Editorial

Rhode Island workers are worth less than those from Massachusetts, say state elected leaders

When the minimum wage in Rhode Island advances to $13 in 2023, low-income workers will have less purchasing power than they did at the beginning of 2022.

Rhode Island News: Rhode Island workers are worth less than those from Massachusetts, say state elected leaders

January 1, 2023, 10:14 pm

By Steve Ahlquist

On January 1st Rhode Island’s minimum wage, for non-tipped workers, rose to $13. Sadly, this increase did not keep pace with inflation, and low-income workers are actually worse off today than they were a year ago. Here’s a piece Uprise RI did in November highlighting this inequity.

On May 20, 2021, Rhode Island Governor Daniel McKee signed legislation that will increase the state’s minimum wage, for non-tipped workers at least, to $15 by 2025. The legislation (H5130A / S0001aa) established a schedule of increases:

  • $12.25 on January 1, 2022;
  • $13 on January 1, 2023;
  • $14 on January 1, 2024; and
  • $15 on January 1, 2025.

The increase in hourly wages coming in January 2023 will be great news for many low-income Rhode Island workers facing eviction and struggling to make ends meet, but sadly, because of inflation, minimum wage workers will be worse off, in terms of purchasing power, than they were last year..

During the first nine months of 2022 the Consumer Price Index (CPI), a “measure of the average change over time in the prices paid by urban consumers for a market basket of consumer goods and services,” rose by 7.8%, well above the upcoming 6.1% increase in the minimum wage. [Thank you to Allan Krinsky at the Economic Progress Institute for getting me these numbers.] Inflation has been brutal for low-income Rhode Islanders, who have seen many of the gains they’ve made in wages eaten up by higher prices.

As Uprise RI said in 2019, to then Speaker Nicholas Mattiello, “Every year that we don’t increase the minimum wage the buying power the lowest income Rhode Islanders goes down, due to inflation.” This also applies to minimum wage increases that don’t keep pace with inflation.

At a recent labor event Uprise RI was able to speak to State Senator Frank Ciccone (Democrat, District 7, North Providence), Representative Evan Shanley (Democrat, District 24, Warwick) and Representative David Bennett (Democrat, District 20, Warwick) about this disparity. Representative Bennett was unequivocal in his support for being more aggressive in raising the minimum wage. He pointed out that the minimum wage in Massachusetts starting in 2023 will be $15, two dollars higher than in Rhode Island, and in Connecticut the current $14 minimum wage is advancing to $15 on June 1, 2023.

Representative Bennett is an outlier among elected officials. Rhode Island workers have long been undervalued by our state legislative leaders, who seem to believe that our labor is somehow worth less than that of our neighbors, and accordingly sell it for cheap. Rhode Island has always trailed neighboring Massachusetts when it comes to the minimum wage. What this means in real terms is that a worker at a fast food restaurant in East Providence will be making two dollars less per hour than a worker in neighboring Seekonk, and a worker in Pawtucket will be making two dollars less than a worker in neighboring Attleboro. For a job that offers 40 hours a week, that’s $80 a week, or $4160 a year, because your Burger King job is in Rhode Island.

Are Rhode Island workers really worth less than those in Massachusetts?