Seattle Mayor: Business, Labor Leaders Helped Raise Minimum Wage

Seattle officials were able to pass an increase in the city's minimum wage to $15 by forming a coalition of business, labor, and nonprofit leaders, said Seattle Mayor Ed Murray.

The Seattle City Council approved the measure Monday that will increase the minimum wage rate over a seven-year period. Murray said the plan was structured to "help employees without harming employers."

"We were able to do it because I put together a task force of business leaders, labor leaders, and nonprofit leaders," Murray, a Democrat, told MSNBC's "Morning Joe" on Wednesday. "How we actually got the agreement took a lot of work, a lot of long nights, a lot of tough discussions."

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The federal minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. President Barack Obama has suggested raising the rate to $10.10, but critics have said the move would result in job losses.

Murray said economic policies over the past several decades had "decimated the middle class in this country."

He maintained that raising the minimum wage would be an economic boost.

"If you don't have a strong middle class, you don't have folks that are actually buying things that stimulate the economy," he said. "This state, like other cities that have high minimum wages, you actually see a lot of job growth."

Murray said that because Seattle was a "very expensive city," a worker would need to earn $21 an hour in order to have a "real livable wage." At $15 an hour, he said it would still be hard for a person to "rent an apartment or buy a home in this city."

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