For Immediate Release: July 24, 2012 Contact: Gary Ginsburg | garykginsburg@gmail.

com | 518-817-6193

Senate Democratic Conference Releases Report On The Minimum Wage

(Albany, NY) The Senate Democratic Conference today released a comprehensive report, New Yorks 30 Years War, detailing the need to raise the minimum wage. The report is the latest initiative in the Democratic Conferences ongoing efforts to advocate for an end to the states poverty wage. Todays report expands on what the Senate Democratic Conference has consistently said over the past legislative session. Our state needs a higher minimum wage and our economy will improve once New Yorkers are better compensated for their hard work, Conference Leader John Sampson said. I urge my Republican colleagues to end their pandering to special interest campaign donors and instead listen to the experts, small-business owners, minimum wage earners, and the states residents and join the Democratic Conference to bipartisanly increase the minimum wage. The Senate Democrats have sent a series of letters to Senate Majority Leader Skelos detailing the moral and economic reasons to raise the states minimum wage. Additionally, the Democratic Conference held a forum in April, presided over by Senator Adriano Espaillat, where advocates, economists, minimum wage earners and small-business owners all testified that providing a higher minimum wage would generate increased economic activity and ensure a higher standard of living for hard-working New Yorkers. This report underscores just how critical it is to raise New Yorks minimum wage. Every day the Republicans block passage of the minimum wage is another missed opportunity to lift millions of New Yorkers out of poverty and get our economy moving again, Senator Adriano Espaillat said. As the sponsor of legislation (S.6335-B) to raise New Yorks minimum wage, I urge my colleagues to return to the legislature immediately and vote on raising the minimum wage. Todays report reinforces the Senate Democratic Conferences efforts to end the current minimum wage which institutionalizes poverty and replace it with a wage which allows New Yorkers to pursue and achieve the American dream of upward mobility. The report details how the minimum wages failure to keep pace with the rate of inflation has meant that current earners have a substantially lower purchasing power. The report also refutes alarmist claims that raising the minimum wage would hamper job growth, a regular excuse the Senate Republicans have used when attempting to rationalize their refusal to listen to their constituents and end the states poverty wage. The Senate Democratic Conference report on the need to raise the minimum wage, New Yorks 30 Year War, is available at: http://www.scribd.com/doc/100833079/New-York-s-30-Years-War-Minimum-Wage

###