Starting pay rises to $12 at Universal

Park follows Walt Disney World Resort, gives workers 20% raise

Universal Orlando workers will be getting a raise as company announced Thursday plans to increase minimum pay to $12 an hour in February.

The pay hike — a 20 percent jump from previous $10 hourly minimum — comes about two months after Walt Disney World Resort and its union reached a contract deal that sets in motion a series of pay increases to bring the minimum to $15 an hour by late 2021.

Many who follow the theme park industry had speculated that Universal might follow Disney and also raise wages. Hiring good employees can be competitive for the two theme park companies, which are both in the midst of busy expansions with new attractions and hotels in the works.

Universal spokesman Tom Schroder said the decision was “long-planned.” “Today’s announcement and the related adjustments we’ll be making means an increase in wages for thousands of our team members,” Schroder said in an email Thursday.

“As always, we will continue to review and adjust our rates so that we stay competitive in the market.”

The news came on the same day that Disney union members held a rally near Universal’s theme parks to push for higher wages.

“If the biggest two do this, the others will have to follow suit,” said Eric Clinton, president of UNITE

“If the biggest two do this, the others will have to follow suit.” Eric Clinton, president of UNITE HERE Local 362

HERE Local 362, who had helped plan the rally. “We think the entire hospitality industry should do this.”

“Even just $1 or $2 is a big deal,” said Krystal White, a five-year Disney worker at the Animal Kingdom.

With her higher pay at Disney, it made it easier for her family to afford a car after their old one was involved in a crash, she said.

In the past, Disney has influenced other companies’ wages.

In 2014, Disney and the unions agreed to increase the minimum salary from $8 to $10 an hour by 2016. Two months after the Disney contract offer, SeaWorld and Universal Orlando — neither of which has a unionized workforce — boosted their employee pay to $9 an hour.

SeaWorld spokesman Travis Claytor declined to say Thursday whether the company plans to raise workers’ pay.

Under Disney’s new contract, the pay of hourly fulltime and part-time employees will increase to $11 by December, $13 in September 2019, $14 in October 2020 and finally $15 in October 2021.

The unions and Disney had negotiated for more than a year in sometimescontentious discussions until they finally reached an agreement.