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One to Keep An Eye On: $15/Hour Wage Hike For Detroit Municipal Employees


As with many labor & employment law related cases (and bills) being litigated around the country, there are always a few that stand out.  This is one to keep an eye on.


Plans are underway for a proposal to be introduced to the Detroit City Council that would see the hourly pay rate for Detroit municipal employees raised to $15/hour.

If approved by the City Council, pay for about 270 municipal employees would go up starting July 1st.  Notably, there are already several thousand municipal employees that already make at least $15/hour.  This proposal would seek to create a floor for Detroit municipal employees that would set the starting salary for any municipal position at $15/hour.

The proposal to create this $15/hour wage floor would cost Detroit a little over $1 million annually.  However, as Mayor Mike Duggan has argued, this cost to Detroit is minor compared to the importance or raising wage rates for municipal employees.  If I were a betting man, I would suspect that once this proposal gets introduced in the coming weeks, it will get approved sooner rather than later.


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