Thousands of airport workers in New York City and New Jersey are getting a raise, with the Port Authority voting to raise the minimum wage to $19 an hour.
The increase will be phased in over the course of the next five years, with workers at JFK and LaGuardia Airports seeing their minimum wage rise to $13.60 an hour by November. At Newark Airport, the minimum wage will increase to $12.45.
Governor Andrew Cuomo argued for the increase, saying today's minimum wage is worth less than it was 50 years ago.
"The middle class is going backwards. Working men and women are going backwards. That is a cause of the frustration and the anger and the anxiety, it is not a perception, it is a reality," Cuomo said to the Port Authority Board.
New York already has plans to raise the state's minimum wage to $15 an hour. He argued that it stimulates the economy by putting more money in the pockets of workers.
"They don't have the advantage of squirreling away and saving money and putting it in a bank, they need it to live. So that minimum wage increase goes immediately into the economy," Cuomo said.
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