As rallies across the country have demanded an increase in the minimum wage to $15 per hour, one state is reducing its legal lowest rate. Missouri is rolling back its minimum wage from $10 to $7.70.
Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens, in office since January, is allowing a bill passed by the Republican-controlled state legislature to become law on Aug. 28 without his signature, The New York Daily News reports.
“Our state needs more private sector paychecks and bigger private sector paychecks,” Greitens said in a statement. “Politicians in St. Louis passed a bill that fails on both counts: it will kill jobs, and despite what you hear from liberals, it will take money out of people’s pockets.”
The move comes on the heels of a study that found that Seattle’s minimum wage hike actually hurt the people it was supposed to help, costing minimum wage workers an average of $125 per month, or $1,500 per year.
The St. Louis city government had passed a law raising its minimum wage to $11 starting in January 2017, but the new state law would nullify that increase as well, according to Fox 2 Now St. Louis.
CBS News reported on how the increase to $10 harmed small businesses.
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