MINIMUM WAGE BARGAIN REACHED
Bill sent to Baker also has family leave, sales tax measures
A grand bargain between political powerhouses over a slate of economic ballot questions passed the Legislature, sending to Gov. Charlie Baker a compromise that boosts minimum wages, enacts paid family and medical leave and enshrines a yearly sales tax holiday.
The bill, unveiled to lawmakers early yesterday hours before it passed the House 126-25, and the Senate 30-8, averts at least two popular ballot measures — a retailer-backed budget-busting $1.5 billion cut to the state’s sales tax and an initiative to institute paid family and medical leave pushed by a grassroots coalition.
The deal hikes the minimum wage in Massachusetts to $15 an hour over five years while phasing out the state’s time-and-a-half Sunday pay over that same period. It adds 12 weeks of paid family leave and 20 weeks of paid medical leave. It creates a permanent sales tax holiday starting next year.
“This legislation is an enormous win for working families,” said Raise Up Massachusetts spokesman Stephen Crawford, whose group dropped its family leave ballot measure in the deal.
The coalition of about 100 groups hasn’t agreed to drop its ballot measure hiking the minimum wage to $15 over concerns that the grand bargain bill is less generous to tipped workers.
“We’ll be taking a look at that sometime next week after people have a chance to review the legislation,” Crawford said.
The reduced number of ballot measures comes two days after the Supreme Judicial Court tossed a controversial millionaire tax initiative successfully challenged by business groups who claimed the 4 percent surtax on incomes over $1 million, and earmarked spending, was unconstitutional.
The loss of the millionaire tax question was key to striking the deal on the minimum wage, paid leave and the sales tax, said Jon B. Hurst, head of the Retailers Association of Massachusetts.
“This would have been a much more difficult decision on our part of whether to deal if the millionaire tax was on the ballot,” Hurst told the Herald.
He said his members remain worried about what the payroll costs are going to be for the minimum wage boost and the paid leave mandates.
“One thing is certain: We knew if we hadn’t reached some middle ground ... the cost and time frame was going to be more severe if these measures went to the ballot,” Hurst said.
Rick Lord of Associated Industries of Massachusetts said his members face less direct impact from the minimum wage hike than other businesses, but he cautioned that raising the floor on pay will put pressure on businesses to raise other low-end wages.
“As it moves up, there’s that whole compression effect,” he said. “If the minimum is $15 people who are already making $15 believe they should be making more.”