To the editor:

In 2023 the Federal minimum wage is still $7.25 per hour, as it has been since 2009 when Barack Obama was president. Twenty-seven states are raising their minimum wage this year, but Georgia is still carving out an exception for certain employers to pay $5.15 per hour.

Clearly there is no historical correlation between inflation and the 10 years of stagnant wages. Yet it is precisely the working poor that the Federal Reserve chairman is battering by increasing the borrowing rate of money, ostensively to “fight inflation.”

This month Japan decided to take meaningful action to fight inflation: they proposed a raise of 40% for the workers in that country. What do they know about economics in Japan that our Fed chair is pretending we don’t know here?

Ellen Starbird

Cape Coral