Bill to boost Nevada’s minimum wage to $15 draws clash at Legislature

CARSON CITY — Backers of a measure to hike Nevada’s minimum wage to $15 an hour said Wednesday that the move would elevate workers out of poverty and reduce demands for public assistance, while critics countered it would shrink the availability of entry-level jobs and harm the economy.

State Sen. Tick Segerblom, D-Las Vegas, who sponsored Senate Joint Resolution 8, told the Senate Committee on Operations and Elections that a $15 minimum is the threshold where people who work 40 hours a week could “earn a stable living wage … and the government would not have to subsidize them.”

It’s a question for society and should be presented to voters, he said.

Food servers, home health care workers and others testified that an increase in wages would allow them to pay rent and buy food instead of relying on government assistance.

“When you pay people more money, not only are they able to pay the rent, they are able to provide for their families, put gas into their car,” said state Sen. Ruben Kihuen, D-Las Vegas. “They are able to stimulate the economy.”

The minimum wage in Nevada is now $8.25 an hour unless employers provide health insurance, then it’s $7.25. Nevada’s wage is automatically set to be $1 higher than the federal minimum wage.

The bill’s opponents said minimum wage jobs are not intended to be career paths, but to provide teenagers and others with work experience.

They also said raising the wage would reduce the number of entry-level jobs and raise consumer prices.

“We do know that a lot of these jobs are part-time and a vast majority of them are short-term,” said Tray Abney, government relations director for the Reno-Sparks Chamber of Commerce. “When wages increase … prices increase.”

Nevada’s minimum wage compares with California at $9, Oregon, $9.10, and Washington, $9.32. Cities such as Seattle and San Francisco have increased their own rates to $15.

The resolution is in contrast to another measure introduced by state Sen. Joe Hardy, R-Boulder City to take the state’s minimum wage out of the Nevada Constitution completely. Hardy said his measure would allow legislators to set rates based on the Consumer Price Index.

Both measures face uphill climbs. Because they seek to amend a constitutional provision approved by voters in 2006, they would have to be approved twice by the Legislature before going to voters in 2018.

But Senate Joint Resolution 8 has an even bigger hurdle, a massive fiscal impact that local and state governments say would cost hundreds of millions of dollars and upset personnel classifications. For state government alone, the projected cost of a $15 minimum wage was pegged at $700 million over a two-year budget cycle.

“If this bill were to pass, the entire state compensation pay scales would need to increase for all classes across the board,” the administration said in a fiscal note attached to the bill. “If not, this would cause inequities/compaction issues in our current classification/compensation system and the state could have further consequences of equal pay for equal work (lawsuits), etc.

“Also, the unclassified and nonclassified pay scales would need to be adjusted to maintain equality which could significantly increase the cost,” it said.

Local governments forecast similar big jumps on personnel costs. Clark County, for example, estimated $12.7 million in additional annual wage costs, while Las Vegas estimated the price at $5 million.