State Hikes Minimum Pay Rate : Hourly Wage of $4.25 Is First Raise Since 1981

A state commission voted Friday to raise California’s minimum wage to $4.25 an hour, a 90-cent hourly increase that drew loud cheers and shouts of “Bravo!” from laborers who packed a hearing room.

The California Industrial Welfare Commission voted 3 to 2 to hike the minimum wage by 25 cents an hour over the $4 level it had preliminarily approved three months ago.

“Thank God, aye!” exclaimed Commissioner David C. Padilla, responding to a roll call with the vote that clinched passage of the measure. More than 200 people rose and applauded enthusiastically.

The panel said the increase, the first since 1982, will go into effect as soon as possible and no later than next July.

‘Subminimum Wage’

The IWC also voted 3 to 2 to establish a “subminimum” wage of $3.50 an hour for workers who earn more than $60 a month in tips, over the objections of a commissioner who said the measure will discriminate against waiters and waitresses.

Rejected on another 3-2 vote was a measure that would have established an alternative minimum wage for students of $3.40.

Labor officials had vowed to legally challenge any subminimum wage established by the commission.

Raising the minimum wage to $4.25 an hour was proposed by the swing vote on the five-member panel, Muriel Morse, 73, of Altadena. It was adopted on a 3-2 vote.

Governor’s Appointees

The two employer representatives, James Rude and Lynnel Pollack, voted against the increase. The two labor representatives, Padilla and Michael Callaghan, voted for it. All five members were appointed by Gov. George Deukmejian.

Workers, hundreds of whom gathered for a rally before the meeting, had sought an increase to $5.01 an hour. But the panel turned down a proposal to adopt that level, with majority commissioners saying the higher pay would lead to unemployment, increased consumer prices and decreased productivity.

Shocked by the recent $4 proposal, a number of large religious and labor organizations had quickly formed a Coalition for a Fair Minimum Wage that bused large crowds to rallies shouting “Five-oh-one!”

Los Angeles Archbishop Roger M. Mahony, Los Angeles Mayor Tom Bradley, Lt. Gov. Leo T. McCarthy and U.S. Sen. Edward M. Kennedy (D-Mass.) all endorsed the coalition’s efforts, urging “a moral minimum wage.”

Moral Obligation

It was argued that the commission has a legal, as well as a moral, obligation to meet the increase in the cost of living.

About 600,000 Californians are paid minimum wage. A full-time worker at the minimum earns less than $7,000 annually, which is only 77% of the poverty level for a family of three and only 60% for a family of four.

Opponents of a boost in the minimum, such as the California Restaurant Assn., argued at the hearings that an increase would injure small business. They said a higher minimum would discourage employers from hiring low-skilled workers and would force employers to lay off employees.

Much of the energy in the higher minimum wage effort came from three large community groups affiliated in Los Angeles. They are the United Neighborhoods Assn., the South-Central Organizing Committee and the East Valleys Organization.

Bill Was Vetoed

A bill to raise the minimum wage to $4.25 was passed by the Legislature earlier this year but was vetoed by Deukmejian, who said the commission should determine the amount.

The Legislature could supersede the commission’s vote only by overriding a Deukmejian veto, and supporters of a higher wage level have said they do not have the necessary two-thirds votes.