Fox News<\/a>\u00a0is reporting the Maine State Legislature has voted to lower the minimum wage, after raising it last November, because the restaurant service staff lobbied for it. Seems the minimum wage for tipped staff is half of the state\u2019s $9.00 minimum wage, known as a \u201ctip credit\u201d rule. This allows the managers to take up a 50% credit from employees\u2019 wages, with the idea the employee will earn the remaining minimum and perhaps more in tips. If tips and credit don\u2019t meet the minimum, the managers must make up the difference. <\/span><\/p>\nIn a referendum, Maine\u2019s House raised the minimum wage by $1 a year through 2024, and removed the tip credit altogether. High fives all around, everyone feels great, here\u2019s your participation award.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cState Senator James Dill, a Democrat who initially voted to raise wages, told the Washington Post that after the Nov. referendum passed, he received \u201chundreds\u201d of calls and emails from servers who were worried about their livelihood.<\/span><\/p>\nAs a result, Dill threw his support behind a Republican measure to return the \u201ctip credit\u201d rule. After passing through the Senate on June 7, the bill was brought before the House on June 13, where it passed with a vote of 110-37.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nThe new law will go into effect 90 days after the Legislature adjourned.<\/span><\/p>\n\u201cAs the Washington Post reports, servers were worried about the ramifications of the new laws for two reasons: first, that it would force employers to raise prices on their menu items, which could affect their current tips; and second, and perhaps more importantly, that employers might be forced to cut servers\u2019 shifts as a result.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\nThe usual suspects are in denial. A Dave Palmer, representing Restaurant Opportunities Centers United, says, \u201cWe do not believe what we see in Maine is representative of the majority of workers. There\u2019s no other industry that gets away with not paying their workers because customers can,\u201d he later added. \u201cThis is bigger than any one state.\u201d <\/span><\/p>\nTell it to Seattle, Dave.<\/span><\/p>\n <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Wait, what? Fox News\u00a0is reporting the Maine State Legislature has voted to lower the minimum wage, … Restaurant workers lobby to lower minimum wage, and win.<\/span>Read more<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":657,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[209],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-73108","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-teh-stoopid"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73108","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/657"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=73108"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/73108\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=73108"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=73108"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.azuse.cloud\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=73108"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
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