Oped Archive

  • Neumark: Raising tipped minimum wages won’t close minority and gender pay gaps

    September 2024 ·  David Neumark ·  The Detroit News

    Last week, hundreds of Michigan tipped workers went to the state Capitol to advocate for the preservation of the tipped minimum wage, claiming that the “Adopt and Amend” Supreme Court ruling — which paves the way for the elimination of the tipped minimum wage — would “devastate” the industry. However, the ruling was celebrated by One Fair Wage, which claims that eliminating the tipped minimum wage will…
  • Save Michigan restaurants from failed tip credit elimination experiment

    August 2024 ·  Michael Saltsman and Rebekah Paxton ·  The Detroit News

    Michigan tipped workers may kiss their tips or their jobs goodbye, thanks to the state Supreme Court and anti-tip credit group One Fair Wage (OFW). The legislature urgently needs to intervene. In 2018, OFW put forth a ballot measure to raise the state’s minimum wage to $12 by 2022 with annual inflation adjustments. It would have also eliminated the separate wage for tipped workers. Instead of putting…
  • California’s not so golden for fast food businesses

    July 2024 ·  Rebekah Paxton ·  Orange County Register

    California’s businesses are hemorrhaging, and the governor is more interested in making himself look good than stopping the bleeding. A first of its kind survey shows most California fast food businesses have been forced to slash employee hours, shut down, or even consider moving out of state. Since Governor Gavin Newsom signed a $20 fast food minimum wage law last fall, businesses and their employees have been…
  • Listen to Ohio’s servers – they’re the ones whose jobs are on the line

    June 2024 ·  Rebekah Paxton ·  Center Square Ohio

    Come July 3, thousands of Ohio’s tipped workers could be staring down the barrel of job losses and severe cuts to their take home pay if a measure that would phase out the tip credit and raise the state’s minimum wage makes its way onto Novembers’ ballot. Ohio’s tipped workers aren’t naive. They’ve seen the data and know similar policies have cost jobs and earnings across the…
  • Eliminating New York’s tip credit is a terrible idea

    March 2024 ·  Rebekah Paxton ·  The Buffalo News

    Legislation to eliminate the tip credit in New York won’t empower restaurant workers. Special interest groups like One Fair Wage don’t speak for workers, who would suffer the real life consequences of fewer jobs, lower tips, and shuttered workplaces. Tipped restaurant employees earn differently, and far more, than other minimum wage employees. Currently, New York law requires restaurants to pay a $10 base hourly wage upstate ($10.65…
  • Misplaced outrage over Panera Bread’s carveout from fast-food law

    March 2024 ·  Michael Saltsman ·  Orange County Register

    In a rare showing of Sacramento bipartisanship, Republicans and Democrats this week were at odds with Governor Gavin Newsom. A report in Bloomberg alleged that a bakery exemption in the state’s forthcoming $20 fast-food wage was inserted to help one of the governor’s campaign donors, a franchisee of Panera Bread. (In separate statements, the Governor and the franchisee denied the allegation.) Republicans responded by calling for investigations;…