A proposal unveiled by House Speaker Robert A. DeLeo yesterday to raise the minimum wage to $10.50 per hour by 2016 reignited a debate among business owners and leaders, with some saying government shouldn't be setting the standard for employee pay.
"We don't think it's the role of government to push up the minimum wage," said Chris Geehern, a spokesman for Associated Industries of Massachusetts, one of the state's largest business groups. "We don't think it's the most efficient way of raising people's standards of living."
But Paul Guzzi, Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce president, said DeLeo has his group's backing.
"We will support a raise in the minimum wage because for a number of reasons it is the right thing to do," said Guzzi.
DeLeo's proposal, unveiled in a speech to the Greater Boston Chamber of Commerce and first reported on bostonherald.com, would raise the state's $8 per hour minimum wage to $10.50 over three years. It is less generous than a bill the state Senate approved last November that would increase the wage to $11 per hour and index future changes to inflation.
"In terms of not tying it to economic factors and inflation, again when I talked to business groups ... one of the major factors that I see ... or hear, is the fact of predictability relative to expenses and taxes," DeLeo said.
The speaker is also calling for unemployment insurance reform, including moving from a one-year to a three-year payroll average that DeLeo said would ease the burden on "most" employers. Guzzi said the Chamber supports reforming unemployment insurance alongside an increase in the minimum wage.
President Obama has proposed increasing the federal minimum wage to $10.10 per hour, and U.S. Secretary of Labor Thomas Perez was in Cambridge yesterday, advocating for the change. "It's the smart thing to do," Perez said.
He met with local small business owners like Glynn Lloyd, owner of City Fresh Foods in Roxbury, who said he pays his workers an average of $13 per hour.
"Probably one of our most important assets is our employees," Lloyd said. "At the end of the day it's the right thing to do."
Rachel Kaprielian, state secretary of labor and workforce development, said it's up to the Legislature to figure out the specifics on a wage hike.
"We have proposals now that are being talked about and discussed, so it looks to me like that's something that has real legs in this state," she said.
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