want the gentleman from Louisiana to know how much we are paying attention to his constituents in the State he represents and the region he represents.

I know the gentleman is concerned. We share that concern, and we share the concern for the people of south Louisiana.

Mr. Speaker, on Monday, the House will meet at noon for morning-hour debate, 2 p.m. for legislative business, with votes postponed until 6:30 p.m.

On Tuesday and Wednesday, the House will meet at 10 a.m. for morning- hour debate and noon for legislative business.

On Thursday, the House will meet at 9 a.m. for legislative business. Last votes of the week are expected no later than 3 p.m. on that Thursday.

Mr. Speaker, we will consider several bills under suspension of the rules, including H.R. 748, Middle Class Health Benefits Tax Repeal Act of 2019. A complete list of suspension bills will be announced by the close of business today.

The House will consider H.R. 3494, the Intelligence Authorization Act. I am pleased to say that the bill was approved by unanimous voice vote in committee and would authorize funding and enable congressional oversight of the U.S. intelligence community.

Mr. Speaker, the House will also consider a resolution to hold Attorney General Barr and Secretary Ross in contempt over efforts to ignore congressional subpoenas and subvert the 2020 Census with the addition of a citizenship question meant only to deter minorities from participating, leading to an undercount in parts of the country.

In addition, the House will also consider S.J. Res. 36, S.J. Res. 37, and S.J. Res. 38.

Mr. Speaker, last month, the Senate passed 22 resolutions of disapproval related to the Saudi-UAE arms sale for which the administration declared an emergency, thereby bypassing the Congress of the United States. The House will take up three of these resolutions related to precision-guided munitions, the most controversial and significant sales contemplated.

Lastly, the House will consider H.R. 582, Raise the Wage Act. This legislation, authored by Chairman Scott, would gradually increase the minimum wage to $15 by 2024. This bill is an important step toward lifting millions of American workers out of poverty.

We believe that one should not be working a 40-hour week and still remain under the poverty level in our country. We raise the minimum wage for the first time in nearly a decade, essentially, 10 years.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for his observations. He, I think, told a partial story of the CBO study and some other studies. Of course, he mentioned the city of Baltimore.

The problem with the city of Baltimore, as the mayor who vetoed it indicated, was that next door, the minimum wage was lower. Had the minimum wage been the same, there would not have been the same transfer, I suggest to the gentleman.

That aside, he mentions the CBO report on the impact of gradually raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour. The minimum wage was last raised in 2007. It then incrementally raised over 3 years to the present $7.25. It has not been raised in a decade. The poorest workers in America have not had a raise in 10 years.

We don't think that is right, as we see this extraordinary disparity of income, where presidents of corporations now are making 1,500 times what their average worker makes.

Very frankly, we are a consumer-based economy. Seventy percent of our GDP is based upon consumers. If we raise their salaries, they are going to spend more, grow the economy, and, I suggest, grow jobs, not shrink jobs.

Let's look at the CBO study. The CBO study had a number of different averages that were perceived, three of which were zero loss of jobs. 3.7 million was the maximum, not the average, the maximum loss.

I am not surprised that opponents of raising the minimum wage would point to that as if it were the figure. It is a maximum, the worst-case scenario.

We have a growing economy. I don't expect the worst-case scenario to occur. The fact of the matter is that we believe that this bill and this raise will have little, if any, adverse impact.

What we do know is this, which the gentleman did not mention. CBO said the bill will give 27 million workers in America a raise, and that the worst-case scenario--we don't want to see anybody lose their job-- would be 3.7 million, but the average would be less than 2 million. That was their average estimate, and three of them were zero.

We believe that 27 million Americans, which will lift 1.3 million Americans out of poverty, is something that will be good for America. It will be good not only for those workers but good for business, for families, for children, and, frankly, for all of us.

The benefits of the Raise the Wage Act for America's workers, in our opinion, far outweigh any potential risk. We think the risk is minimal.

More than 10 years with no increase in the Federal minimum wage, I might point out, Mr. Speaker, is the longest period since the adoption of the minimum wage in 1938, the longest period we have gone without raising the minimum wage.

Mr. Speaker, it has been 10 years since we Democrats were in the majority. I point that out because the last time we were in the majority, we passed and, very frankly, President Bush signed the raise that was to $7.25 an hour. But this is the longest time in history it hasn't been raised.

The Raise the Wage Act is a critical step, in my view, toward restoring the value of work and ensuring that working families--we all say we are for working families. Well, we ought to pay them, and we ought to pay them a decent wage.

By the way, this raise is probably a very, very infinitesimal percentage of the raises that those at the upper level, in the top 10 percent and the top 5 percent, have received.

This will allow working families to achieve some type of financial security. We believe that is essential.

We are very pleased that this bill is moving forward, and we urge all of our Members to support it.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I would simply say that he said the entire State of Maine. Maybe he missed the fact that I said 27 million people, under this bill, are going to get an increase in their salary and in their ability to support themselves and their families. That, by the way, is about the size, perhaps, of New York. It is not quite California, which is 38 or 39 million people. But 27 million are going to get a raise.

My suggestion is, and I believe this sincerely, that that increase and raise, because they are consumers, those consumers all spend their spendable money. They need it to support themselves, and that is going to be an infusion.

When the gentleman says small business, I understand that. We all pay it in the end because the consumer of services and goods is who will pay it. We understand that. But not paying it perhaps advantages us because some families can't support themselves and, very frankly, may be on public assistance, so we pay for it one way or the other.

This is the right thing to do. Twenty-seven million Americans, that is about a sixth, I think, of our workforce, somewhere in that neighborhood, are going to get a raise under this bill.

I hope that the estimate of 1.3 million is wrong. I think it is wrong, as I explained. If everybody is doing the same, then the employer that needs to have things done is going to get those things done. He or she will be on a competitive level because others will be doing the same thing, in terms of the level of pay. They won't be competing with people who are paying their folks at a very low level, and people will be able to survive.

I understand the gentleman's position. By the way, I would say the gentleman's argument has been made since 1938.

Every time the minimum wage came up for increase, we have heard this. I didn't hear it in `38, I want to make that very clear. But that argument has been made every time the minimum wage, while I have been involved in this floor over the last 30 years, has been made. And I suggest to you, as a result of the raising of the minimum wage, our economy has been better, it has grown more, people have been better off, and we have had a better country.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

I think we have exhausted that subject. I think the positions have not changed since 1938, and I don't expect them to change in the next few minutes.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for yielding.

We did have a meeting, and in a bipartisan fashion, I think we are all hopeful that we can pass the USMCA.

I was here when we passed NAFTA, as was the Speaker. There were a number of promises made, as the gentleman knows from his knowing experience of NAFTA. We are very focused, as the gentleman knows, on workers' rights, environmental protections, the price of

biologics, and the length of time that they would be protected from generic competition and bringing prices down.

But we are, as we discussed in the meeting to which the gentleman referred where we met with the Prime Minister of Canada, Mr. Trudeau, and many of his Cabinet, we are very concerned about enforcement. We want to say if we make this agreement that it will, in fact, be enforced. And, as the gentleman knows, there were meetings as late as yesterday on this issue.

The good news is, as the gentleman probably knows, Ambassador Lighthizer has great respect and confidence on both sides of the aisle. I would say that he is one of those people who both sides of the aisle believe is credible, knowledgeable, straightforward and an honest broker. So we are working very hard with him.

Almost every Democrat has said we are trying to get to ``yes'' on this. I don't think you have heard many Democrats, if any, say we are not for this agreement.

So I am hopeful that we can get there, personally. I think this is an improvement over the existing NAFTA.

I would say, however, that I think it would be a mistake if, in fact, we don't get to an agreement, which I hope we will, to back out of NAFTA, as the President has indicated. I think that would cause chaos in our economy and with respect to Canada and Mexico, as well. So I think that would not be a good policy. But I think a good policy would be, if we can get enforcement and the assurances that the agreements that are made will, in fact, be carried out by all parties, then, hopefully, we can get this done.

Whether we can get this done by the August break, can't make that representation to the gentleman, which does not surprise him, I am sure. But I can tell you, yesterday, as you know, there was work being done on it, and I trust that there will be work being done on it in the coming days. And if we can get to an agreement, we will move it as quickly as possible.

But we may need to make sure that the protections that are referenced in the document will, in fact, be the protections that are affected and enforceable.

I thank the gentleman.

I thank the gentleman for his comment, Joe Wilson, of course, a member of his party.

Joe Wilson filed that bill five Congresses ago, 8 years ago, and it languished. It was not brought to the floor. It did not pass.

I understand the gentleman's concern, but he ought to also reflect upon the fact that Joe Wilson introduced it four Congresses ago, so that we have now included it in the bill. We think it was a proper provision to have in our bill.

Of course, all your people voted against that bill, and I would observe, they voted against a bill that, frankly, the chairman of your committee, now the ranking member, wrote an op-ed in The Wall Street Journal that said the appropriate level of funding was exactly what we put in our bill. The Joint Chiefs of Staff said that the figure for 2020 was 733.

I was deeply regretful that a bill which was the figure that Mr. Thornberry put forward in an editorial in The Wall Street Journal--and, I might say, I had conversations with him subsequent to that, recently, which confirmed to me that he still held that view.

Notwithstanding that, every one of your Republicans voted against it. And it was the largest--there was this complaint about the size of the military pay raise. It was the largest raise for our military in 10 years. Now, we were in charge 10 years ago and we are now back in charge, which means we have had the two largest raises, and that was included in your MTR.

Mr. Speaker, I would hope the whip would, as we do so often, work in a bipartisan fashion on these issues. The committee did work in a bipartisan fashion. I am very disappointed that this was made a political issue. Mr. Speaker, it was made a political issue on the theory that maybe the Democrats can't pass this bill, and if we all vote against it, we will say: Look, the Democrats don't support defense.

Mr. Speaker, we did pass that bill. We passed it with over 218 votes--220, to be exact--and it included some very, very important things for our men and women in uniform, for weapons systems, for operations, for training to strengthen our national security.

It was turned into, in my opinion, Mr. Speaker, a partisan issue, and that is sad and unfortunate because, at least on the national security of which I have been supportive for 38 years--I supported much of the Reagan buildup. I supported the deployment of missiles in Europe. I supported the MX missile, which was somewhat controversial in my district. I did it because I thought America needed to be strong and to make sure the world knew we were going to be strong.

When you talk about Joe Wilson's amendment, which we included in our bill, which you were supportive of and I think the level of funding was also, frankly, intellectually supported, if not politically supported, I regret that we did not have a bipartisan vote on the defense bill.

With respect to his specific question, I respond to the whip, Mr. Speaker: We hope this bill is signed. If not, we hope it goes to conference. We hope we have a conference agreement, Mr. Speaker, and we hope that the Wilson amendment is kept in the conference report.

Mr. Speaker, will the gentleman specify what they were?

Mr. Speaker, obviously, we could debate a bill we just passed, a bill that has been debated on this floor for 3 days, a bill that was chairmanned and supported by somebody equally, if not more, bipartisan in terms of his work over the years on this matter of defense, Adam Smith, period.

It is a good bill, Mr. Speaker. It takes care of the men and women. It provides them the necessary resources. And, yes, it says we ought to have a new AUMF that is now 18 years old.

With respect to the pay raise that was going to happen anyway, I presume that the gentleman refers to the recommendation of the President of the United States, a Republican. We took the recommendations of the President of the United States and put it in our bill. It is higher than any figure that was put in for our men and women in uniform during the previous 10 years that the Republicans controlled the House and controlled this bill.

There were poison pills, from my perspective, in the defense bills in years past. I now note that I voted against those bills when they passed the House. I voted for the conference committee when it came back.

I am hopeful that the Republicans will decide that the rhetoric they used, ``If you vote against this bill,'' meaning the defense bill, to our side, ``you vote against the men and women in the Armed Forces, the men and women in uniform, the men and women at the point of the spear,'' I hope you will remember that language, Mr. Speaker. I hope my Republican colleagues will remember that language. Now, apparently, it doesn't apply.

This was a good bill. That was a bill worked on in a bipartisan fashion.

I will tell the whip, Mr. Speaker, that I had conversations with some of the top Republican leaders on that committee with respect to funding levels. I was told that the funding levels that were in our bill, as the Joint Chiefs said and as the ranking member said in an editorial in The Wall Street Journal, were appropriate levels that will fund the priorities of our country and the needs of our national security, Mr. Speaker.

Certainly, I hope that the Senate and the House can work on this. By the way, the Senate number is the same as our number as it relates to compensation, I believe, for members of the Armed Forces.

I would hope, Mr. Speaker, when this bill comes back from conference, that we will have agreement, will pass it, and will send it to the President for signature. That is the way it ought to be.

I am sorry that we didn't get significant support, as is almost always the case, except when political games were played, not just that items were put in that the Republicans didn't like or the Democrats didn't like. There were a lot of things in the defense bills that I

voted for that I didn't like, but I thought the overall bill was a bill that supported our troops and supported our national security, as I think this bill did. We will see.

Mr. Speaker, I only want to say that I do not accept the premise that anything in this bill we just passed with a majority vote undermines training, operations, or acquisitions, period.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman from Nevada (Mr. Horsford) for yielding and thank him for the work he is doing on this issue and so many issues that affect American families.

Sometimes here in Congress we can be distracted by issues that come up on a daily basis, but the gentleman from Nevada has kept his mind focused on the things that everyday Americans are concerned with, that is, proper wages, livable homes, good education, affordable housing. I am appreciative that we have kept our eyes on the prize, kept our eyes focused on the policy and the things that move the needle on this.

I was so happy to hear just a few moments ago from the gentleman from Philadelphia, Mr. Evans, because, although he talks quite a bit about Philadelphia, there is one area he talks about quite a bit, and that is sustaining the Black middle class, sustaining Black homeownership.

This minimum wage bill, Raise the Wage Act of 2019, supports those kind of initiatives. It gradually raises, as we have said, the Federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 over several years, over the next 6 years, to lift millions of workers out of poverty, even those who are working, who are still the working-class poor, stimulate local economies, and restore the value of the minimum wage. It gives 40 million Americans a raise.

As we heard from the gentlewoman from Michigan (Mrs. Lawrence), my colleague and good friend, it helps women and workers of color.

Today, more than 40 percent of Black workers and one-third of Hispanic workers will get a raise under this bill. Women make up nearly two-thirds of all minimum wage workers.

In areas like the Virgin Islands, where many of the homes and percentages of homes are run by single-person households, those being predominantly Black women, this is very important that women are two- thirds of the minimum wage workers. For them to be lifted out raises families.

One thing that I think this touches on and is part of that hasn't really been expressed as yet is wealth disparity.

The wealth, the measure of an individual's or a family's financial net worth, provides all sorts of opportunities for American families. Wealth makes it easier for people to seamlessly transition between jobs, move to new neighborhoods, and respond to emergency situations.

Unfortunately, wealth in this country is unequally distributed by race,

particularly between White and Black households. African American families have a fraction of the wealth of White families, leaving them more economically insecure and with far fewer opportunities for economic mobility.

Even after considering positive factors such as increased education levels, African Americans still have less wealth than Whites. Less wealth translates into fewer opportunities and is compounded by lower income levels and fewer chances to build wealth or pass accumulated wealth down to future generations.

This also is very symptomatic and has a well-documented history of mortgage market discrimination. It means that Blacks are significantly less likely to be homeowners than Whites, which means they have less access to savings and tax benefits that come with owning a home.

Persistent labor market discrimination and segregation also force Blacks into fewer and less advantageous employment opportunities than their White counterparts. Even when they have homeownership, they have less access and ability to be able to use that homeownership.

In the Virgin Islands, surprisingly, almost 60 percent of families of Black people own their home, but they are unable, and the banks are unwilling, to allow them to leverage that wealth for education, for second mortgages, to start businesses. The scrutiny is high.

When we are talking about wages, in the Virgin Islands, we make 75 percent of what is the national average. The average for a Virgin Islands family is $37,254; whereas, the estimated national average is $50,221. And 13.5 percent of U.S. Virgin Islanders have family income levels below $10,000 a year--for a family. That is horrendous.

This bill, however, and passage of this bill would mean lots of wealth and lots of opportunities for Black families, African Americans, the working poor, White poor families, Hispanic families.

African Americans own approximately one-tenth of the wealth of White Americans. In 2016, the median wealth for nonretired Black households 25 years old and older was less than one-tenth that of similarly situated White households. Those are White households, making the same and having the same access as Black families, which are making one- tenth that of similarly situated White households.

The Black-White wealth gap has still not recovered from the Great Recession. In 2007, immediately after the Great Recession, the median wealth of Blacks was nearly 14 percent of Whites. Although Black wealth increased at a faster rate than White wealth in 2016, Blacks still owned less than 10 percent of White's wealth at the median.

Black households have fewer and are in greater need of personal savings than their White counterparts. For a variety of reasons, Blacks are more likely to experience negative income shocks but are less likely to have access to emergency savings. As a consequence, Blacks are more likely to fall behind on their bills and go into debt during times of emergency.

The systematic challenges in narrowing the wealth gap for African Americans with Whites persists. The wealth gap persists regardless of a household's education, marital status, age, or income.

This is something that we are fighting for. We are grateful for this legislation that is going to make a difference in African American lives.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for bringing this important matter to the floor for us to discuss here this evening, and it is my plea for my colleagues to pass this legislation, for it to go to the Senate so that it can make a tremendous difference in so many Americans' lives. Raising the income level of the less fortunate assists all Americans in raising the tide of Americans' ability to excel.

Mr. Speaker, I thank the gentleman for that discussion about what is happening in Nevada and raising the minimum wage, what that is going to do in the gentleman's State. Kudos to the Governor to take that bold leap.

There is concern about what happens with small businesses, and I know that the chairman of the Committee on Education and Labor has been thinking about that as well, that this bill does take this into account, that there are small businesses that this may be difficult for.

But we have to understand what the entire objective is of this bill. I know that there are amendments by other good Democrats to look at the Government Accountability Office to determine employment impacts.

That is much more helpful than what was done with the tax bill that the Republicans passed. They aren't trying to see what the impact has been of their legislation. They didn't ask for a lookback to see is this, in fact, stimulating the economy, because the objective was not to stimulate the economy.

The objective was to give the 1 percent--those corporate CEOs and others--additional money. It was not to

put money into the economy. Because, if it was, then we would be looking at it right now: What is the impact on America?

That was not put into that tax bill. But the Democrats are willing to do that. The Democrats want to make sure that this legislation is doing what it is meant to do; that is, to be for the people, for the larger American people, by supporting that.

When I was talking earlier about the wealth gap and income, income and employment are obstacles to the wealth gap. The income gap has actually worsened over time.

According to a 2016 Economic Policy Institute report, the income gap between Blacks and Whites has grown since the 1970s, not lessened. In 1979, for example, Black men earned 22 percent less than White men. In 2015, Black men earned 31 percent less.

The report's authors note that, in 1979, Black women's wages reached near parity with White women's wages, but that by 2015 the gap had risen to 19 percent.

We are not getting better. The equality gap is not narrowing. We need to face the statistics. And Democrats are willing to do something about that.

The report also found that the gap persists across women's educational levels and worsens for those with higher levels of educational attainment.

The gap at a higher level of education for White women and Black women with similar education is worse than it is for those lower.

In 1980, college-educated Black women with more work experience actually earned slightly higher wages than college-educated White women with the same experience. By 2014, however, the gap had widened to 10 percent in White women's favor. That is a reversal.

Similarly, while the gap between college-educated Black and White men in 1980 was slightly less than 10 percent, it rose to 20 percent by 2014.

In 2017, researchers from the Federal Reserve Bank of San Francisco similarly concluded that the Black-White earning gap is growing, and that the growth can largely be attributable to so-called immeasurable factors.

What are some of those factors? Those factors that play a role in the Black-White income and employment gap include employment discrimination, weak enforcement of antidiscrimination laws, and racial differences in unobserved skill levels, as opposed to measurable factors such as educational attainment or work experience.

I am grateful that we have this time this evening to talk about this, to let the American people see the truth--not a tweet, not what is happening on the news on a regular basis, but the things that everyday Americans care about: wages; minimum wage; having quality of life; and, as my colleague from Nevada said, the ability to have one job to sustain your family, not having to juggle two and three jobs, leaving your children at home and not being able to be an important and positive force in your children's lives because you have to work.

We are concerned as well about what is happening to our young children who don't have that supervision in the evening.

Those are some of the issues where we have concern in Black communities, not because parents aren't working and they are not there for their children because they are shiftless, they are lazy, et cetera, the things that you hear. It is because parents have two jobs. They are trying to hold it together.

Single households, even those households that have both parents working, they have to have two jobs to make ends meet.

This is a means to get people to be able not only to get out of poverty but to support their families, to support their communities, to create wealth, to have homeownership, which allows access to so many other things such as education and so many things that are, in fact, the American Dream.

Every day, every week, and definitely every month, they are trying to juggle which bill they are going to pay, and which bill they are not going to pay. Are they going to be able to keep the lights on? Are they going to be able to pay the rent?

In the Virgin Islands, public school students wear uniforms. Are they going to be able to scrounge up money at the end of the summer to be able to provide clothing for their children to be able to go to school?

Those are the things that people are concerned with working minimum wage jobs, and working them hard; and then maybe at night having a nighttime job somewhere else; and making sure that maybe one of the older children is watching the younger ones; making sure that they are asleep while they are away at that job; and praying that nothing happens while they are there, not because they are negligent parents, but that they care enough to be trying to put food on the table.

Those are the stories that I am sure you hear in your district; that I know I hear in the Virgin Islands; and that I am sure all of our colleagues, if they are willing to listen to the people that are on the ground, the people that have put them here in Congress, are facing every day.

Mr. Speaker, I applaud the gentleman and the coleader for leading this event for the Congressional Black Caucus under the leadership of Chairwoman Karen Bass. The Congressional Black Caucus is the conscience of this Congress.

I don't know if you know, and I am constantly reminding people, Mr. Speaker, that the President, in August 2016, came to Philadelphia and said, ``What the hell do you have to lose?'' That is what he said.

Mr. Speaker, I rise to join my colleagues from the Congressional Black Caucus in calling for an increase in the Federal minimum wage. I am pleased that the Democratic leadership plans to put the Raise the Wage Act up for a vote in the House.

A raise for these workers is long overdue. Congress has not raised the national minimum wage in 10 years.

My home State has not raised its minimum wage for 13 years. Inflation has increased the cost of living nearly 19 percent from 10 years ago. Food, healthcare, and utilities all went up.

Let me repeat that. A raise for these workers is long overdue. Congress has not raised the national minimum wage for 10 years. My home State of Pennsylvania has not raised its minimum wage for 13 years. Inflation has raised the cost of living nearly 19 percent from 10 years ago. Food, healthcare, and utilities all went up.

Members from both parties should be able to agree that no one who works full-time should live in poverty. I am very focused on poverty because my city of Philadelphia has a 26 percent poverty rate.

Raising the minimum wage is one of the best tools in the toolbox for lifting Americans out of poverty. That includes 600,000 children who will be lifted out of poverty by the Raise the Wage Act.

It is important, Mr. Speaker, to understand that one of our colleagues, Congresswoman Barbara Lee, who leads the effort around the reduction of poverty, particularly child poverty, when we talk about the issue, 600,000 children will be lifted out of poverty by the Raise the Wage Act. How can my colleagues say no to that?

We need to find some way to move forward. We have an opportunity, and that opportunity is the Raise the Wage Act. Americans who are working the hardest to grow our economy need to share the rewards of that growth. Just think, that raise in their pocket allows them to spend money in the economy. That is not something to take lightly.

When we talk about small businesses--and I am the vice chair of the Small Business Committee--and we talk about small businesses being the backbone of our community, obviously, they need customers. They need customers who have money in their pockets.

It is not just enough for that individual, but it is enough for entrepreneurs. It is enough for building businesses. It is enough for building communities. It is enough for all of us to recognize the importance and the significance of raising the wage.

We need to not take that lightly. We need to understand that, in some of our communities, there is a growing income inequality gap, and we need to address that. The way to address it is by fundamentally raising the wage. Raising the wage gives people more of an opportunity to participate in this economy.

We know this economy tends to be rigged for those who are at the top against those at the bottom who are trying to struggle and find a way. When you talk about our not raising the minimum wage in 10 years--and 13 years in Pennsylvania--I want anyone who is listening or watching what is taking place here this evening to know that the Congressional Black Caucus, clearly, as the chairperson always likes to say--she always talks about hidden figures. The hidden figures are that we haven't raised the wage in 10 years, and in Pennsylvania, they haven't raised it in 13 years.

Americans who are working are working harder. They are working more than one job. They are working two, three jobs. There is something wrong with that. The CEOs have definitely been getting their raises.

Where is the raise for the people who cook their food, make their beds, and clean their offices? Where is the raise for the people who cook their food, make their beds, and clean their offices?

Today, led by my two colleagues from the great State of Nevada and the great Virgin Islands who are leaders in this effort, I am glad to join with them to add my voice to raising the wage.

This is not an accident that the Congressional Black Caucus will be in the forefront because this is an issue that means a great deal to an awful lot of Americans and particularly African Americans when we have a President of the United States who comes and says: What do you have to lose?

The fact of the matter is, when we look at his administration, clearly, the policies are not connecting to moving the people, at least not moving the people whom we are talking to and the situations that we are seeing.

The bottom line on the minimum wage is simple: Pay these people now. Pay these people now and raise the wage.

We can no longer joke about this. We can no longer have it as political rhetoric. We must show action, and we must show people that we are determined to raise the wage.

I thank my colleagues for giving me the opportunity to add my voice to both of yours for what we are attempting to do today. We need to keep doing this every single day and not leave here until this wage raises.

The bottom line of the minimum wage is simple: Pay these people now and raise the wage.