M-Viv — $15 for min wage
IF THE CITY COUNCIL speaker has her way, the city’s minimum wage might not be so minimal.
Melissa Mark-Viverito (D-Manhattan) said Tuesday she would like to see the minimum bumped to as much as $15 an hour in the city, nearly double the current statewide minimum of $8.
She is ready to convene hearings on the matter, she said.
“We’ve seen municipalities across the country enacting their own increases. We would love to engage in hearings and find out what the best rate would be,” Mark-Viverito declared.
She sided with Mayor de Blasio in calling for a wage “well above $10 an hour.” She added, “I know people talk about $13 to $15; that’s probably more of a range that would be better.”
De Blasio’s call for raising the minimum wage in the city is part of his “progressive” agenda to attack income inequality.
Gov. Cuomo had been a roadblock to de Blasio’s idea, but he flip-flopped over the weekend, embracing it to help win the endorsement of the left-leaning Working Families Party. He came out in fa- vor of legislation that would allow communities to set a minimum wage as much as 30% above the state minimum. The bill’s chances of getting through the state Senate, which is controlled by Republicans and five breakaway Democrats, is uncertain.
The Seattle City Council on Monday approved a $15 minimum wage, the nation’s highest, to be phased in over several years.
De Blasio had a closed-door meeting April 29 with Seattle Mayor Ed Murray to discuss that proposal.
James Parrott of the liberal Fiscal Policy Institute said New York is lagging behind other states in im- plementing a higher minimum wage, which he said could help stimulate the local economy.
“Workers will stay on the job longer if they are better compensated,” he said. “They’re going to spend more in local stores.”
Opponents said businesses would suffer if every municipality could set its own rate.
“If you raise just the New York City minimum wage, then my district in eastern Queens has to compete with Nassau, where (businesses) can pay a lower wage,” said City Councilman Mark Weprin (D-Queens). “I would certainly open a restaurant in Great Neck before I opened it in Little Neck.”