By Ed Sealover
Denver Business Journal, Feb 18, 2016

Business leaders shot down several attempts at the Legislature last year to raise Colorado’s minimum wage. ... Colorado Families for a Fair Wage — a newly formed group that organizers say is composed of low-wage workers and small-business owners — filed two proposed constitutional amendments with the Secretary of State’s office on Thursday that would raise workers’ minimum hourly pay to $12 over the next four years.

Both would bump the state minimum wage, now $8.31 an hour, to $9.30 at the start of 2017 and then increase...

By Matt Kroschel
CBS4 News (Denver), Feb 18, 2016

SEE VIDEO

DENVER (CBS4) – Supporters of a push to increase the minimum wage statewide say $12 by 2020 is not unreasonable. ...

[S]upporters like Richard Correa, who owns an insurance agency in Colorado, says he supports the effort because he thinks it's just the right thing to do.

“This is a no-brainer, we should be helping our workers to be able to take care of their families and with the cost of living increases, this needs to happen,” Correa said.

A group called Colorado Families for a Fair Wage...

By Charles Ashby
The Daily Sentinel (Grand Junction, CO), Feb 18, 2016

A group that wants to raise the state’s minimum wage filed a proposed ballot measure with the state Thursday to do just that. The group, which called itself Colorado Families for a Fair Wage, filed two proposed citizen’s initiatives that call for raising the state’s minimum wage to $12 an hour by 2020. The current minimum wage is $8.31.

“Raising the minimum wage makes good business sense,” Richard Correa, owner of Correa Insurance Agency on the Front Range, said in a news release. “Workers will...

By Peter Marcus
Durango Herald, Feb 18, 2016

DENVER – A ballot proposal to raise the minimum wage in Colorado was filed on Thursday. The effort comes just a day after Republicans in the state Legislature blocked an effort to allow local governments to raise wages in their counties. ...

Colorado Families for a Fair Wage has proposed gradually increasing the state minimum wage to $12 an hour by 2020. ... Full-time workers make $8.31 an hour under the state’s minimum wage, about $17,000 per year. Proponents say the wage has not kept up with cost-of-living increases. ...

“Raising...

By Heesun Wee
CNBC, Jan 12, 2016

As the broad U.S. economy finished 2015 with a big round of job creation, more pockets of Main Street are feeling optimistic about near-term prospects and planning to add new positions. ...

For now, small-business owners planning to hire include Gina Schaefer. She's co-owner of nine Ace Hardware stores in Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia. Schaefer has plans to open two more locations in the new year and has recently hired about a dozen new workers, with plans to bring on about 12 more.

"The mood has gotten...

By Jason Daley
Entrepreur Magazine, January 9, 2016

Last April, the city of Seattle began rolling out an incremental minimum-wage increase. Employers with 500 workers or fewer would bump hourly wages up to $15 over the course of seven years; larger businesses would have to reach the mark in three years, with an immediate raise to $11 per hour. (The federal minimum wage is $7.25.) It has been a controversial law on many fronts, but no more so than in the franchise world. For the purposes of the law, any franchised business is considered a...

By Richard Correa
Providence Journal, Jan. 5, 2016

On Jan. 1, Rhode Island raised its minimum wage to $9.60. Raising the minimum wage makes good business sense whether you are a Republican, Democrat or independent. It should not be a partisan issue.

Across the political spectrum, voters strongly support raising the federal minimum wage. This includes 77 percent of Republicans, 87 percent of independents and 97 percent of Democrats, according to a recent poll by McLaughlin & Associates and Oxfam America.

Raising the minimum wage is a personal issue for me. I grew up in a...

Op-Ed By Richard Correa, Owner, Correa Agency
Also in the Detroit News, many more
Raising the minimum wage makes good business sense whether you are a Republican, Democrat or independent. It should not be a partisan issue. ...

By Kate Rogers
CNBC, Dec 31, 2015

From major cities like Los Angeles to big businesses like McDonald's, 2015 saw momentum for lifting pay above the federal level of $7.25 an hour. Effective Thursday and New Year's Day, 14 states will implement higher minimum wages through legislative action or automatic cost-of-living increases. ...

"Consumer demand and income levels have not recovered in the wake of the Great Recession and raising the minimum wage is a very effective tool in boosting consumer demand," said Alissa Barron-Menza, vice president of Business for a Fair Minimum Wage....

By Kate Rogers, CNBC

From major cities like Los Angeles to big businesses like McDonald's, 2015 saw momentum for lifting pay above the federal level of $7.25 an hour. Effective Thursday and New Year's Day, 14 states will implement higher minimum wages through legislative action or automatic cost-of-living increases. ...

"Consumer demand and income levels have not recovered in the wake of the Great Recession and raising the minimum wage is a very effective tool in boosting consumer demand," said Alissa Barron-Menza, vice president of Business for a Fair Minimum Wage. ...

Plus, small businesses have...

MetroWest Daily News, Dec 31, 2015

Effective Jan. 1, 2016, Massachusetts will raise its current minimum wage to $10, with another one dollar increase on Jan. 1, 2017.

Massachusetts is one of 14 states that will raise their minimum wage the week of Jan. 1. In 21 states, minimum wage workers make the federal rate of $7.25 an hour, which comes to just $15,080 a year. The highest state minimum wages on Jan. 1 will still have less buying power than the minimum wage of 1968, nearly $11 in today's dollars.

The National Conference of...

Nightly Business Report, Produced by CNBC, Dec 25 and 28, 2015

KATE ROGERS, NIGHTLY BUSINESS REPORT CORRESPONDENT: From big corporations like Walmart to big cities like Los Angeles, 2015 was the year of the raise. With the federal minimum wage stagnant at $7.25 an hour since 2009, companies along with state and local governments have taken matters into their own hands. ...

ROGERS: But for wage advocates, raises aren't kicking in fast enough.

ALISSA BARRON-MENZA [Vice President, Business for a Fair Minimum Wage]: Consumer demand and income levels have not recovered in the wake of...

Cape Cod Today, Dec 26, 2015

The Massachusetts minimum wage rises Jan. 1 to a highest-in-the-nation $10 an hour and the state income tax will simultaneously fall to 5.1 percent from 5.15 percent ...

MASSACHUSETTS, CALIFORNIA WILL HAVE HIGHEST MINIMUM WAGES IN 2016

Massachusetts and California on Jan. 1, 2016 will be tied at $10 an hour for the highest state minimum wages, according to a national business group. The Massachusetts wage floor is rising from $9 an hour under a 2014 law that also requires the minimum wage here to increase to $11 an hour on Jan...

By Catherine Conlan 
Monster.com, December 6, 2015

The recession took a toll on businesses of all sizes and dampened salary levels as well. But as businesses have rebounded, so have compensation expectations for employees at small businesses, says Jose Laurel, director of recruitment services for G&A Partners, a human resources services provider in Houston. ...

The insights below will help your small business as you set 2016 salary levels. ...

Ripple Effects from an Increased Minimum Wage

The debate over an increased minimum wage, while often focused on large employers, affects small businesses as well...

By Nick McCrea
Bangor Daily News, Dec 15, 2015

BANGOR, Maine — Some members of the business community praised the city’s decision to increase the minimum wage locally, calling it an example the rest of the state should follow in order to help workers. Others interviewed Tuesday said the move overstepped local authority and could put the city at economic risk. The City Council voted 7-2 Monday night to boost the minimum wage in Bangor effective the first day of 2017, when it will jump from the statewide rate of $7.50 per hour to $8.25. The next year...