A minimum wage increase that prices competition out of the market while exempting companies with a unionized work force, that’s what.
This article by Partrice Lee at the Independent Women’s Forum points out how in many of the cities where unions are vociferously supporting a $15 minimum wage those same unions are simultaneously negotiating exemptions for workers who are subject to a union contract. Of course this creates an incentive for non-unionized companies to accept unionization. If you want to avoid the high minimum wage, go union. According to Lee:
In many major cities where the minimum wage has been hiked, local unions have strategically negotiated behind closed doors through last-minute lobbying efforts to secure carve-outs or waivers for their members from the higher wage laws as a part of a collective-bargaining agreement. Understandably, business groups are ticked off.
San Francisco ($15.00 per hours by 2018), Chicago ($13.00 by 2019), San Jose ($10.30 currently), and Washington, D.C. ($11.50 by 2016) are cities that have raised their minimum wages above the prevailing federal and state minimums, but secured special exemptions for unionized workers.
