[T]he House Appropriation Committee narrowly approved a compromise proposal on Monday that might not hit the Legislature’s $15 minimum wage target until 2028. A bill passed by the Senate would have hit that figure by 2024.
Committee members voted 6-5 to advance the amended bill to the House floor. Rep. David Yacovone, D-Morrisville, was the only Democrat to vote against it. He was unhappy with the lack of action to support health care providers.
Damien Leonard, an attorney for the Legislative Council Office, was in and out of the committee room Monday afternoon as last-minute tweaks were made to the bill.
“I think the big takeaway is this is a slower increase than what passed House General,” Leonard said, referring to the earlier version of the bill, S.23, which would have hit $15 on a firm, five-year timeline.
The new version — an attempt at a compromise drafted by Rep. Matt Trieber, D-Bellows Falls — would increase the wage by 2.25 times the inflation rate each year, unless there is a major economic downturn.
That would set the minimum hourly wage on a path to hit $15 by 2026, unless there is a recession, according to an analysis by the Joint Fiscal Office.
In a recession scenario, said Leonard, the timeline could be pushed back by a year or two, though he noted that recessions do not always mean stagnant inflation. The increase could also be put on hold indefinitely under certain economic scenarios.
The bill has a “pause button” in case of a recession. If actual sales and use tax and projected general fund revenue drop by 2% at the same time, the process for setting Vermont’s minimum wage reverts to current law, which tracks with inflation.
That mechanism is meant to mitigate some of the central concerns with the bill, mainly that significant wage increases would strain businesses during an economic downturn.
Rep. Kitty Toll, D-Danville, chair of House Appropriations, said the committee was trying to craft the best policy it could while also considering how much support the bill would get on the floor.
“I think that there’s been several members that are working very hard with it and found this was the best path forward,” Toll said. “Looking at dynamics throughout the Statehouse, crafting policy that works with the varying positions of different people, this is where we landed.”
While the amendment may make the bill more palatable to those worried about a recession, it immediately drew frustration from Progressives.
“I think that the state really needs to make a commitment to bring people up to a living standard, not perpetuate poverty,” said Rep. Robin Chesnut-Tangerman P-Middletown Springs, chair of the House Progressive caucus.
“I’ve been generally supportive of…saying that i would like to see action rather than fall on my sword,” he added. “To me this is really at the point of is half a glass really better than none?”
The Legislature has entered its final week, if it stays on its current adjournment schedule.
Gov. Phil Scott has indicated little willingness to compromise on a minimum wage bill, at least one that looks anything like the proposal to reach $15 by 2024, which was passed in the Senate.
If Scott does veto the minimum wage bill — assuming it gets that far — legislative leaders can still pass the law during an override session, but would need to get two-thirds of the votes in each chamber.
That’s a much taller task in the House, which last year approved a minimum wage proposal by a narrow vote of 77-69.
House Appropriations could vote on the Trieber amendment as soon as Monday. It would then have to pass in the full House before the body begins negotiations with the Senate to hash out a final version of the bill.
This article will be updated.
