L.A. City Council approves increase in city's minimum wage to $15 by 2020
The Los Angeles City Council tentatively agreed Tuesday to raise the city’s minimum wage to $15 per hour, joining a trend sweeping cities across the country as elected leaders seek to address stagnating pay for workers on the lowest rungs of the socio-economic ladder.
The ordinance would boost the $9 an hour base wage to $15 by 2020 for as many as 800,000 workers, city officials say, and make L.A. the largest U.S. city to adopt a major minimum-wage increase. Chicago, San Francisco and Seattle already have adopted similar laws.
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Tuesday's 14-1 vote was the latest demonstration of organized labor’s clout at City Hall. Through close to a year of often-emotional debate, labor leaders never gave ground on their central demand that the minimum wage rise to at least $15.
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The council’s plan will now be submitted to the city attorney’s office, which will draft an ordinance that will return to council members later this year for approval.
After that, the wage increase would be signed into law by the mayor, with the first wage boost – to $10.50 per hour – taking effect in July 2016.
More:
http://www.latimes.com/local/lanow/la-me-ln-minimum-wage-hike-20150518-story.html