Businesses Seek State Law To Preempt Local Labor Laws
MINNEAPOLIS (WCCO) -- Minnesota's top business leaders are pushing for a state law to stop cities from adopting sick leave and minimum wage policies.
Workers in Minneapolis Wednesday rallied for a city-wide $15-an-hour minimum wage. Those workers collected 20,000 signatures on a petition for the wage hike. That's three times the number required to put the minimum wage on the Minneapolis ballot in November.
"Let's offer the people a fair wage here," said Steven Suffridge, a McDonald's worker and organizer of the "Fair Wage" rally, "so they can afford to live here, and keep on supporting Minnesota."
Businesses say it's creating a big mess, with different laws in different cities, even for companies already offering strong wage and benefit packages.
"These are some of the best benefits in the country!" said Charlie Weaver, the head of the Minnesota Business Partnership, which represents the state's largest companies who employ more than 400,000 workers.
Weaver says businesses want one statewide wage and benefit law.
"What we don't want is Minnesota to become an island, where you've got a hundred or a thousand, potentially, different cities having different laws that are really hard to enforce," he said.
A "preemption" law would ban cities from adopting labor policies that are tougher than state or federal laws.
Businesses want it passed in a special session -- something Governor Mark Dayton says is too complicated to rush through the legislature.
"It can't just be one way that says businesses can't do what most of us believe they should do -- which is provide family leave, or provide sick leave," Dayton said.
Several dozen cities have passed local minimum wage laws in the last few years, and 17 states are considering preemption laws that could nullify those laws, and also sick leave and scheduling policies.