Governor Cuomo Cuts Deal for $9 Minimum Wage

Joseph Byrne Monday, March 18, 2013

The minimum wage on Long Island, and the rest of New York, is about to take a big jump. Governor Andrew Cuomo and New York legislative leaders agreed to raise the state minimum wage to $9 an hour from $7.25 as part of a $136.5 billion budget deal.

This new increase in miimum wage is not going to come all at once though. The increase would be phased in over three years starting Jan. 1, when it would rise to $8, then to $8.75 a year later before reaching $9 in 2016. With this increase agreed to, now the task is how to distribute $700 million in tax cuts agreed to for small businesses and families as they move toward an overall deal on the fiscal 2014 spending plan. An accord may be reached by tomorrow, said Dean Skelos, a Long Island Republican who co- leads the Senate. New York’s fiscal year begins April 1.

Negotiators are also discussing extending a higher tax rate on joint filers earning $2 million or more a year, which raises $1.9 billion annually and is set to expire in 2014, Skelos said. Cuomo, who comes up for re-election in 2014, pushed the tax through in December 2011, coupling it with reductions for married couples earning less than $300,000 a year.

What does all this mean for those who are working at minimum wage jobs? After three years if you still do not have a corporate job somewhere you might be able to make more at that minimum wage job than unemployment. Maybe.

joeb@longislandyellowpages.com

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