Minimum wage rising
Advocates: Increase set to go in effect this week is more vital than ever
Struggling businesses fret as the state’s minimum wage hits $12 an hour.
Thousands of low-wage workers in Connecticut, from home health care aides and child care providers to cashiers and fast-food employees, will see their hourly wages rise to $12 this week.
The $1 increase in the state’s minimum wage will put an extra $40 into Marlie Meranville’s pocket each month.
The new hourly rate won’t bring the 23-year-old Stamford woman much closer to her goal of moving out of her mom’s house and into her own apartment. But, she said, it will make paying her monthly bills a little less stressful, especially since her hours at Sbarro have been cut due to the pandemic.
“I’m trying to look for other jobs, but right now it’s hard,” Meranville said.
For Brian Jessurun, who owns the Vanilla Bean Cafe and three other restaurants in northeastern Connecticut with his brother, Barry, the higher labor costs will add 50 cents to the price of hamburgers and other grilled items.
Restaurants are already facing a sharp downturn in customers due to the virus, and the wage increase will cut into already slender profit margins, he said.
“It’s just math,” Jessurun said. “When you increase my cost of doing business, I have to pass that along. It’s as simple as that.”
Last year, the legislature approved a bill that would incrementally lift the state’s hourly minimum wage, from $10.10 to $15 on June 1, 2023. It reaches $12 on Tuesday.
When lawmakers debated the bill over the course of many hours in May of 2019, supporters spoke of the ways a higher hourly wage would provide an important boost to those on the lower rungs of the income scale while opponents predicted it would hurt Connecticut’s business climate.
But no one could have predicted that the second step of the increase would occur during a time of financial upheaval brought on by a global pandemic. Some business leaders have called on Gov. Ned Lamont to postpone the wage increase until the economy stabilizes.
Lamont rejected that idea. “Gov. Lamont’s support today for an increase to Connecticut’s minimum wage is the same as it was when he signed it into law over a year ago,” said Max Reiss, spokesman for the Democratic governor. “An increase in wages ... will provide additional support to so many of our front-line and essen
tial workers who have been showing up for work every day throughout this pandemic.”
Takara Gilbert of Hartford, an activist in the “Fight for $15” movement, said the increase will help her afford little extras such as an occasional manicure.
“It will help me save up a little more and afford some of those luxuries,” said Gilbert, who is 21 and rents a bedroom in her father’s Hartford home. Some economists say low-wage workers tend to spend their increases, which act as a stimulus for the economy.
Like many minimum wage employees, Gilbert has had her hours at T.J. Maxx reduced to three days a week and is having a hard time finding more work.
The pandemic has also hurt Jessurun, and he fears what coming weeks will bring. Dog Lane Cafe, his family’s fast-casual eatery in Storrs, relies heavily on customers from UConn. Before the pandemic, it served about 650 people daily; the number has dwindled to fewer than 100 now.
“As my prices go up, my customers will fall away,” he said. Like many small businesses, his restaurant group relied on federal aid through the Paycheck Protection Program.
“But the PPP money will run out, then it’s winter and the outdoor seating goes away and you’re doing 50% capacity inside,” Jessurun said. “You’re going to start seeing people go out of business dramatically by the end of the year.”
George Norman, who helps manage his family’s dairy farm in Griswold, said the increase will hurt small producers who already barely make a profit as it is. After feed for the animals, labor is the biggest expense.
“Our economy is very complex, and anyone who thinks they can stand back and make tweaks here and there and it won’t have an impact” is wrong, he said.
Like restaurants and retailers, the child care industry employees a significant number of minimum wage workers. The increase will add pressure to providers who are already struggling with drastic cuts in enrollment due to the pandemic, said Merrill Gay, executive director of the Early Childhood Alliance.
“Yes, it is an additional strain right now, but it pales in comparison to the bigger problem that there are lots of child care slots that aren’t being filled right now,” Gay said. “I’ve always been supportive of efforts to raise the wages of the folks who work in child care.”
Gay said he knows of one child care worker who has spent decades in the field but still had to find a part-time job on weekends to make ends meet. Some minimum wage workers said those who earn more cannot really fathom the challenges of making due on $11 or $12 an hour.
“It’s hard to live on that, especially in Stamford,” said Meranville, who has worked at Sbarro in Darien for almost six years.
She doesn’t have a car, so she relies on the bus to get to the fast-food restaurant. Sometimes, she uses her mother’s car to earn extra money delivering groceries through Instacart or food through Door Dash.
The increase that takes effect Tuesday will help, she said. “Every little bit helps.”