New Jersey Lawmakers Not Giving Up on Minimum Wage Increase

Back in May, New Jersey seemed to be on its way to a higher minimum wage when the state’s General Assembly passed a bill (A-2162) to raise the state’s minimum wage from $7.25 to $8.50 per hour and index it to keep pace with inflation. That raise is urgently needed: full-time minimum wage earnings of $14,500 a year leave a mom with two kids thousands of dollars below the federal poverty line in a state with one of the highest costs of living in the country. But after Governor Christie made it clear he would not sign the bill, it stalled without a vote in the state Senate.

This month, however, the minimum wage is back on the legislative agenda in New Jersey. Senate President Steve Sweeney recently introduced a resolution (SCR 1) proposing an amendment to New Jersey’s constitution that would raise the minimum wage to $8.25 per hour and index it for inflation. The Senate Budget and Appropriations Committee approved the resolution last week, and the Senate Labor Committee held a public hearing yesterday. The resolution will next move before the full Senate.

A constitutional amendment shouldn’t be necessary to raise New Jersey’s minimum wage, and setting the starting point at $8.25 per hour – lower than the $8.50/hour level in the Assembly-passed bill, and considerably lower than what the minimum wage would be today if it had risen with the cost of living in recent decades – is certainly not ideal. Indeed, Senator Sweeney has said that he “continue[s] to want to see the Assembly-approved bill sent to the governor.”

But the advantage of a constitutional amendment in New Jersey is that, if approved by the legislature, it can be placed on the ballot in November 2013 and adopted by popular vote, without any action by the governor. A recent poll showed 76 percent of New Jerseyans support raising the minimum wage, and the Economic Policy Institute (EPI) estimates that close to half a million New Jersey workers – 55 percent of them women – would benefit from a minimum wage increase. EPI also projects that the additional dollars flowing into the state’s economy as a result of higher wages would create more than 1,700 jobs.

Not surprisingly, Governor Christie has also expressed opposition to the proposed constitutional amendment. But when a clear majority of the residents of his state believe it’s time to raise the minimum wage – and so many stand to benefit – it would behoove Governor Christie to avoid what he describes as a “truly ridiculous” amendment to the state constitution by agreeing to sign a meaningful minimum wage increase into law.