THE COASTAL PACKET: New evidence that Maine's minimum wage hike worked

Thursday, April 5

New evidence that Maine's minimum wage hike worked

Maine Center for Economic Policy - New Occupational and Employment Statistics, or OES, data released  by the US Bureau of Labor Statistics continued to strengthen the case that Maine’s new voter-approved minimum wage law has successfully lifted Mainers’ wages without causing harm to Maine workers or Maine’s economy.

Conclusions drawn from this latest OES report data reinforce those MECEP found in a preliminary analysis in January, based on a the Quarterly Census of Employment and Wages, or QCEW, which reported aggregate wages paid statewide in the first half of 2017, along with average weekly earnings.

The QCEW data showed that the minimum wage law coincided with the largest annual wage gain in a decade and did not cause the job losses predicted by the minimum wage law’s opponents. Now, the OES data shows that the law also hasn’t spurred employers to cut their low-wage workers hours to “make up for” the increased wages.

Taken together, these data sets indicate the minimum wage law is working exactly as proponents had intended. Mainers are seeing more money in their paychecks, without the economy shedding jobs or employers cutting their employees’ hours.

No comments: