USA TODAY: A $15 minimum wage like the one adopted in Seattle doesn’t buy many luxuries in most American cities.
Lattes, theater tickets and cable television will still be out of reach for most minimum-wage workers. But about $31,000 a year should be enough to pay the average rent for a shared one-bedroom apartment, plus utilities, health insurance, groceries and an inexpensive cellphone plan.
This week’s vote by the Seattle City Council created the nation’s highest minimum wage. The state minimum wage in Washington was already $9.32 an hour, the highest state wage in the U.S… (more)
EDITOR: The hotel industry is exceptionally competitive and is very labor intensive, so there is tremendous pressure to keep wages down. If there were a higher minimum wage law, there would be no competitive effect since all hotels would have to pay the higher amount. Hotel rates would move up a bit. And workers would receive a fairer pay check.
