Read Kuehl\u2019s motion here<\/a>.]<\/em><\/p>\nKuehl said she’d \u201cnever been prouder than I am today\u201d about giving \u201ctens of thousands of low-wage workers whose labor has been undervalued and, too often, stolen\u201d the opportunity to enter the working class rather than living in \u201cthe poverty class.\u201d<\/p>\n
Antonovich countered that \u201ca $15 minimum wage is really $21.17,\u201d once taxes and health insurance are considered. He also warned that theme parks like Magic Mountain and retailers like Ross and Walmart might be annexed to other cities to avoid paying the higher wage, hurting the county tax roll.<\/p>\n
\u201cAre you going to have businesses stay here, thrive and create jobs or are you going to have another exodus?\u201d Antonovich said.<\/p>\n
The board discussed the proposal last month, but postponed a vote due to concerns over a Los Angeles County Economic Development Corporation report on the issue.<\/p>\n
Dozens of workers packed the county board room Tuesday in support of the wage hike, telling the board that despite working full-time, they’re unable to pay for basic necessities. They faced off against business owners, large and small, who mostly opposed the increase, warning the board that they would be forced to lay off workers, cut hours and raise prices.<\/p>\n
The board’s action \u2013 which will also apply to county employees \u2013 leaves dozens of municipalities to decide whether they will respond in kind.<\/p>\n
Business representatives warned that setting a higher wage in unincorporated areas would create a bureaucratic nightmare for businesses that operate within and outside of those \u201cislands.\u201d<\/p>\n
Following its approval of a minimum wage increase in unincorporated areas to $15 by 2020, the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted Tuesday to increase the \u201cliving wage\u201d for contract workers on county jobs to $13.25 by 2016.<\/p>\n
Additional raises approved as part of the board’s action put the living wage on pace to exceed the minimum wage. Supervisor Mark Ridley-Thomas recommended the increase, the first since 2007.<\/p>\n
The living wage is the minimum that county contractors — who perform cafeteria, janitorial, landscaping and other typically low-wage functions — must pay their employees. Roughly 4,200 workers under more than 220 contracts will be affected.<\/p>\n
They currently receive an hourly wage of either $9.64 with health insurance or $11.84 without health benefits, for an annual take-home pay of $20,051 or $24,627, respectively, for a 40-hour work week.<\/p>\n
The board’s vote does away with the two-tiered system and sets the living wage to increase to $13.25 by 2016, $14.25 by 2017, $15 by 2018 and $15.79 by 2019, with changes thereafter based on changes in the cost of living index.<\/p>\n
The board’s vote was 3-2, with Supervisors Michael Antonovich and Don Knabe dissenting. Knabe in particular objected to tying wage increases to the Consumer Price Index, saying it would limit the ability to manage through economic downturns.<\/p>\n
–<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
LOS ANGELES \u2013 The Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors voted 3-2 Tuesday to incrementally raise the minimum wage in unincorporated areas over the next five years, reaching $15 an hour by 2020. Supervisors Sheila Kuehl, Hilda Solis and Mark Ridley-Thomas backed the ordinance. Supervisors Michael Antonovich and Don Knabe dissented, raising concerns about the […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":70,"featured_media":65047,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[10,11,23],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65046"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/70"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=65046"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/65046\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/65047"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=65046"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=65046"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/theavtimes.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=65046"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}