Readers React: Minimum wage boost might be bad for business

To the editor: Few people supporting a minimum wage increase to more than $15 an hour by 2019 — far more than the $13.25 by 2017 that L.A. Mayor Eric Garcetti has proposed — talk about where the money to pay for it will come from. (“Six L.A. council members seek to boost minimum wage to $15.25 an hour,” Oct. 7)

For a small-business owner like myself, employing 70 people, this increase represents a $20,000-a-month increase in payroll. The only way to cover this amount would be to increase prices substantially, as I believe everyone in a situation similar to mine would have to do.

At the end of the day, more people would suffer with this increase, as job losses and higher prices would surely be the result.

No one can absorb a minimum wage increase of this amount. It would put me out of business.

Anne Patterson, Sherman Oaks

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