Rights and Democracy and other Raise Up N.H. campaign partners in the state are encouraged that there is legislation moving this year that would get us a step closer to making our minimum wage a livable wage.

We currently have no state minimum in New Hampshire, so the low bar falls to the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour, a starvation wage. While we believe the minimum wage should be at least $15, the current bills winding their way toward the governor’s desk, which would raise the wage to $12 an hour, would go a long way toward alleviating poverty and making our communities healthier, safer and more equitable.

Here are seven and a quarter ($7.25) reasons why Gov. Chris Sununu should stand with Granite State workers and support legislation to raise the wage:

$1 – We can do better. New Hampshire has the lowest minimum wage in all of New England. It’s the only state in the Northeast – and one of just 21 states nationally – that does not have a higher wage than the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour.

$2 – Granite Staters want a higher minimum wage. Raising the minimum wage is exceedingly popular in New Hampshire. Seventy-six percent of N.H. voters support raising the minimum wage.

$3 – Business owners support it. Four in five business owners support raising the minimum wage. In a recent survey of 1,000 business executives, 80% supported raising their state’s minimum wage, while only 8% opposed it. Hermit Woods Winery in Meredith raised pay for its employees to $15 an hour. “I think it’s a good investment to invest well in your employees,” owner Bob Manley said. “I think that’s a very meaningful way to grow your business.”

$4 – This is about adults and teens. Many, many workers learn necessary skills on the job and New Hampshire should not discriminate based on age. Many teens are contributing to their family’s income or saving for school. The notion that most minimum wage workers are teenagers working for “pocket money” is just not true.

$5 – It will help reduce racial wealth disparity in New Hampshire. Nearly 40% of all black and Hispanic workers in New Hampshire would benefit from a $15 minimum wage.

$6 – It will benefit women. Nearly one-third of women in New Hampshire would benefit from a $15 minimum wage.

$7 – We’ve fallen behind. The real value of the minimum wage has fallen in the past 40 years. In 1968, the federal minimum wage was the equivalent of nearly $11 per hour today.

A quarter of the workers in our state overall would benefit from a $15 an hour minimum wage (that’s 173,000 people). Getting us to $12 per hour is an important step on the path toward a livable minimum wage in the Granite State.

If you haven’t already, please call and email Gov. Sununu and ask him to sign into law any bill that comes to his desk to raise the minimum wage in New Hampshire above a paltry $7.25 an hour. Tens of thousands of hard-working Granite Staters are counting on him.

(Jan Schaffer lives in Warner.)