When San Jose Raised the Minimum Wage to $10 an Hour

Nearly every student I spoke with cited San Jose’s inflated cost of living as a motivating factor for raising the minimum wage. Brooke Wayne, a recent SJSU graduate who joined the Measure D campaign January 2012, is blunt about why it resonated with her. “I felt like California is very expensive. It’s very, very expensive,” she says. “I didn’t see how $8 could possibly make it in California.” She balks at the fact that the minimum wage in Arkansas and Oklahoma, where her mother’s family is from, was only 75 cents less than in California. “There’s a world of difference in the standard of living,” she says.

In Next City, Nona Willis Aronowitz looks at the story behind the minimum wage increase in San Jose, which jumped to $10 per hour from $8 per hour after the city’s residents voted for the increase last November — “the single largest minimum-wage jump in the nation’s history.”

The story is complicated. Aronowitz shows how difficult it was for low-wage workers and students to do the initial organizing to get the bill known as “Measure D” passed (“I’m depressed, I don’t want to get out of bed, I can’t feed myself, I can’t feed my kid, I can’t do anything, and you want me to do what?” remarked one of the organizers). The tech industry, which dominates the area and has fueled some of the rising costs of living, has remained tight-lipped when it comes to these kinds of issues (except for some controversial thoughts from people like Sarah Lacey). Some businesses have supported the wage increase and have reported happy workers. Some businesses have had to cut hours for some workers. It’s difficult to gauge what the impact will be at this early stage.

The story is behind a paywall, but can be purchased for $1.99, which is what I paid this morning to read the story, but you can read an excerpt here.

Photo: John Callas

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