It will be a mojor theme. Witness...
Posted on 01/05/2007 2:05:18 AM PST by leadpenny
ST. CLAIRSVILLE — Ohio’s new minimum wage is just five days old but already, some businesses have begun raising their prices to pay for it.
On Monday, the state’s minimum wage rose $1.70 from the national level of $5.15 an hour to $6.85. Annual cost-of-living increases will follow. Voters approved the change via a constitutional amendment in the November general election.
About 600,000 of Ohio’s 5.5 million workers got raises Jan. 1.
Several Belmont County businesses said they have cut back on their work force or at least workers’ hours.
Jerry Gasber of Gasber’s Fine Day Restaurant, located on U.S. 40 west of St. Clairsville, said he already has cut back one person on each shift. In addition, he’s had to raise prices.
“It’s very inflationary,” he said of the increase.
It comes at a time when Gasber’s business is being affected by a gasoline surtax on food deliveries and a tax on sanitation. He noted sanitation rates have increased four-fold over the past five years.
At Sonny Boy’s on National Road in Bridgeport, there haven’t been any staff cuts. However, the restaurant has raised its prices by about 50 cents per meal, said Tracy Leiffer, spokeswoman for the business.
Mike Palicka, manager of Garfield’s restaurant in the Ohio Valley Mall in St. Clairsville, said that business hasn’t raised prices yet, “but I’m sure it’s going to come.”
The business, he said, will have to cut back on hours for its employees. However, he doesn’t think it will be a problem. The wage increase comes at a time when the holiday rush is over and many employees are returning to school, he said.
At the Subway store in Martins Ferry prices have gone up by 20 cents a sandwich, said manager Loren Beckett. However, there have been no cuts in staffing, she said.
But the increase seems to have had no effect on the Convenient Food Mart in Flushing, according to manager Linda Porter.
The same goes for Zontini’s Pizza in Martins Ferry and Carlini’s Pizza in Shadyside.
When asked if he’d seen any changes, Zontini’s manager John Canter said “not really.”
According to published reports, U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi, D-Calif., has indicated a federal minimum wage increase will be part of her first 100-hour agenda. The measure would call for a raise to $7.15 an hour, but it is not expected to include adjustments for inflation.
Meanwhile, Michigan’s minimum wage will go from $6.95 to $7.15 on July 1 and to $7.40 a year later.
Pennsylvania’s minimum wage rose to $6.25 an hour on Monday and will increase to $7.15 on July 1. The increase was approved by the state’s General Assembly and was signed by Gov. Ed Rendell in July
I hear that Neil Cauito had a rather nasty run in with Barney Frank during an interview regarding putting limit on the salary of CEO's.
I believe that the minimum wage push is not about poor working people, but about the Unions pushing the Dumbs to raise them.
Almost all union contracts are tied to increases in minimum wage. When the minimum wage is raised so are the wages of the union workers. As I see it the minimum wage serves no useful purpose. Amen.
xactly.
Facts! Nancy and the gang don't want no steeenking facts.
I didn't expect them to have to foresight to get this right either.
They fail to understand the simplest of concepts. Thats exactly why Kerry said he had a plan(s) but couldn't say what they were until after the election. To his credit he was smart enough to know how stupid he was, and that he couldn't show that stupidity to the people before they voted.
Don't encourage them. They think that that's exactly how economics works.
L
Minimum Wage Hikes are linked to UNION WAGE CONTRACTs. If the Rate is increased, all Union workers get a raise.
Payola.
It will be a mojor theme. Witness...
CEO pay gets passed on to customers as well. But nobody here is bitching about that.
Because CEO pay isn't controlled by a LAW. You get that, right?
In other words, the Democrats are a bunch of complete turd-brained idiots.
Regards, Ivan
Maybe the answer is to have the ballot initiative that raises the minimum wage should also REQUIRE companies that are affected by the increase also MUST increase their prices, across the board, by the same percentage. If it's a 20% increase then their would have to increase their prices by 20%. The voters should also be willing to force the customers to help fund the increase. Only FAIR!
"The "businesses" do not pay this...
...their customers do."
Don't forget about the increased weekly payroll taxes. Employer matching SS and Medicare will increase weekly to line the treasury. Where does that money come from? It don't come from the money tree!
And this is unexpected? Where to the *raise the minimum wage* people expect the moeny to come from? News for them, too; minimum wage jobs are not meant to be lived on.
Hmmm I must have missed the bill congress passed that gave a mandatory raise to CEOs.
Could you provide a link to such?
What goes up must come down. Will it be the business owners' fault next? The politicians will tax the rich businesses to make up for the inequity, thus starting another spiral of price hikes. Yep, what goes up must come down. The unwashed masses these predators preach to are oblivious that they are being conned and coined all for a vote.
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