Tuesday, March 12, 2024
Chair Friedman, Chair Peisch, and Members of the Committee:
My name is Jonathan Cohn, and I am the policy director at Progressive Massachusetts. We are a statewide, multi-issue, grassroots membership organization focused on fighting for policy that would make our Commonwealth more equitable, just, sustainable, and democratic.
We strongly support the elimination of subminimum wages, and passing ballot initiative NO. 23-12, An Act to require the full minimum wage for tipped workers with tips on top, would accomplish that.
We are appreciative of recent efforts by the Legislature to improve living standards for working people across the Commonwealth, but tipped workers have not been able to benefit fully from recent minimum wage increases. The tipped minimum wage in MA rose to $6.75 per hour last year as a result of the last increase. $6.75 per hour. A living wage in Massachusetts, according to the MIT Living Wage Calculator, is $27.89—just for a single, childless adult. That means a tipped worker would need to collect three times their wage in tips just to achieve a living wage.
Although employers are supposed to guarantee that workers get the full minimum wage with tips, this has never been common practice, and wage theft is rampant in the industry. The tiered wage system allows this to happen.
Moreover, sexual harassment remains widespread in the restaurant industry. As our country continues to grapple with the problem of sexual harassment and sexual assault across industries, we must face up to the fact that unequal wage systems create the breeding ground for such inappropriate and predatory behaviors.
The tiered wage system has its roots in the legacy of slavery and persists because of the way society views certain occupations – particularly those disproportionately held by women, people of color, and immigrants – as less deserving of good pay and benefits than others. Alaska, California, Minnesota, Montana, Nevada, Oregon, and Washington all already pay the full minimum wage. Massachusetts should join them.
Thank you for your work on this committee, and we urge you to do right by workers and advance this.
Sincerely,
Jonathan Cohn
Policy Director
Progressive Massachusetts
