Economists call for higher minimum wage in US

Seventy-five economists, including seven Nobel laureates in economics signed a public letter Tuesday urging an increase of the minimum wage for US the workers.

The Group urged to raise the minimum wage per hour from the current threshold of $7.25 to $10.10 by 2016, by hiking 95 cents annually starting 2014, Xinhua reported Tuesday.

The increase would mean that minimum-wage workers who work full time, full year would see a hike of their current salary of about 15,000 dollars to 21,000 dollars. These proposals will also raise the tipped minimum wage to 70%, the letter said.

The letter was released by the Economic Policy Institute, a Washington D.C.-based think tank funded in part by labour unions.

Among the signatories of the letter were Nobel Prize winners Kenneth Arrow, Peter Diamond, Eric Maskin, Thomas Schelling, Robert Solow, Michael Spence and Joseph Stiglitz.

The minimum wage has not been changed for about five years.

Recent researches have shown that the increases in the minimum wage have had "little or no negative effect on the employment of minimum-wage workers, even during times of weakness in the labor market," according to the letter.