COLUMBUS – Ohio’s minimum-wage workers just got a raise but some lawmakers in the Statehouse say they need another one, a big one.
The state’s lowest-paid workers are earning 25 cents more per hour this year than last, but some lawmakers and policy analysts contend $8.55 an hour still doesn’t cut it.
“In Ohio, the most common jobs, the ten jobs that employ the largest number of workers, six of those are paying a wage that’s so low that people are dependent on food aid if they’re supporting a family of three,” said Michael Shields, a researcher for the progressive-leaning group Policy Matters Ohio.
A 2006 ballot measure set Ohio’s minimum hourly wage at $6.85 and indexed it to inflation, but a report written by Shields shows wage growth and economic growth are out of sync, the result being that Ohio minimum-wage workers earn 28 percent less than their counterparts in 1968, when wages were at their peak value.
A bill introduced in the Ohio House last week would raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour over the next 5 years, which Shields says would benefit about two million workers in the state, though critics say the gains would be negated by the resulting inflation.
House Bill 34, introduced earlier this month, calls for a $12 -per-hour wage floor in 2020, with $1 bumps each year until 2023.
A similar bill introduced last year didn’t succeed. Opponents argued that it would be costly for business and result in job losses but Shields argues that research has shown that increases in the minimum wage have not resulted in substantial job losses or consumer price increases.
The Cleveland Clinic, Nationwide and Amazon are among Ohio companies raising hourly pay to $15 dollars, he said.