Michigan minimum wage increase could hurt small businesses, says restaurant owner
Chris Weavers revealed to ‘Fox & Friends’ that the minimum wage increase could hurt small businesses
Michigan small businesses preparing for required increase in wages
JW’s Food & Spirits owner Chris Weavers on why the state-mandated wage increase including for tipped workers will hurt small businesses.
As Michigan prepares to increase its minimum wage in that state, one small business is fearing the worst.
Last week, Court of Claims Judge Douglas Shapiro ruled that Michigan’s minimum wage for untipped workers should increase to $12 an hour — up from $9.87 an hour.
Meanwhile, the minimum wage for tipped workers should be raised to $9.60 an hour, up from $3.75 an hour, according to the ruling.
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Chris Weavers, the owner of JW’s Food & Spirits, a restaurant in Grand Haven, Mich., told "Fox & Friends" on Tuesday morning that the wage increases won’t be good for her business.
A judge in Michigan ruled last week that the state should increase its minimum wage for uptipped workers up to $12 an hour and for tipped workers up to $9.60 an hour. (iStock / iStock)
"It’s not going to be good, and it’s not going to be easy," Weavers said.
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She said she may even have to let people go because she can’t afford to pay workers the increased wages.
"It’s scary for the whole industry because restaurants — we’ve already been dealt a huge blow with the pandemic, and now we’re just trying to get on the other side of it and recover," Weavers said.
Many restaurants are still "trying to get on the other side" of the pandemic "and recover," said one small business owner on Tuesday. (iStock / iStock)
"The ones that are still struggling are not going to make it," she added.
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"There are going to be a fair amount of restaurants closing because of this, I would speculate."
A waitress is shown counting out tips from a customer's payment while working in a restaurant. "You really need to manage every penny," said Chris Weavers, a small business owner in Michigan. (iStock / iStock)
Weavers explained that for the restaurant industry, a nickel of every dollar brought in is profit.
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"That’s slim," Weavers said.
"And you really need to manage every penny … Something like this could be a huge blow."
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Weavers added, "It’s the small businesses, the businesses that our country was built on — [they] are suffering the worst. The big corporations, they have deeper pockets. They will be better able to weather the storm than us."
"But it's going to take out a lot of the small businesses," she said.