[Congressional Record Volume 143, Number 85 (Wednesday, June 18, 1997)]
[Extensions of Remarks]
[Page E1251]
From the Congressional Record Online through the Government Publishing Office [www.gpo.gov]


                            GOP WELFARE PLAN

                                 ______
                                 

                        HON. WILLIAM (BILL) CLAY

                              of missouri

                    in the house of representatives

                        Wednesday, June 18, 1997

  Mr. CLAY. Mr. Speaker, I would like to bring to your attention an 
important editorial that appeared in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 
Monday, June 16, 1997. It brings to light the harsh reality of a GOP 
plan that deprives welfare participants of minimum wage.

           [From the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, June 16, 1997]

                   GOP Welfare Plan Insults the Poor

       Just when GOP leaders were promising to put a compassionate 
     face on their social-reform initiatives, they show us their 
     ugly side. Witness the party's unconscionable opposition to 
     paying the minimum wage to some welfare recipients. The GOP's 
     anti-family plan is an insult to human decency and fair-labor 
     laws. This idea is the party's response to President Bill 
     Clinton's recent order that the minimum wage apply to 
     workfare participants employed by public agencies and 
     nonprofit groups, just as it would apply to private-sector 
     jobs.
       Rep. William L. Clay of St. Louis says the GOP's proposal 
     ``reminds me of slavery's cruel exploitation of human 
     labor.'' GOP Rep. James Talent of St. Louis County responds 
     that job earnings of welfare participants would be boosted 
     beyond the minimum wage through other benefits--Medicaid, 
     child care, housing subsidies and food stamps.
       That's like saying middle-income workers don't deserve pay 
     raises because their incomes are indirectly inflated by 
     subsidized health insurance, subsidized housing in the form 
     of mortgage deductions and other benefits. Perhaps GOP 
     leaders should go further and recommend pay cuts for federal 
     lawmakers because of the innumerable subsidies--we call them 
     perks--that come with their jobs.
       Maybe Republicans don't realize that workfare participants 
     need the income. A single mother on welfare with two children 
     must earn at least $12,590 just to stay above the poverty 
     line. If she earned $19,370, she would be earning just 55 
     percent of the U.S. median income for a three-person family.
       It's misleading for Mr. Talent and others to suggest that 
     subsidies, such as those for child care, compensate for a 
     lower-than-minimum wage. In all likelihood, these working 
     mothers will have to pay part of the cost of their child 
     care. Also, there's no guarantee the mothers will continue 
     qualifying for Medicaid once they take jobs. And let's not 
     forget such incidentals as work-related transportation costs.
       If the GOP is serious about workfare being a declaration of 
     independence for poor women, then the party must make the 
     work financially viable. Stigmatizing welfare mothers by 
     paying them sub-minimum wages is hardly an incentive for them 
     to take jobs.

     

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