Starting tomorrow, most business owners around the state will have six months to prepare for a coming jump in the state’s minimum wage.
The Fair Wage Act of 2023, passed earlier this year, was a priority for Governor Moore in his first year in office. The change accelerates the move to $15 per hour as phased in under a 2019 law.
Aaron Seyedian, owner of Well-Paid Maids, said business owners should embrace the coming change because of its overall benefits.
“The cost of living is high here and so this kind of Wal-Mart model where the state, according to some people, can kind of withstand a kind of race-to-the-bottom economics, that’s just not the kind of economy Maryland has. It’s in line with our history and our reality … to say you know, things tend to cost a bit more so people need to be paid a bit more. I think it’s pretty rational when you think about it that way.”
In Maryland, a single adult must earn $19.61 per hour to cover basic living expenses, according to the Massachusetts Institute of Technology’s living wage calculator. Regionally, in western Maryland and the Eastern Shore, that living wage is about $4 less.
The coming increases “amount to pennies on the dollar” to business owners, Seyedian said. “I just don’t think that it’s the thing that business success hinges on.”
