OAN's Elizabeth Bolbelding
8:42am – Sunday, January 7, 2024
This year, five states are deciding whether to end the practice of paying employees who earn tips below the minimum wage.
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Activists also argue that framing the issue as a key cost-of-living issue in an election year is extending the fight to other states.
Tipped hourly workers, such as servers and bartenders, are paid “below minimum” wages than non-tipped workers.
Pending ballot measures in Michigan, Arizona, Ohio and Massachusetts, as well as a reintroduced bill in Connecticut, would eliminate the long-standing two-tier pay system.
Currently, only seven states have a single minimum wage regardless of tips. Even though more than two dozen other states have raised their minimum wages for tip earners above the federal standard of $2.13 an hour, which was last raised in 1991, these workers' base pay still remains at their respective below the state minimum wage.
If tips are less than the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, employers are expected to make up the difference, but labor advocates and researchers say that's not always the case.
Advocates are extremely optimistic after Chicago city councilors voted in October to phase out the tipped minimum wage over five years until it equals the city's standard hourly wage of $15.80. I'm in the mood. Then he took similar action less than a year later, when voters in Washington, D.C., approved a ballot initiative by a wide margin.
Saru Jayaraman, president of the national advocacy group One Fair Wage, which led the Chicago effort, issued a statement regarding the situation.
“We are seeing tremendous momentum following the win in the Windy City,” Saru Jayaraman said.
She said advocacy groups are already willing to pay below-minimum wage in favor of giving all front-of-house and back-haul employees the same base pay and adding tips. He said he is seeing it being abolished.
“This is about the big changes that have taken place in the restaurant industry post-pandemic,” Jayaraman added.
Jayaraman said tips keep minimum wage workers afloat as the economy recovers and employers find it harder to hire, while inflation drives up the price of everything from a head of lettuce to a month's rent. I concluded that I was gradually becoming unable to do so.
Waive the minimum wage for tipped workers, which will likely add millions more in 2024, an election year where Jayaraman said “the number one issue in every poll I've seen is the cost of living.” One Fair Wage not only pays universally but also wants to protect an improved foundation.
Ballot efforts the group supports in Michigan, Arizona, Ohio and California would eliminate the minimum wage for incarcerated people, the only residents still eligible for it in those states. It would also increase the state's overall minimum wage, he added. compensation.
“Forcing these workers to rely solely on tips no longer works,” Jayaraman added.
The next 12 months will reveal how many voters and policymakers agree with this decision.
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