Oberweis Pitches His Own Minimum Wage Plan
(CBS) -- State Sen. Jim Oberweis (R-Sugar Grove), who is challenging U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin in the November election, has unveiled his own plan to raise it to $10 per hour over three years for adult workers.
Oberweis opposed President Barack Obama's plan to raise the national minimum wage to $10.10 per hour -- a plan Durbin supports -- before the Republican primary last month, and now has proposed a gradual increase in the minimum wage in Illinois.
His proposal would hike the state's minimum wage for those who are 26 or older from $8.25 per hour to $9 per hour next year, then again to $9.50 per hour in 2016, and $10 per hour in 2017. The minimum wage for workers between the ages of 18 and 26 would stay at the current rate of $8.25 per hour; for those under 18, it would stay at $7.75 per hour.
Oberweis' plan would bar municipalities from establishing a higher minimum wage.
Legislative Democrats have their own plan, which would ramp up the minimum wage higher and faster, and apply to everyone 18 or older. Under that plan, the Illinois minimum wage would reach $10.65 per hour by July 1, 2016.