Council Votes to Raise Pay for 50,000 in Health Care
In a major victory for unions, living wage supporters and working family advocates, the New York City Council yesterday passed by a vote of forty-six to zero a bill strongly supported by these groups to provide a ‘living wage’ to over 50,000 private sector health care workers whose employers hold city contracts. The new bill requires companies that provide day care, home care and help for people with cerebral palsy, under city contracts, to pay all their employees at least $8.10 per hour with health coverage, or $9.60 without coverage---which amount will increase by $1.90 an hour over the next four years, and thereafter be linked to inflation. Although council members scaled back the number of workers covered under the bill in the past months in order to increase its chances of being signed by the mayor, some have already announced their intention to expand coverage in the future and the bill has received high praise from the city’s teachers’, healthcare and daycare unions.