HARRISBURG, PA — Legislation to increase Pennsylvania’s prevailing wage threshold will be reintroduced in the next session by Sen. Gene Yaw.

The Prevailing Wage Act requires that all public bodies pay the prevailing minimum wage to workers on a public works project. But the prevailing wage threshold of a total cost of $25,000 for the project has not changed since the 1960s. Yaw’s bill would raise the threshold to $185,000.

Yaw said, “The prevailing wage increases the cost of a project by what could be as much as 30%, and we felt it was something that should be adjusted to at least keep up with the times, and where inflation is now.”

At the $25,000 threshold, Yaw said, the prevailing wage applies virtually to every construction, repair or demolition project that may be undertaken by a municipality or other public body.