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 The bill by San Francisco Democrat Mark Leno would supersede a
measure passed less than two years ago raising the minimum wage to
$10 over the same period.
“Despite our recovering economy, millions of Californians, many of
them children, continue to live in poverty,” Leno said in a
statement. “Full-time workers in this state should not be forced
onto public assistance simply because they earn the minimum wage."
The state's current minimum wage of $9 an hour leaves workers below
the federal poverty line for a family of four, Leno said. After
raising the minimum wage to $11 in 2016, his bill would hike it
again to a minimum of $13 per hour in 2017, and tie it thereafter to
the rate of inflation.
It comes amid nationwide concern that pay increases for middle-class
and blue-collar workers have been far outstripped by inflation.
Seattle recently began implementing a plan to raise the minimum wage
there to $15 per hour, and the Los Angeles City Council recently
voted to hike that city's minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2020.
Leno's bill, one of a flurry of anti-poverty measures under
consideration in the Democratic-controlled legislature this year,
would still have to pass the state Assembly and be approved by
Democratic Governor Jerry Brown.
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It is opposed by numerous business organizations including the
California Chamber of Commerce.
In 2013, Brown was only willing to sign a law increasing the minimum
to $10 if the implementation was put off until 2016.
Some 29 states and Washington, D.C. have minimum wages above the
federal minimum of $7.25, and 10 states enacted increases in 2014.
(Reporting by Sharon Bernstein; Editing by Lisa Shumaker)
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