Federal wage floor for school support staff: $45k full-time, $30/hr part-time

What it does

This bill creates a federal grant program requiring states to ensure paraprofessionals and education support staff earn a living wage: $45,000 annually for full-time staff and $30/hour for part-time staff starting in 2026, with automatic inflation adjustments thereafter. The federal government appropriates $25 billion in 2026 (plus inflation adjustments) to help states and school districts meet these wage floors within four years, with funds flowing through state grants to local school districts.

Why we flagged it

The bill's operative mechanism is a direct federal appropriation to establish and enforce minimum wage/salary standards for a defined class of public-sector workers. It is not deregulation, tax relief, or a private carve-out; it is a straightforward public-employment wage mandate.

What the text implies

• States retain discretion to set minimum salaries/wages above the federal floor and to determine subgrant allocation formulas, creating potential for unequal implementation across districts serving low-income students.
• The bill permits (but does not require) use of subgrant funds to increase pay for teachers and other staff beyond paraprofessionals, potentially diluting resources intended for the named beneficiaries.
• Contracted staff are covered by the wage floor, but enforcement relies on state monitoring—compliance mechanisms and penalties for violations are not specified in the text.
• The 'supplement not supplant' rule (subsection h(4)) requires federal funds to add to, not replace, state/local spending, but does not prevent states from reducing their own education budgets in other areas.
• No waiver authority (subsection h(3)) prevents the Secretary from granting exceptions, but the bill does not establish enforcement penalties or remedies for non-compliance by states or districts.

Section numbers refer to the bill text the analysis read — linked under Primary records below.

Who it affects

Paraprofessionals and education support staff—who are predominantly women and workers in lower-income brackets—receive direct wage increases to a living-wage floor, improving their economic security and reducing reliance on public assistance. Families and students benefit from more stable, better-compensated school support systems.

Who stands to gain

• paraprofessionals and education support staff (direct wage increase)
• school districts (federal funding to offset wage costs)
• regional educational laboratories and nonprofit organizations (up to 1% reserved for research and te

Named in the bill

Department of Education, Secretary of Education, States (as grant recipients and administrators), Local Educational Agencies (school districts), Charter schools, Regional Educational Laboratories, Elementary and Secondary Education Act of 1965, Education Sciences Reform Act of 2002

Where it stands

11 cosponsors: 10 Democrats, 1 Independents.

• Jul 24, 2025 — Introduced · Congress.gov: “Introduced in Senate”
• Jul 24, 2025 — Referred to Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions · Congress.gov: “Read twice and referred to the Committee on Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions”

Dates and quoted wording are Congress.gov's action record; the timeline shows status changes, not every procedural step.

Money around this bill

1 lobbying clients named this bill on 1 disclosure filings across 1 quarter, Jun 2026 to Jun 2026. Those filings disclosed $750,000 in lobbying spend. A filing names 28 bills on average, so that figure is what each filing reported, not a share belonging to this bill.

More lobbying clients named this bill than 0% of bills with at least one filing.

Ed Markey, the sponsor, reported $658,450 in PAC receipts in the 2026 cycle.

• Doordash, Inc. — $750,000 on 1 filing

Lobbying Disclosure Act filings through Jul 20, 2026. A filing shows who paid to lobby on a bill it names, not what changed.