CONNOR HOFFMAN
Staff Writer
It looks like SUNY has beaten Sen. Bernie Sanders to the punch, and the SUNY Board of Trustees passed a resolution calling to raise wages for SUNY employees. This resolution took effect on January 28, and resulted in the first of many wage increases aimed to get employees to $15 per hour by 2021.
“We are going to raise the minimum wage to bring economic opportunity back to millions of hardworking New Yorkers and lead the nation in the fight to fair pay,” said Cuomo at a Jan. 4 at a rally in New York City.
The Western New York region is expected to have 5,833 employees’ wages increase. This increase is going to affect all state-employed workers, which includes student workers such as work study and student assistants, according to Megan Mackowiak, the assistant director of Financial Aid.
The Work Study program is a federal program run by the Department of Education that provides students in need financial awards and provides them jobs to pay the money off. Since the students are working to earn the amount of their financial awards, this wage increase means they will have to work less hours.
“Work study students can earn a specific dollar amount for the academic year,” said Mackowiak. “Work study students will need to work less hours due to the wage increase. This does not mean that work study students will earn less money. Their award amount for the current year remains the same.”
The wage is expected to go up to $10.75 per hour by December, and it is expected to be raised to $15 per hour by July 1, 2021.
“As a SUNY auxiliary corporation it’s not completely clear at this point,” said Matt Snyder, the assistant director of the Faculty Student Association (FSA). He also said that, although it’s not clear, FSA has decided to budget for a wage increase anyways.
Snyder said that this new minimum wage will affect all FSA employees because it will lead to old wages looking low.
“First it’s going to affect students, because now they would be under the new minimum. Going forward, eventually as we get further into the scale of the increases it will eventually affect our FSA employees and some management, as the higher minimum puts pressure on the other wages which may now be perceived to be too low,”said Snyder.
FSA will also follow the statewide wage increase increments.
Snyder explained that this wage increase itself won’t lead to less workers being hired or workers given less hours, but that it will be one of the things that contributes to that, along with lower enrollment.
“With decreased enrollment it makes it pretty difficult to balance the budget, so for the past five or six years we’ve been in a contracting mode,” said Snyder. “For this foreseeable future we’re going to have the double whammy of sorts, decreased enrollment and higher wage pressure.”
Snyder also feels that this wage increase will inflate the local economy, and eventually lead to businesses following suit and increasing their employees wages.
“The governor wants the minimum wage to be state wide to apply to every worker, and when that happens no one will have a choice,” said Snyder. “Large businesses like McDonald’s, they’re going to automate where they can. The small privately owned businesses, they’re going to have to evaluate their own situation and how it’s affecting their profitability.”
Despite the possibility of inflation, many students are supportive of a wage increase whether they work for the school or not.
“I think it’s a good play, I think people are working hard here,” said Zach Pease, a freshman psychology major.