YAKIMA, Wash. - Supporters of the $15 minimum wage plan to rally at the downtown Yakima McDonald's this morning.

The 9 a.m. rally, part of a full day of activities statewide, is being organized by Working Washington, a coalition of organizations, faith-based groups and unions in support of higher wages.

Other rallies are also being held in Spokane, Pasco and Olympia. Participants will then continue to a statewide gathering in Seattle, which recently adopted a $15 per hour minimum wage.

Supporters are working to spread the momentum they've gained in Seattle to other parts of the state.

McDonald's and other fast-food locations have been at the center of these minimum wage discussions nationwide, so it's not surprising the organization will be holding one of its rallies at a McDonald's location.

Greg Luring owns the McDonald's where the rally will be held along with a dozen other locations in Yakima and Kittitas counties.

In 2013, Luring told the Herald-Republic that junior managers at the restaurant were paid at the $15 per hour range but noted that expanding that rate to entry-level workers wasn't as easy as advocates think.

But he also said that it wasn't an impossible task, especially if customers were willing to help bear increasing labor costs: "Maybe our customers would be willing to pay $5 for a Big Mac to see (higher wages) happen."

Meanwhile, the Freedom Foundation, an Olympia-based think tank, is looking to counter Working Washington's event with the release of a new study, "Promises Made, Promises Broken: The Failure of Washington's Minimum Wage Law."

The study's central argument is that minimum wage increases have not helped get more people out of poverty. To support this argument, it states that the poverty rate has not declined since the passage of Initiative 688, which tied the minimum wage to inflation.

"Given I-688's poor track record, state and local voters and policymakers should seriously consider the potential consequences before enacting further, unprecedented increases in the minimum wage," the study's authors wrote.