— by James Wolf —
Washington State’s minimum wage increases 15 cents to $9.47 an hour beginning Jan. 1, 2015.
The increase reflects a 1.59 percent growth in the federal Consumer Price Index for Urban Wage Earners and Clerical Workers (CPI-W) over the 12 month period ending Aug. 31.
The state Department of Labor and Industries calculates the state’s minimum wage each year as required under Initiative 688, which was approved by Washington voters in 1998.
Does anyone else think it is time for the San Juan Islands to raise our minimum wage to $15 per hour! Anyone willing/wanting to work on this please contact me…I’m in the book. Happy New Year! Merry
If you’re just going to pick an arbitrary (meaningless) number out of the hat why not $25, or $50? The whole concept of a government set “minimum” wage that private businesses have to pay for jobs of all descriptions flies in the face of everything free market enterprise (what built this country into the worlds largest economy) is about. If you want to pay someone $15-25-50 per hour for a job that is worth (in a free and open market) $9, you won’t be in business long.