By Jordan Larimore
Joplin Globe, Dec 11, 2016
... Give Missourians a Raise — the same group that successfully campaigned for a ballot initiative raising the state's minimum wage from $5.15 to $6.50 per hour in 2006 — is considering multiple minimum wage proposals to try to bring before voters next year, said Lew Prince, the group's treasurer. That effort could include a petition drive. ...
The current minimum wage in Missouri is $7.65 per hour, but the 2006 measure that was passed also tied the wage to the Consumer Price Index, meaning it is evaluated and adjusted accordingly every year. Missouri's minimum wage did not increase in 2016 but will rise by 5 cents on Jan. 1 to $7.70 per hour.
Most of the proposals being advocated by Give Missourians a Raise would immediately raise the state's minimum hourly wage to $9.45 per hour and phase in more increases to between $12 and $15 per hour from 2017 to 2020, Prince said.
The proposed increase is similar to those recently passed by state legislatures in California and New York, and closer to those approved by voters in Arizona, Colorado, Maine and Washington in last month’s elections. Residents in those four states voted to raise the minimum wage to at least $12 per hour by 2020. ...
Prince, with Give Missourians a Raise, said he doesn’t believe minimum-wage workers at large corporations are at risk of losing jobs to technology if wages go up because those companies would already have automated if it were feasible.
“These businesses that want to deal with as few employees as possible are going to go to (automation), that has nothing to do with the minimum wage,” he said. “But what it does do is it forces companies — Wal-Mart has some 40,000 employees (in Missouri) — and it forces them to leave that money in our state, to leave $2 more an hour in our state.” ...
Prince said he co-owned and operated Vintage Vinyl, a record store in the St. Louis suburb University City before selling his share of the business and retiring recently. He said he and a partner started the business with “four crates of records in a $10-a-week stall” at a farmer’s market in 1981, and like Hulfeld, working tirelessly to get the company off the ground before eventually expanding to having about 24 employees today.
“The difference between, you know, $7.50 and $9.50, which is really what we’re talking about — $2 per hour — won’t kill a business that’s already functioning anyway,” Prince said. “But it will keep hundreds of millions of dollars in the state of Missouri and would be really good for the economy, for local businesses.” ...
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