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Barack Obama renews minimum wage push; denies stirring up 'class resentment' in Labor Day speech

US president Barack Obama has renewed his push for Congress to raise the minimum wage and has attacked domestic opponents who have accused him of stirring up "class resentment".

In a Labor Day address, Mr Obama said his plan to raise the minimum wage from $US7.25 to over $US10 was having a positive impact on job growth, and that 13 states and DC were participating.

"You'll hear opponents say [raising the minimum wage is] going to kill jobs," he said.

"Except it turns out the states where the minimum wage has gone up this year had higher job growth than the states that didn't raise the minimum wage ... that's the facts."

He also noted that in the past six months more than 200,000 jobs had been created each month - for the first time since 1997 - and that he was fighting for women's pay equality.

Fellow Democrats, who have been attacked by their Republican counterparts over the wage rises, calling it 'class warfare', have appealed to Mr Obama to relax his hardline stance.

Mr Obama said that it did not have anything to do with class, but just keeping up with general living costs.

"I'm not stirring up class resentment," he said.

"Let me tell you something, working families, they're fine that folks are rich.

"The average person is not looking for a yacht, they're not looking for their own plane, they're not looking for a mansion, they don't need to be vacationing in St Barts.

"All they're looking for is that if they work hard, they can pay the bills."

Despite Mr Obama's achievements, a poll by the Federal Reserve showed that two in three Americans believe they are the same or worse off financially than five years ago after the Great Recession - a challenge for the Democrats who are campaigning to keep the Senate in the mid-term congressional elections in November.