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Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Voters Will Decide on Minimum Wage Hike - Impacting Workers Compensation Benefits

Workers' Compensation Rates are computed from the State's Average Weekly Wage (SAWW). NJ voters will an opportunity to vote on this landmark change in NJ law. Today's post was shared from njtvonline.org

The state’s current minimum wage is $7.25 an hour. If you work a 40-hour week, that’s $290 a week, or $1160 a month, before taxes, in a region where the average monthly rent is $1,760. Take away food, transportation and other incidental costs and, well, you do the math. It’s why a broad coalition of labor, elected and other officials are pushing hard for Public Question 2, 

which would change the state’s constitution to raise the minimum wage to $8.25, and tie future increases to the cost of living, something that newspaper vendor Tony White would welcome.
“It would be nice if was $8.25 for a lot of jobs out here because the minimum wage has been down for a long time. It’s time for the little people to make a little something, ya know? That’s all,” White, of Newark, said.

Tazia Treadwell knows about working for $7.25. She did it for a couple of years at a fast food restaurant just out of high school.

“After two, three months, I got a 10-cent raise, so I was at $7.35 an hour. After two years, no progress. I was was frustrated. I was just out of high school and I was at that stage where I wanted everything new, the latest of everything and I could barely do that,” Treadwell said.
Then came an...
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