Rabbi Michael Namath is program director of the Religious Action Center of Reform Judaism. The Religious Action Center is the Washington, D.C., office of the Commission on Social Action of Reform Judaism, a joint office of the Union for Reform Judaism (representing 900 congregations with 1.5 million Reform Jews) and the Central Conference of American Rabbis, whose […]

Stephen Copley is chair of the board of the Let Justice Roll Campaign, a coalition of 90 faith, community, labor and business organizations working to raise the minimum wage. It sponsors annual “living wage” days, which this year fell on Jan. 10-11, 2009.

The Methodist Federation for Social Action, with offices in Washington, D.C., is an independent group of Methodists concerned with peace and justice issues, including economic justice. Chett Pritchett is the executive director.

Interfaith Worker Justice, based in Chicago, tries to organize people of faith in the United States to push for better working conditions, benefits and wages for low-income people. Its Web site states that “among the key principles shared by all faiths are the importance of paying workers fairly for their labor and the right of […]

Richard S. Toikka, a lawyer and economist, is principal with Farkas and Toikka, a law firm in Washington, D.C. He is co-author of a study released by the Employment Policies Institute in Washington, D.C., in May 2005, which concluded that the impact of increased income gained through a living-wage ordinance was offset by the loss of other government assistance. […]

John Doyle is managing director of the Employment Policies Institute, a nonprofit research group which has funding from the food and beverage industry, and which contends that raising the minimum wage could lead to a loss of jobs. When wages go up, the institute argues, employers respond by hiring fewer people.

Anthony B. Bradley is a research fellow with the Acton Institute for the Study of Religion and Liberty, based in Grand Rapids, Mich. Bradley has written that raising the minimum wage hurts teens and low-skilled minorities. He has linked the Black Lives Matter movement to Christianity in a commentary.

The National Restaurant Association opposed the minimum-wage increases. The association contended that relatively few minimum-wage workers are trying to support families and that such legislation would be too expensive for restaurants.

The National Federation of Independent Business is an advocacy group based in Nashville, Tennessee, that represents the interests of small businesses. The federation opposes efforts to raise the minimum wage, saying such measures have ripple effects on the economy and can hurt entry-level workers. Email through the website.