Unofficial results show the minimum wage initiative passing but the minimum wage increase will not begin January 1, 2015.
Former Labor Commissioner Ed Flanagan with the Alaskans for Fair Minimum Wage campaign said that date was set because the ballot measure was originally supposed to be on the August Primary election ballot.
Now the raise will be implemented 90 days after the November 4 general election ballot initiatives are certified.
Flanagan said they were pretty confident when the initiative made the ballot.
Flanagan: “We really wanted to get a 2:1 vote, we’ve gotten a little over that we’re running consistently at 69% and it was important to get a strong vote because in two years under the law the legislator can go in and mess with it, repeal it or gut it as they actually did in 2003 after they passed a similar bill but we think the legislator will think twice about going against the expressed will of 69% of the electorate.”
We asked what he though of the argument that raising minimum wage raises consumer prices.
Flanagan: “It really has never come to pass, 2003 was the best case and point in Alaska when the minimum wage went 27% literally over night. The initial bill, governor Knowles bill had been to raise it in two steps just as we’ve done, because you do want to give businesses time to adjust but they legislator had sat on it for a year. When that happened employment overall continued up at the same level it had in prior years and subsequent years and the industries that employee most of the low wages workers such as seafood processing, bars and restaurants, employment went up at a greater rate.”
