By Alaa Elassar
CNN, March 9, 2021

President Joe Biden, along with other Democrats, have voiced support for an increase in the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 an hour. ... Here's what some hourly workers and small business owners have to say ...

Owner: Ji Hye Kim

Ji Hye Kim, 43, owns Miss Kim, a Korean restaurant, in Ann Arbor, Michigan.

Kim, the owner and chef, said she fully supports raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour. She currently pays staff $12 an hour, but some earn even more with tips. The minimum wage in Michigan is...

By Aarthi Swaminathan
Yahoo Finance, March 9, 2021

Increasing the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025 will boost wages for 32 million workers in America, a new report says. ...

'It makes great business sense'

...  For many workers, an increase to $15 would have a significant impact on their day-to-day finances. "...it's really a struggle and I'm working from paycheck to paycheck," Tracey Thuo, a 59-year-old worker Wilmington, Del., said at a press conference earlier this week organized by a coalition of groups that support a $15 minimum wage, including Business for a...

By Alex Seitz-Wald
NBC News, March 8, 2021

WASHINGTON — ... For the first time in years, Democrats may find a receptive audience from major business interests and some Republicans for raising the minimum wage — although not all the way to $15. Even the U.S. Chamber of Commerce, the titan of Washington business lobbying, says the current $7.25 federal minimum is "outdated."

Holly Sklar, who runs a coalition of hundreds of companies that support a $15 minimum wage called Business for a Fair Minimum Wage, said: "This is 2021. So whatever people thought of $15 in...

By Alina Selyukh
NPR Morning Edition, March 8, 2021

RACHEL MARTIN, HOST: NPR's Alina Selyukh talked with a lot of different business owners about a possible $15 minimum wage. And she got a whole lot of different opinions. ...

ASHRAF HIJAZ: People will spend the money when they have it.

SELYUKH: Ashraf Hijaz has about 150 workers at about two dozen beauty supply and furniture stores around the South. His starting pay is about $9 an hour. But Hijaz advocates for the $15 minimum because it would affect most of his shoppers.

HIJAZ: They will spend...

By Joe Irizarry
Delaware Public Media, March 8, 2021

Legislation raising Delaware’s minimum wage to $15 per hour is expected to be introduced soon. And there is some business support for it. ...

Courtney Sunborn is the owner of Ecolistic Cleaning, a cleaning service in Lewes, and she says raising the minimum wage will help businesses as well as employees.

"Raising the minimum wage will bring people out of the impossible situation of working so hard at a full-time job that they're not able to make ends meet and when you raise the minimum wage...

By Zoë Read
WHYY, NPR, March 8, 2021

A coalition of business groups and politicians spoke Monday during a virtual event in favor of a $15 minimum wage in Delaware.

Legislation introduced by Sen. Jack Walsh would gradually increase the state’s minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2025. ... “Someone who puts in a hard day’s work deserves to earn enough to keep a roof over their head and food on the table. Frankly, they deserve what previous generations of low-wage earners have had — a living wage,” Walsh said during the event....

By Mark Fowser
WGMD, Delmarva, March 8, 2021

Supporters of a movement to increase Delaware’s minimum wage spoke as one Monday in favor of raising it to $15 an hour within a few years, and to dispel messages against it they say are not true.

Senator Jack Walsh (D- Stanton) has submitted a bill that would increase the minimum wage from its current level of $9.25 to ... $15 per hour in 2025.

Represented Monday were the United Food & Commercial Workers Local 27, SEIU 32BJ, Delaware Working Families Party, and Business for a Fair Minimum Wage. ...

Courtney...

By Mike Phillips
WDEL News Radio, Mar 8, 2021

... State Senator Jack Walsh (D-Stanton) said he intends to file legislation this session that would raise the minimum wage in Delaware to $15 an hour by the middle of the decade. ...

Courtney Sunborn, who owns Lewes-based Ecolistic Cleaning, believes maintaining a living wage benefits both workers and the business.

"We've seen that it increases both employee commitment and reliability, but it decreases turnover," she said. ...

Read more

By Eric Morath and Heather Haddon
Wall Street Journal, March 1, 2021

A debate to raise the federal minimum wage has tied Congress in knots, but many large employers and business groups wouldn’t mind an increase. ...

Costco Chief Executive Craig Jelinek told Congress at a hearing last week that the retailer was raising starting pay to $16 an hour and that hourly employees are paid an average of $24 an hour. Costco has about 180,000 full-time and part-time U.S. employees.

“This isn’t altruism,” Mr. Jelinek said. “It helps in the long run by minimizing turnover, maximizing...

Op-Ed By Michael O'Connor, Owner, La Barberia

I’m a small business owner, and I strongly support raising the minimum wage to $15. ... I know that if my employees aren’t happy, my customers won’t be happy. ...

By Oscar Perry Abello
Next City, Feb 26, 2021

While federal policymakers are debating the first federal minimum wage increase in more than a decade, consumer giant Costco with its 180,000 employees announced it will raise its internal minimum wage to $16 an hour. That’s one dollar more than the $15 an hour that workers and labor groups have been demanding for years as a federal minimum wage. ...

One business group, Business for a Fair Minimum Wage, has been growing its members who support a $15 minimum wage. This week the group released a...

By Mia Summerson
Keene Sentinel (NH), Feb 25, 2021

One of the leaders of a Gilsum-based business testified before the U.S. House of Representatives Committee on Small Business on Wednesday, speaking in favor of raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour.

Addressing the committee via video call, W.S. Badger Company’s co-CEO, Rebecca Hamilton, urged Congress to support the Raise the Wage Act of 2021, which aims to increase the minimum wage incrementally until it reaches $15 an hour in ... 2025. ...

New Hampshire is the only state in New England that does not have...

By Ledyard King
USA TODAY, Feb 25, 2021

Backers of a push to raise the federal hourly minimum wage to $15 suffered a key loss Thursday after a Senate official ruled the controversial measure cannot be considered as part of President Joe Biden's $1.9 trillion COVID relief package making its way through Congress. ...

Rebecca Hamilton, co-CEO of New Hampshire-based W.S. Badger Company, which makes skincare products, told the [House Small Business] committee that paying her employees no less than $15 an hour has helped her small firm.

"This approach has enabled us to spend virtually zero dollars on...

By Samantha Manning
Cox Media Group, Washington News Bureau, Feb 24, 2021

Leaders in Washington are debating whether the federal minimum wage should be more than doubled from $7.25 an hour to $15 an hour. A House subcommittee took up the issue Wednesday, and lawmakers were at odds over the long-term economic impact to workers and small businesses.

Lawmakers heard from a small-business owner of a [skin care] company based in New Hampshire which already starts the pay rate for workers at $15 an hour.

“Our fair pay business model has helped us to attract and retain excellent staff, while...

By Damien Fisher
Union Leader (NH), Feb 24, 2021

As Congress considers raising the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour — a measure that might be included in President Joe Biden’s $1.9 trillion COVID-19 relief bill — the head of a Gilsum-based health products company testified in favor of paying workers more.

Rebecca Hamilton, co-CEO of the W.S. Badger Company, spoke in favor of the higher minimum via video conferencing Wednesday before the House Small Business Committee. She said high wages have been the key to success at the 90-employee company her father started. ...

Read more