Minimum decency.

Byline: The Register-Guard

Over the past 10 years, Congress has doled out more than $36 billion in tax cuts for small businesses. Over the same period, federal lawmakers haven't raised the minimum wage by even a paltry penny.

But that didn't stop Senate Republicans last week from blocking a proposal to raise the minimum wage by insisting on the addition of new tax cuts for businesses.

It was an unconscionable move that illustrates the growing chasm between the "haves" and "have nots" in this country and that provoked a well-deserved rebuke from Sen. Edward Kennedy, D-Mass.

"What is the price you want from working men and women?" Kennedy asked Senate Republicans. "How much more do we have to give up to the private sector and to business? How many billion dollars more are you asking, are you requiring? When does the greed stop?"

Some may accuse Kennedy of moralizing, and they are exactly right. The minimum wage has indeed become a moral issue. It currently stands at $5.15 an hour - or $10,712 per year. For a family of three, that's more than $4,000 under the federal poverty line. As a result of inflation, the minimum wage's purchasing power has dropped to its lowest level in more than five decades.

Two weeks ago the U.S. House voted to increase the minimum wage by $2.10 over the next two years. Instead of supporting this modest increase, Senate Republicans insisted that small businesses needed more tax relief to buffer the higher labor costs.

It's a familiar but fallacious argument. The majority of this nation's minimum wage workers do not work for small businesses. They flip burgers for McDonald's or make beds at Holiday Inns. They work for corporations that are not exactly standing on the corner with tin cups in need of more tax breaks.

Nor is there any evidence to support Republican claims that increasing the minimum wage hurts businesses and forces job cuts.

Oregon is a prime example. In 2002, state voters approved an increase in the minimum wage, with yearly adjustments for inflation. The state's minimum wage increased to $7.80 on Jan. 1, almost 50 percent higher than the national minimum wage.

Despite dire predictions of job losses by foes of the increase, Oregon has experienced a robust rate of economic growth. The same is true of Washington state and California, which also have minimum wages that rank among the nation's highest.

Nor is it true, as some Republicans insist, that raising the minimum wage hinders corporations from competing effectively in an international economy. To the contrary, states with higher minimum wages have not experienced losses in exports or foreign direct investments to states with lower minimum wages.

Senate Republicans, most of whom have voted to give themselves more than $30,000 in raises over the past decade, should now give their low-wage constituents a break. They should abandon their efforts to secure tax breaks for businesses and approve the House version of the minimum wage bill.