Senator Mark Leno, Democrat, San Francisco

The state Senate on Monday passed a bill that would raise California’s $9 minimum wage to $11 an hour on Jan. 1 and boost it again to $13 in 2017.

Sen. Mark Leno (D-San Francisco) made the proposal out of concern that census figures show a quarter of the state’s 38 million residents live in poverty, he said.

“It is time that we make it illegal to pay sub-poverty wages in California,” Leno told his colleagues during a heated floor debate.

He said the wage increase would boost the economy because working families would be able to spend more money. “It’s going to be spent immediately to meet daily needs in our community,” he said.

The bill passed 23 to 15, on a largely party-line vote.

And yesterday, the Los Angeles City Council voted 18 to 1 to raise the minimum wage in the city to $15.00 an hour by 2020 in graduated raises.