Policy: Labor  Obama to raise minimum wage for federal contract
workers  By | Politics,White House,Brian Hughes,Barack
Obama,Labor,PennAve,Economy,Budgets and Deficits,Minimum
Wage,State of the Union  President Obama in his State of the
Union address Tuesday will announce an executive order to raise
the minimum wage for workers on new federal contracts to $10.10
an hour.  “A higher minimum wage for federal contract workers
will provide good value for the federal government and hence
good value for the taxpayer,” says a White House document
detailing the executive order Obama will sign. “Boosting wages
will lower turnover and increase morale, and will lead to higher
productivity overall.”  The president will also call for
Congress to raise the minimum wage for all workers from $7.25 to
$10.10 an hour beginning in 2015. Democrats will continue to
push for a bill sponsored by Sen. Tom Harkin, D-Iowa, and Rep.
George Miller, D-Calif., that has the backing of the White
House.  But with limited appetite for that bi