Baltimore City Council members plan to begin work this week on legislation that would rapidly increase the city’s minimum wage to $15 an hour — a proposal that has drawn heavy criticism from city agencies, economists and businesses.
Council members are split on the measure, which would increase the minimum wage to $15 by 2020. Mayor Stephanie Rawlings-Blake has not formally opposed the bill, but the city’s Finance Department estimated it would cost the city more than $150 million over the next five years, and push the unemployment rate as high as 10.6 percent.
“This would return the City to the unemployment levels of the Great Recession, and virtually all of the jobs lost would be youth, young adults and unskilled jobs,” the department reported.
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