D.C. Pauses Plans To Hike Minimum Wage for Tipped Workers
Washington, D.C. will pause the implementation of a measure that is set to eliminate the city’s tipped wage system, as the yearslong debate over the law’s adverse impacts continues to divide the District’s left-leaning lawmakers.Â
The D.C. Council on Tuesday voted 8–4 to pump the brakes on Initiative 82, the 2022 ballot referendum that mandated employers pay service workers the full minimum wage, as opposed to the traditional lower base pay that employees supplement with gratuities. (Employers were already required to make up the difference if an employee’s take-home pay with tips did not equal the minimum wage.) Initiative 82 requires yearly increases to the city’s tipped wage—which was previously $5.35 per hour—until it meets D.C.’s full minimum base pay—set to increase next month to $17.95 per hour—in 2027.
July was supposed to see the tipped wage rise from $10 to $12. The Council’s vote will delay that increase until October as Mayor Muriel Bowser, a Democrat, advocates for overturning the law entirely.
This saga has been ongoing. D.C. voters weighed in on the issue in June 2018 when a majority approved Initiative 77, a ballot referendum that also abolished the tipped wage. But the Council countermanded that in October of that same year by a vote of 8–5, leading to a public outcry from some who said the government was undoing the will of the people.
Indeed, the issue has long polarized a city that is dominated by liberal and progressive politics and politicians, some of whom have confronted that good intentions do not equal good outcom
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