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Momentum is building to raise the minimum wage. Several states have already taken action聽 鈥� Connecticut has boosted it to $10.10 by 2017, the Maryland legislature just approved a similar measure, Minnesota lawmakers just reached a deal to hike it to $9.50. A few cities have been more ambitious 鈥� Washington, D.C. and its surrounding counties raised it to $11.50, Seattle is considering $15.00

Senate Democrats will soon introduce legislation raising it nationally to $10.10, from the current $7.25 an hour.

All this is fine as far as it goes. But we need to be more ambitious. We should be raising the federal minimum to $15 an hour.

Here are seven reasons why:

1. Had the minimum wage of 1968 simply stayed even with inflation, it would be聽more than $10 an hour today. But the typical worker is also聽about twice as productive聽as then. Some of those productivity gains should go to workers at the bottom.

2. $10.10 isn鈥檛 enough to lift all workers and their families out of poverty. Most low-wage workers aren鈥檛 young teenagers; they鈥檙e major breadwinners for their families, and many are聽women. And they and their families need a higher minimum.

3. For this reason, a $10.10 minimum would also still require the rest of us to pay Medicaid, food-stamps, and other programs necessary to get poor families out of poverty 鈥� thereby indirectly subsidizing employers who refuse to pay more. Bloomberg View describes McDonalds and Walmart as 鈥淎merica鈥檚 biggest welfare queens鈥� because their employees receive so much public assistance. (Some, like McDonalds, even聽their employees to use public programs聽because their pay is so low.)

4. A $15/hour minimum won鈥檛 result in major job losses because it would put money in the pockets of millions of low-wage workers who will spend it 鈥� thereby聽giving working families and the overall economyand creating jobs. (When I was Labor Secretary in 1996 and we raised the minimum wage, business predicted millions of job losses; in fact, we had more job gains over the next four years than in any comparable period in American history.)

5. A $15/hour minimum is unlikely to result in higher prices because most businesses directly affected by it are in intense competition for consumers, and will take the raise out of profits rather than raise their prices. But because the higher minimum will also attract more workers into the job market, employers will have more choice of whom to hire, and thereby have more reliable employees 鈥斅爊 lower turnover costs聽and higher productivity.

6. Since Republicans will push Democrats to go even lower than $10.10, it鈥檚 doubly important to be clear about what鈥檚 right in the first place. Democrats should be going for a higher minimum rather than listening to Republican demands for a smaller one.

7. At a time in our history when 95 percent of all economic gains are going to the top 1 percent, raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour isn鈥檛 just smart economics and good politics. It鈥檚 also the morally right thing to do.

Call your senators and members of congress today to tell them $15 an hour is the least American workers deserve. You can reach them at 202-224-3121.