Last month, Amazon raised its minimum wage to $15 an hour, including all American part-time full-time, temporary and seasonal employees. This is a big (and long overdue) move that has been pushed nationally by many employees and organizations and is definitely a positive for the $15 minimum wage movement.
Despite this win for employees with large firms, small businesses may end up receiving the short end of the stick. Going one step further, Amazon announced that the company will also lobby Congress to push for a similar increase on a national level.
While good in theory, this new increase could see some small businesses close up shop due to an increase in expenses.
“Many of the small business owners I have talked to think Amazon is using its political influence to push for a policy that will undermine small to mid-size business competitors. These entrepreneurs do not like that at all,” Small Business & Entrepreneurship Council (SBE Council) president and CEO Karen Kerrigan wrote to Small Business Trends in an email.
The current national minimum wage is 7.25, and while I do agree that needs to be increased, doubling it in one go is a bit extreme. I do believe that each state is different in terms of cost of living, so $15 in Montana is much different than $15 in say California and the minimum wage should be determined accordingly.
Currently, 20 states will give these workers a mandated boost in 2018. New York, Washington and places in California have taken the lead and gone to a $15 benchmark already. This is fine, but to make it a mandate everywhere may not work and should be looked at alot closer before a decision is made. We will see what happens but as we know, Amazon usually gets what it wants.
