All of you people who just lost your jobs can thank Washington D.C. Mayor Muriel Bowser for your newfound freedom from job lock.
Via Free Beacon:
Restaurants in the nation’s capital experienced their worst hiring period in 15 years, fueling speculation that wage hikes are reducing employment opportunities.
Employment in the food service industry fell in Washington, D.C. even as it continued to increase in the region. Restaurants shed 1,400 jobs in the first six months of 2016, a three percent decrease and the largest loss of jobs since the 2001 recession, according to an analysis from American Enterprise Institute scholar Mark Perry.
The steep drop was isolated to D.C. Neighboring suburbs in Virginia and Maryland added nearly 3,000 jobs over the same period, a 1.6 percent increase in hiring.
Perry said the hiring slowdown can be tied to recent minimum wage hikes in the city. Washington, D.C. began the year with a higher-than-average wage for tipped employees in the restaurant industry. Tipped employees in the nation’s capital earn a base wage of $2.77, almost 30 percent above the federal minimum of $2.13 that is used by Virginia. The city also mandated a $10.50 minimum hourly wage for non-tipped employees in January—higher than Virginia’s $7.25 and Maryland’s $8.75 rate.
“The preliminary evidence so far suggests that DC’s minimum wage law is having a negative effect on staffing levels at the city’s restaurants,” Perry said on AEI’s website. “If the DC restaurant industry can’t easily absorb an $11.50 an hour minimum wage without experiencing the greatest job losses over the last six-months than in any comparable period in 15 years, just imagine the troubles adjusting to further labor cost increases of more than 30% (and $3.50 an hour) for minimum wage workers in the coming years to the full $15 an hour.”
The gap between D.C. labor costs and its neighbors is about to increase even further. In June, Washington D.C. joined a handful of major cities to adopt the $15 minimum wage, more than double the federal minimum of $7.25 an hour. That bill will nearly double wages for waiters and other tipped employees, hiking wages from $2.77 to $5 an hour. Similar laws have been adopted in New York and California.