Dear Madam or Mister President,

I am a high school student attending East West School of International Studies. I find that an issue in America is how low the federal minimum wages are. The federal rate of minimum wages in America are causing problems for people and families all over, especially in areas of poverty, and people trying to get themselves out of debt. 

Minimum wages are the bare wages that people get paid or in cases it's their source of income. The minimum wage was last increase in July 24, 2009 since then price in food, medicine, electricity ,etc have all gone up. Right now the current federal minimum wage rest at $7.25 per hour, for people the minimum wage is their can be their only income and can be very difficult for people to get out of poverty even with affordable housing. I can understand why for many small business the increase of minimum wages would be very difficult because of large corporations underpaying their workers forcing the small businesses out of work. 

Business can't might try to cheat the increase of minimum wages by cutting their workers hours. If a small business like a restaurant or a grocery store did this then a bill should also be passed along with it to decrease the tax for small business and increase the tax for large companies. This would create a balance to counter poverty in homes without causing their jobs to start firing or cutting hours. As a result of increasing the minimum wage people will have more money meaning, decrease in poverty and more money being fed into the economy. For the large business upset about the tax they would gain more consumers since people will have more money to purchase more so corporations have the chance to make money back maybe more from the result of the taxes. 

As a young black student seeing the poverty around affordable housing areas, its crushing to see people stuck due to their lack of wealth and social stereotypes that cause them to remain in a poverty cycle. Increasing the wages allows more money to circulate helping the economy, people in low income areas, and reducing the debt of the U.S. people. In reality its most likely not as simple as this but I believe this is a good path to helping decrease poverty in the U.S. 

Thank you for your time Sincerely,

Destyn Hall