Missouri Lowers St. Louis Minimum Wage from $10 to $7.70

Missouri: Republican Governor Eric Greitens enforced a new law that prohibits local governments from raise the minimum-wage higher than the state’s minimum wage.  A lawsuit was filed by business owners in St. Louis after a local ordinance set the minimum wage at $10, but the preemptive state law now will reduce it back down to $7.70.  –GEG

If you thought the minimum wage only moved in one direction, then Missouri Republicans have a surprise for you.

After St. Louis leaders raised the wage floor for workers within city limits, the state GOP recently passed what’s known as a statewide “preemption” law, forbidding localities from taking such matters into their own hands. On Friday, Missouri Gov. Eric Greitens (R) said he would let the law go into effect, thereby barring cities and counties from setting a minimum wage higher than the state level.

For low-wage earners in St. Louis itself, the new law will have a startling consequence: It will actually push the minimum wage back down, from the city-approved $10 per hour to the state-approved $7.70. The downgrade is slated to take effect on Aug. 28.

For someone earning the bare minimum, that’s a potential cut of 23 percent.

It’s impossible to say how many St. Louis employers will take the GOP up on the offer to slash pay, given the effect such a move could have on competitiveness and morale. But if businesses agree with Republicans that the city wage hike is too aggressive, then at least some of them are likely to revert to the lower pay rates, particularly in low-wage industries like fast food.

Greitens wasn’t eager to own the state-sponsored pay cut, opting not to sign the bill. But he doesn’t have to sign it for it to become law. Under the Missouri Constitution, a bill passed by state legislators eventually goes into effect so long as the governor doesn’t veto it.

The governor said the St. Louis minimum wage would “kill jobs.” “And despite what you hear from liberals, it will take money out of people’s pockets,” he added, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch.

The Fight for $15 ― the union-backed campaign behind the St. Louis initiative and other wage-boosting efforts around the country ― called Greitens’ passive approval of the law “disgusting.”

If St. Louis’ existing measure were to stay in effect, the city’s minimum wage would be $10 this year and would then climb to $11 in 2018. The statewide rate of $7.70 typically goes up just a few cents a year, since it’s tied to an inflation index.

St. Louis originally passed a minimum wage hike two years ago, prompting business groups to sue to stop it in court. The Missouri Supreme Court recently ruled that the St. Louis measure was lawful, but the new state preemption law renders it irrelevant.

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