New York panel approves $15 fast-food wage

Many fast-food workers say their industry should pay a minimum wage of $15 an hour so workers can afford the high cost of living in New York City and elsewhere.

On the other side of the country, a state panel in New York recommended the minimum wage for fast-food chain restaurant employees be raised to $15 an hour.

On Wednesday, the New York State Wage Board approved a wage increase that would increase gradually over three years in N.Y.C. and six years for the rest of the state.

The increase will affect workers at chains with 30 stores or more, NPR notes, and will match recent bumps in minimum wage in other large cities such as Los Angeles and Seattle.

A state Wage Board proposed a salary increase of $15 to fast-food workers amidst the disapproval from the owners.

Fast-food workers in Central Florida say they are encouraged by a wage hike that happened 1,200 miles away.

Speaking at today’s meeting, Board member and Gilt founder Kevin Ryan said of the phasing approach, “This reflects that businesses need to digest this increase, and be able to plan for it”.

Low wages in the fast-food industry cost New York taxpayers $700 million a year.

The New York State Restaurant Association told Bloomberg that raising wages one sector at a time is wrong.

Restaurant workers in the state of New York City will be the first to experience a rise in 2018. The state minimum wage is now $8.75.

Some progressives have grumbled that Cuomo hasn’t done enough to advance minimum wage bills, but the Democratic governor said the Wage Board’s proposal “is just the beginning”.

Governor Cuomo: “When New York acts, the rest of the states follow”.

Jorel Ware, 34, works at a McDonalds in the Bronx where he is paid the minimum wage. We didn’t stop in our city, we didn’t stop in our county, and we aren’t stopping now. “They work in poverty, and the industry has set itself up that way so they can interchange people for hours at any given time”, he added. Fast-food employees themselves have emerged as a potent political force in New York and around the nation.

Councilors meant to exclude tipped workers from the wage increase.

Dennis Kessler, a former owner of more than 20 Burger King restaurants in the Greater Rochester area, said that he doesn’t necessarily oppose a wage increase, but doesn’t understand why only fast food establishments were the focus of the wage board.

Unlike, Pennsylvania, however, Cuomo would not have to seek legislative authorization to boost the Empire State’s minimum wage.