BC’s lowest income earners will go to work today and make more money than they did during their last shift.
The minimum wage in our province is increasing by 75 cents to $14.60.
The increase is part of the provincial government’s promise to implement a $15/hour minimum wage by next year after no increases were seen between 2001 and 2011.
StatsCan is reporting that the unemployment rate in the province increased to 11.5 percent in April, with nearly 400,000 jobs lost since March.
Sixty percent of those who earn the minimum are women and 93 percent of the minimum wage jobs are in the service sectors, including cleaning services, grocery stores, and restaurants.
Quebec, New Brunswick, Newfoundland and Labrador, the Northwest Territories, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward Island, and Yukon have already increased the minimum wage in 2020.
