Seven Funders Behind the Movement for a Higher Minimum Wage

This article is co-published with Inside Philanthropy.

The $1.9 trillion COVID stimulus bill now moving through Congress and at long last toward President Joe Biden’s desk embodies what some commentators have called a seismic shift in American politics toward a more assertive federal government. It’s widely popular at the moment, and the inclusion of elements like additional direct payments, expanded unemployment benefits and a new child tax credit stand in contrast to D.C.’s muted response to the recession a decade ago. 

The atmosphere around government intervention is shifting, and yet one major economic equity policy still remains unchanged since 2009: the federal minimum wage. As of the time of writing, a bid to step up the wage from $7.25 to $15 over time—part of Biden’s agenda for the bill—has been unable to clear congressional hurdles for inclusion in the final version, though it remains an option for separate future legislation. 

Though the loss of the minimum wage hike is a setback for progressives, the fact that such a substantial boost has been under serious consideration—and is polling well among the U.S. public—is a testament to an economic justice movement that has gained significant traction since the last recession. Political organizing groups have pushed successfully for wage hikes in many state and local jurisdictions via campaigns like the Fight for 15, and over the past year, the pandemic has justified advocates’ calls for more far-reaching economic justice policies. 

Much of the ground-level organizing for higher minimum wage laws is openly political, but there is also significant 501(c)(3) activity on this front. Labor movement nonprofits and economic justice-oriented think tanks have been focal points for advocates for years, drawing on philanthropic funding as one source of support. In conjunction with unions and political groups, these nonprofits are poised to continue the drumbeat for a policy shift that’s been a long time coming. 

Here, in a non-exhaustive list and in no particular order, are seven funders that have been key supporters of organizations pushing for a higher minimum wage.

W.K. Kellogg Foundation

This stalwart liberal legacy foundation has long been a backer of groups looking to empower workers. Like many progressive funders, Kellogg pursues economic justice in an intersectional way, acknowledging workers’ rights as a key facet of its larger bid to support thriving children and families through a racial equity lens. Kellogg is a regular supporter of worker advocacy groups like Restaurant Opportunities Centers United (ROC United), the National Domestic Workers Alliance (NDWA) and the National Employment Law Project (NELP). 

Kellogg is also notable for its longstanding support for farmworker organizing, including grants to groups like the Coalition of Immokalee Workers, the Farmworker Association of Florida and the Farmworker Justice Fund. Along with domestic workers and other service sector and retail employees, farmworkers are often unrepresented in the traditional union system—which often doesn’t account for many women and people of color—and thus make up one good constituency within the “new labor movement” that has commanded attention from a variety of funders in recent years.

James Irvine Foundation

Since circa 2016, this California-focused funder has gone all-in on empowering low-income workers in its region, awarding grants to support policy change, equitable workforce development and projects in high-need areas of its state. Like Kellogg, Irvine backs many of the nonprofit labor movement’s biggest players, including NDWA, NELP and ROC United. The foundation has also backed regional and demographic worker organizing efforts like the Orange County Labor Federation, the National Black Worker Center Project, and Mujeres Unidas y Activas. 

Irvine has sought to capitalize on relatively worker-friendly state politics in its labor advocacy to act as a model for regional philanthropies elsewhere in the country. It has been looking for ways to partner with government to help workers, for instance, backing a joint effort between the labor commissioner’s office in Sacramento and 14 community-based organizations to address wage theft. At the start of 2021, an existing state law bumped the California minimum wage up to $13 or $14 depending on employer size. The wage is set to hit a $15 minimum for all California workers at the start of 2023. 

Robert Wood Johnson Foundation

Robert Wood Johnson isn’t your typical labor movement funder, and its grants to workers’ rights nonprofits do not always directly support organizing for things like a higher minimum wage. But especially in recent years, RWJF has been giving sizable sums to places like One Fair Wage, NDWA and NELP, often under the heading of its dedication to the social determinants of health. 

Robert Wood Johnson is one example of a funder that has increasingly found its priorities—centered on public health—stymied by public policies that exacerbate inequality and hobble government’s responsiveness. RWJF’s support for labor movement organizing groups is one way to approach that problem systemically. So is its involvement—along with a number of other funders—in efforts to curtail aggressive state preemption of local laws. 

As we explored in depth last year, preemption of local minimum wage hikes by state legislatures is a constant barrier to wage reform below the federal level. A nationwide increase, of course, would be a desirable form of “preemption” for economic justice advocates. 

Ford Foundation

We’d be remiss without including the worker advocacy movement’s biggest philanthropic backer. Though Ford’s approach to economic opportunity funding in the U.S. has shifted over the decades, it has long been behind many of the headline groups backing a higher minimum wage. Pretty much every one of the national groups we’ve mentioned enjoy some degree of Ford support, including NDWA, ROC United and One Fair Wage, as well as groups like the Jobs with Justice Education Fund, the Partnership for Working Families, and the National Day Laborer Organizing Network (NDLON). Ford is also NELP’s largest supporter. 

Ford is also a committed backer of minimum wage efforts on the policy front via grantees like the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) and the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities. EPI in particular is a prominent beltway voice for a higher minimum wage, issuing forth research, advocacy and testimony at a steady clip. Some of the think tank’s other major philanthropic funders include Kellogg, RWJF and the Hewlett Foundation.

JPB Foundation

Like RWJF, the JPB Foundation is a lower-key supporter of minimum wage advocacy organizations. But it does back an array of groups aligned with that work in a way that’s rare for a grantmaker headed by a living donor: Most worker advocacy funders tend to be legacy institutions. But Barbara Picower’s giving through JPB has bucked that trend with support for movement groups and advocates—NDWA, NELP, the Jobs With Justice Education Fund and the Coalition of Immokalee Workers—as well as copious funding for liberal think tanks—the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, the Center for American Progress, the Institute for Policy Studies and others. 

General Service Foundation

Many of the funders on this list are large grantmakers whose funding does the most, monetarily, to prop up organizations advocating for a higher minimum wage. But more modest grantmakers like the General Service Foundation are among those most dedicated to intersectional economic justice. GSF is one of a cadre of smaller progressive funders who’ve been leading the COVID-era (and pre-COVID) charge for philanthropy that builds power among hard-hit communities, including the millions of people earning low wages. 

In conjunction with a vigorous defense of democracy, GSF’s grantmaking includes support for national worker advocacy groups like NDWA, NELP, the Partnership for Working Families and NDLON. There are also grants for regional efforts like 9to5 Colorado and the Workers Defense Project in Texas, as well as grants channeled through progressive intermediaries like Tides to support intersectional organizing. 

Hill-Snowdon Foundation

Hill-Snowdon works with GSF on the Defending the Dream Fund, dedicated to supporting inclusive democracy. The two modest progressive funders are also similar in their solid support for grassroots economic justice organizing. In Hill-Snowdon’s case, that involves grants for places like United for Respect, NDWA and the Workers Center for Racial Justice, in addition to a number of workers’ centers and local organizing groups across the country. Grants also go out to worker organizing groups in Hill-Snowdon’s home base of Washington D.C., including the local ROC chapter and DC Jobs With Justice. 

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Numerous other philanthropies big and small back workers’ rights and advocacy organizations pushing for livable, decent wages. Other funders we could cite here include the Nathan Cummings Foundation, the Walter and Elise Haas Fund, the Hewlett Foundation, the Annie E. Casey Foundation and the Surdna Foundation, among others. The Rockefeller Foundation, which has supported worker advocacy efforts here and there, recently ramped up its support with $7 million this past December to help hard-hit communities access the safety net. Grantees there included labor groups like the NDWA, NELP and the 9to5 National Association of Working Women.

It’ll be interesting to see whether more major living donors follow in the footsteps of Pierre and Pam Omidyar and take the leap into worker advocacy giving. It’s virgin territory for most billionaire donors, and only a few progressive super-rich philanthropists besides Omidyar have actually kicked in notable grants—think George Soros, Barbara Picower, Peter and Jennifer Buffett of the NoVo Foundation, and Nick Hanauer. 

But MacKenzie Scott included grants to two labor groups—One Fair Wage and the NDWA—in her initial round of giving. There may well be a lot more where that came from. And efforts like the Families and Workers Fund have been successful in courting billionaire donors to fund alongside labor movement groups, if not directly for their organizing work, in the spirit of pandemic relief. 

Although support for workers’ rights and economic justice policy remains rare in the wider philanthrosphere, calls for higher minimum wages and other economic justice policies are only getting louder. More and more states are enacting wage hikes by ballot measure (including red ones), and progressive lawmakers in D.C. are almost certain to continue pushing for a bill in conjunction with the president’s stated support. In this climate, the question is whether more grantmakers actually move into this territory, “radical” no longer, or whether the circle of worker empowerment funders remains a small one.