The $15 minimum wage issue will get its first hearing on Dec. 10.
Assembly Speaker Craig Coughlin today introduced legislation to increase New Jersey’s minimum wage to $15 an hour. The Assembly Labor Committee has already scheduled it for consideration on Dec. 10.
Under the bill, the minimum wage will rise from $8.85 on Jan. 1 to $9.50 for most workers on July 1, 2019, and then to $11 on Jan. 1, 2020. It would then increase each year until reaching $15 in 2024. The bill would increase the minimum wage rate more slowly for seasonal workers, farm workers and others.
“This bill addresses the issue of helping New Jersey’s working poor be better able to afford living in the State while taking into consideration the concerns of the State’s valued small business community,” Coughlin said. “Raising the minimum wage will not only lift up the current generation of low-wage workers but ensure fairness for future generations and tackle issues of hunger and inequality.”
NJBIA has been leading the fight against a $15-an-hour minimum wage because it will hurt New Jersey’s competitiveness and have a negative impact on small businesses.
“We still have many concerns about the impacts of this bill and will continue to work with the Legislature on exceptions for certain workers and industries,” said NJBIA President and CEO Michele Siekerka. “We do not feel that the proposed exceptions go far enough.”
“In NJBIA’s 2018 Health Benefits Survey, we saw a 7-percent decline in employers that offered health coverage plans for their employees from the previous two years. We are concerned that unless there is a consideration of overall compensation in this legislation, more employers will choose to drop employee health benefits plans to adjust for the increase in wages,” she said.
“We are also asking the Legislature to include a provision in the bill requiring an economic analysis of scheduled increases to provide the state the option of freezing an annual increase during a major economic downturn or in the wake of a natural disaster.”
Unbelievably bad!
We’re moving out of New Jersey! First the legislature adds another weeks vacation at the employers expense called medical leave, not they are asking NJ employers to add a 67% increase to our wage base. How can we build competitive products when our labor costs increase 67%.
Going to ruin a lot of small business-we are a Janitorial/Window Cleaning Company of which 3/4 of our workforce is part time. This will destroy us-we’ve been in business for 92 years
The problem in New Jersey is an affordability issue. Eliminate the waste in this state and make if more affordable. Raising the minimum wage will not solve the problem.
Immediately I can think of 8 employees that don’t work up to a $9 per hour standard no way I’m keeping them at a higher wage!!! This will ultimately hurt the workers and unemployment will climb.
NJ legislators never address the real problem in NJ which is high Real Estate taxes, sales tax, gas tax, and income tax all to fund bloated pension plans and medical benefits for state employees. This republican planning to leave NJ to all the people that vote for this nonsense!
We hear the same hue and cry every time an increase in the minimum wage is considered. “It’s going to eliminate thousands of jobs”, “It’s going to destroy thousands of small businesses”. And what really happens? More jobs and an expanded economy. It’s Econ 101. You put more money in peoples pockets, they go out and spend it. And, contrary to the usual party line, people earning the minimum wage are not just a bunch of kids saving up for the prom. The average age of people in the fast food industry, for example, is 34. Finally, anyone working full time at legitimate job should be earning a wage above the poverty line.
Childcare will become so expensive that the average minimum wage worker of 34 whom needs childcare to work will not be able to afford it. The solution isn’t about putting more money in the pockets to make it affordable to live in NJ. The solution is to provide more training and schooling opportunities so workers can move up and out of entry level jobs.
This is an awful idea. I ran a manufacturing business for years and we sold it several years ago, so I have no dog in this hunt. But, this is an awful idea. What is going to happen in the manufacturing space for small privately held employers of roughly 100 or fewer people, is that they will work their good people overtime and not hire. Almost all manufacturing jobs require a skill set that takes a lot of time develop. Our business was perhaps more difficult from a training perspective in that it took us at least 2 months to get any production out of new people and likely at least a year before they became a break even proposition. Meanwhile for every 5 or 6 hires I was lucky to get one who made it through year one. As a privately owned business you have a relationship with your employees and you are better off from a productivity standpoint letting them work all the overtime they can handle instead of paying $15 per hour to a trainee who is months or years away from making money for you. Maybe that is not a “growth” perspective, but most private businesses care about cash flow and profit more than growth. So, those $15 per hour minimum wage folks with no skills are not going to be finding jobs. Way to go Murf…
Liberals and Socialist love to dictate how to spend other people’s money. They don’t have any idea how to be competitive in a capitalistic free market. That’s because they don’t believe in how America works. I wish they would move to a country that runs how they believe like Russia, China, or Siberia. Just leave!!
I just feel bad for the young people, high school kids and most college kids. 90% of them are barely working at a rate worth, maybe, $9/hour. I doubt any small business will be hiring these kids. It’s such a shame, I feel like it’s the small businesses that give these kids a chance and teach them responsibility and work ethic at a young age. How is the youngster that doesn’t choose the college route ever going to get his/her first job?
The increase will effectively shut down childcare. This is the one place that you can’t automate, reduce work hours or staff. The State has a very strict teacher per child ratio that must be maintained at all times. The only way to cover the cost is to increase tuition. Childcare already cost a lot due to insurance, high property tax and ect. The increase will make childcare un-affordable.
We are a small 9 hole golf course in South Jersey. We hire mostly part time ,seasonal seniosr and teenagers. This increase in the minimum wage as proposed will significantly and negatively impact our business. Many businesses will simply pass this cost on to their customers. We are not able to do that because of competition from 2 government run golf courses within 5 miles of us, who do not have to make a profit. For many years we have contributed to the local economy , however this new minimum wage puts us in jeopardy. Jack
I don’t know why politicians don’t understand the concept of free markets. If a prospective employee is not pleased with the pay being offered he/she does not have to take the job. If an employee feels they can make more money at another company they are always free to interview and take the position. Higher skilled employees will command more money, lower skilled, less reliable/capable employees will command less. These are the basic principles of how our economy works.
When you force small business owners to pay more for their labor than competitors do and more than their economics permit, they have 2 choices; leave the state or close up shop. Neither benefits the employees or the state.
We don’t want to leave NJ, but if we must we will.
This legislation will hurt so many small businesses and it’s employees. It will have very harmful unintended consequences of employees either being terminated or having their hours cut, employers raising prices on consumers, closing the business because they can’t absorb the higher labor costs, or eliminating jobs and having them replaced by automation. These are the cruel facts of significantly raising the minimum wage. The business community has warned the New Jersey lawmakers this would happen but their concerns have been ignored and have fallen on deaf ears (What I have just accurately described has already occurred in Seattle, New York, and California). My heart goes out to all of the small businesses and employees who will be negatively affected and hurt by this irresponsibly reckless legislation. This is not a one-size-fits-all. Government mandates don’t work, does more harm than good, and winds up undeservedly hurting many innocent people.