SARASOTA – Florida voters have said yes to increasing the states minimum wage to $15 an hour making it the first state in the south to do so.
“Right at this time or next September when we are beginning to recover from COVID is gonna be really tough for a lot of small businesses,” said Michael Klauber.
Florida joins eight other states in increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour from the federal minimum wage, which is $7.25. The amendment would propel worker’s wages to increase to $10 an hour starting September 30th, 2021 and would increase by one dollar every year until reaching $15 by 2026.
But an economic impact study shows several thousand employees could lose their jobs after an already difficult year caused the pandemic.
“It’s close to a 75% increase per labor cost and for a lot of small businesses including ours, that is really tough,” said Klauber.
Klauber, Co-proprietary owner of Michael’s on East, says several local restaurants across the state will have to either increase prices at their establishments, cut workers hours, or even fire a portion of their employees to overcompensate the pay increase.
“Being forced really to reduce the number of employees, reducing the hours that employees work,” said Klauber. “It’s gonna change the personality of that retail or restaurant hospitality experience.”
Restaurant industry leaders aren’t opposed to raising their employees’ wages for the work they do. But more research needs to be done to see if it can be done in post COVID world.
A study found that up to 3.7 million jobs would be lost should the federal minimum wage rise from $7.25 to $15—with 1.3 million workers pulled out of poverty, but as many as three people would lose their jobs for each person no longer in poverty.
The amendment barely passed with the needed 60% of votes. The last time Floridians voted on a minimum wage increase was in 2004, when they voted in favor of increasing it to $6.15.
