Raising the PA Minimum Wage: “rather difficult”
- Amy Ruffo
- Dec 5, 2025
- 3 min read
Updated: Dec 6, 2025
Since 2009, the Pennsylvania minimum wage has remained unchanged at $7.25 due to legislative inaction. Meanwhile, Pennsylvania legislators have received automatic annual pay raises that increased their base salaries 45%, from $78,315 to $113,500.
Minimum Wage versus Living Wage
According to the US Department of Health and Human Services’ 2025 Poverty Guidelines, a $7.25 per hour wage ($15,080 per year) in Pennsylvania can now be characterized as a “poverty wage” for one person.
This amount is well below $22.91 per hour, the amount established by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s Living Wage Calculator as a living wage for a single Pennsylvania resident working full time with no children.
Thirty States Have Raised Their Minimum Wage
To support residents struggling to move out of poverty, 30 states have succeeded in passing legislation to raise the minimum wage above $7.25 per hour. Ten states and Washington, D.C. now have minimum wages of $15.00 or more.
All seven of the states surrounding Pennsylvania have established minimum wage levels between $11.00 and $17.00 per hour, as shown on the graph below. In four of them the minimum is now more than double Pennsylvania’s.
Lack of a law. No lack of bills.
Between 2015 and 2024, when most nearby states were successful at raising their minimum wage, Pennsylvania legislators introduced 43 bills addressing this issue. All were referred to the House or Senate Labor and Industry Committees. Forty-two did not receive any hearings or votes and died at the end of the session. Only one bill, HB1500 from the 2023-2024 session, was voted out of committee and received a final vote in the House, with all but one Democrat voting Yes and all but two Republicans voting No. The bill then went to the Senate and remained unaddressed in committee for 17 months, until the session ended.
Pennsylvanians Support a Minimum Wage Increase
At least two polls in the past five years have provided evidence of support for an increased minimum wage in Pennsylvania. In 2021, 67% of respondents to a Franklin & Marshall poll (select “Search” and “Minimum Wage”) supported an increase to $12.00 per hour. In 2024, a poll conducted by the Philadelphia Inquirer, New York Times, and Siena College found that 82% of likely PA voters supported an increased minimum wage, with only 14% opposing an increase.
Legislators’ Role
Senate Labor and Industry Committee Chair Devlin Robinson suggested in a 2024 radio interview that bills failed to move because some legislators favored raising the minimum wage to $20.00 an hour, with others preferring $15, and some wanted regional increases, with others arguing for a statewide increase.
Chairman Robinson stated:
“Trying to get everyone on board with the same thing is rather difficult.”
While neighboring states, most with part-time legislatures, have found ways to negotiate raises for their states’ poorest workers, that skill eludes PA’s professional, full-time legislators. Yet they continue to enjoy the fruit of legislation enacted 30 years ago that rewards them with an annual automatic increase to their base salary.
.
On December 1, 2025, our 253 legislators received their annual automatic salary increase. Their salary increase this year, 3.25%, results in a base salary of more than $113,500, netting an additional $3,600 per legislator. They are the third-highest-paid legislators in the country, behind New York and California.
What would it take?
Five bills have been introduced since January 2025 to raise the minimum wage. As in 2023, one — House Bill 1549 — passed quickly in the House Labor, Rules and Appropriation Committees and again on the House floor and has been waiting since June in the Senate Labor and Industry Committee for a further vote. Negotiation and compromise seem essential skills for well-paid legislators and their policy staff. Perhaps 2026 will be the year they find a way to accomplish that “rather difficult” task.
Further Reading: