{"id":29496,"date":"2021-03-01T14:11:03","date_gmt":"2021-03-01T20:11:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=29496"},"modified":"2021-03-01T14:24:55","modified_gmt":"2021-03-01T20:24:55","slug":"increased-minimum-wage-considered","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/?p=29496","title":{"rendered":"Increased minimum wage considered"},"content":{"rendered":"

Members of the Business and Labor Committee discussed a proposal March 1 to increase the minimum wage incrementally over 10 years.<\/p>\n

\"Sen.
Sen. Terrell McKinney<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Currently, the state minimum wage is $9 per hour. LB480, sponsored by Omaha Sen. Terrell McKinney, would raise the wage to $10 per hour in 2022, with additional $1 per hour increases annually until it reaches $20 per hour in 2032.<\/p>\n

McKinney said the incremental approach would allow businesses plenty of time to adjust to the increases while still providing more pay for individuals.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s become astonishingly clear, especially in a global pandemic, that Nebraskans are not paid adequately,\u201d he said. \u201cWe rave about a low unemployment rate, but we forget that many Nebraskans are working multiple jobs and are still struggling to support themselves and their families.\u201d<\/p>\n

Karen Bell-Dancy, executive director of the YWCA of Lincoln, spoke in support of the proposal. She said that nearly half of all Black and Latino workers nationwide make less than $15 per hour.<\/p>\n

\u201cBy raising the minimum wage in yearly increments starting in 2022 … LB480 could dramatically decrease poverty and close the racial income gap and disparities which have continually remained,\u201d Bell-Dancy said.<\/p>\n

Also supporting LB480 was Scout Richters, speaking on behalf of the ACLU of Nebraska. She said economic justice is critical to advancing racial justice.<\/p>\n

\u201cHigher wages for low-skilled workers reduce both poverty and violent crimes, as well as crime among adolescents,\u201d Richters said. \u201cA 10 percent increase in wages for non-college educated men results in approximately a 10 to 20 percent reduction in crime rates.\u201d<\/p>\n

Opposing the bill was Dallas Jones, representing the Lincoln Independent Business Association. Passing the measure, he said, would cause a dangerous drag on the Nebraska economy.<\/p>\n

\u201cA 2018 report from the Harvard Business School estimates that every $1 increase in the minimum wage leads to a 14 percent increase in the likelihood for many restaurants to close,\u201d Jones said. \u201cAn $11 ultimate increase in the minimum wage under this bill would be devastating for not only restaurants, but for all small businesses and their employees.\u201d<\/p>\n

Loreen Reynante of Papillion also opposed LB480. She said the bill would not have the desired effect of pulling workers out of poverty.<\/p>\n

\u201cWe all want higher wages but that will only come from higher productivity, better training, education and friendly tax policies that increase quantity and quality of capital,\u201d Reynante said.<\/p>\n

The committee took no immediate action on the bill.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Members of the Business and Labor Committee discussed a proposal March 1 to increase the minimum wage incrementally over 10 years.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"colormag_page_container_layout":"default_layout","colormag_page_sidebar_layout":"default_layout","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":true,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[7],"tags":[262],"class_list":["post-29496","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-business-and-labor","tag-sen-terrell-mckinney"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29496","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=29496"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29496\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":29499,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29496\/revisions\/29499"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=29496"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=29496"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/update.legislature.ne.gov\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=29496"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}