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With the exception of a few notable sectors, the minimum wage in New York City is $15 an hour. A statewide path to $15 was passed by the New York State Legislature in the 2016-17 State Budget and created a phase-in process that allowed each region to get to $15 incrementally. The movement known as the Fight for 15 started four years earlier, when 200 fast-food workers in New York City walked off the job, demanding a living wage, and has since bought together a strong coalition of unions and expanded across the country, even leading a successful push for a ballot measure that established a $15 minimum wage in solidly red Florida in 2020. The Fight for 15 exemplifies a belief I hold dearly from my time in the labor movement, and as the Chair of the New York State Senate’s Labor Committee: so-called low-skill workers can win big when they are organized.
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