By Shane Richard Bell
North Idaho Business Journal, Jan 29, 2013
... 10 states and two cities officially raised their minimum wages on Jan. 1. Idaho wasn’t one of those states. In fact, Idaho’s state minimum wage matches that of the federal minimum wage at $7.25 an hour. A tipped employee in Idaho makes $3.35 per hour.
Washington and Montana, Idaho’s neighbors, pay their tipped workers more than twice as much per hour than Idaho.
In Montana, for a tipped employee, the minimum wage is $7.80. In Washington, a tipped employee earns $9.04 per hour, and a non-tipped employee, $9.19 per hour — the highest minimum wage in the nation. ...
Idaho has mirrored federal minimum wages since 1991. “Since then, the minimum wage increased in three 70-cent increments — to $5.85 in July 2007, $6.55 in July 2008 and $7.25 in July 2009,” wrote Alivia Metts, a regional economist for the Idaho Department of Labor, in her January 2011 Idaho Employment Report. Today a minimum wage job of 40 hours a week in Idaho generates an annual income of $15,080.
The question remains: Is the Idaho Legislature’s reluctance to enact a higher minimum wage preventing a more prosperous future for Idahoans or curtailing a strain on an already trembling sector of business owners?
Christopher Paul of Coeur d’Alene knew exactly how he felt in response to this question.
“You have all of Idaho servers making an hourly wage of $3.35 per hour,” said Paul, 21. “If Idaho raised the minimum wage, waiters would stop commuting to Washington for work. We’re losing workers and money. If you don’t have thriving workers, you don’t have a thriving economy.”
Paul got his first job in Coeur d’Alene when he was 18. He’s worked his way up every rung of the North Idaho service industry ladder — bagging groceries, collecting carts, bussing tables, and serving meals.
Now Paul is managing Golden City Loan and Pawn of Coeur d’Alene and devising a plan to open his own business.
“If you were to raise the bar on our minimum wage, you’d see productivity and quality in the work force increase,” he said. “Any lawmaker has to consider the fact that the Idaho worker is not motivated because we have such a low minimum wage.”
Darius Ross, contributor to the American Forum and managing partner of D Alexander Ross Real Estate Capital Partners, cites an intriguing fact on the history of minimum wages in the U.S.
“The year 1956 is so long ago that most Americans, including me, weren’t even born yet,” writes Ross. “Yet, our federal minimum wage is just $7.25 while the value of the 1956 minimum wage is $8.46 in today’s dollars. That’s no formula for economic success.” ...
Metts, the regional economist for the Idaho Department of Labor, said higher wages provide benefits across the board.
“If Idaho could become more competitive with its wages overall, not necessarily just minimum wages, it would help attract an even more skilled work force, gain competition with neighboring states, reduce labor turnover, and increase productivity, which will overall increase economic activity,” said Metts.