First state law in the country - Yay MD...
I'd love to know how they came up with these numbers.
"This law lifts tens of thousands of families out of poverty and into the middle class," said Tom Hucker, a first-term Democratic delegate to the Maryland House and before that the executive director of Progressive Maryland, the main group backing the bill."
Malarkey. If this guy believes that $11.30/hr makes you "middle class" living in the Baltimore-DC corridor he's even more out of touch than most of his colleagues.
Our minimum wage is already $1 over the feds. Now we're going to legislate a "living wage". I'd be upset at this but it's a lot more bark than bite. The law excludes a lot more people than it includes. Literally it only impacts employers with state contracts, and there are exclusions even there. They'll be working hard to expand it though have no doubts. I'll be interested to see how many companies just decide not to deal with state contracts any more. More likely they'll all just increase their prices and pass the increase back to the state. Then let's see, who might the state pass it on too...
"Some Republicans and business leaders said the law would increase state spending when Maryland was facing a $1.5 billion budget deficit."
Gee, ‘ya think?