Gov. Cuomo Calls for Support for Raising Minimum Wages

New York’s Fast Food Wage Board held its first meeting May 20, and Gov. Andrew Cuomo is calling on citizens to offer testimony to ensure the group knows the importance of the issue.

Cuomo sent an email to residents with a link to make it easy for people to offer their thoughts on the minimum wage. The move follows a recent Op-Ed piece the governor penned in The New York Times outlining the “urgent” need for reform.

“The promise of the minimum wage is not unlike that of the American Dream – if you work hard, you should be able to provide for your family and build a brighter future,” Cuomo wrote in today’s email.

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He added, “Yet for tens of thousands of hardworking men and women in the fast food industry, that promise has been forsaken. When 60 percent of food workers in the Empire State have at least one family member on public assistance – the highest rate of any industry in our economy – it is clear that the minimum wage is not working.”

He asks that people who write to the board tell them who you are, where you’re from, and offer insights into why fast food workers should be given a raise.

New York’s minimum wage is now $8.75 per hour, up from $7.25 before 2013, and it will increase again to $9 by the end of the year. Cuomo proposed to increase it to $11.50 per hour in New York City and $10.50 throughout the rest of the state, but the plan was turned down by the legislature.

He hopes to take another crack at it.

“This board is a real, concrete step forward in the fight for fair pay. Raising the minimum wage will lift thousands of hardworking families out of poverty while decreasing the cost to taxpayers,” Cuomo said. “It’s the right thing to do, and it’s the smart thing to do.”

Patch file photo.

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