I am all for fair pay and opportunities for workers in all industries. After all, hard-working New Yorkers should be able to earn an acceptable wage and provide for their families – that is what members of the Legislature and the governor should be working for. However, the governor has proposed an increase in the minimum wage for tipped workers that will not only cripple the ability of food service workers to make a decent living, but will also force the owners of local mom-and-pop restaurants to raise prices to undesirable levels. And who pays for that? The answer is both the customer and the server.

The customer will pay $4 more for a cheeseburger at their favorite local establishment, while the server will be tipped far less due to the increased cost of the meal. Cutting into the tip-base for servers throughout the state will result in a take-home amount that is far less than what they are making now.

Many servers and their employers report that they make $25 or more per hour with tips. The governor’s plan would increase the paid wage of servers to about $11 per hour, leaving $14 per hour that servers are unlikely to recover.

So, who does this really benefit? The government. It works like this: the governor forces policy to increase the wage of tipped workers, restaurants are subsequently forced to raise prices, which then raises the cost of the total bill and New York state gets to rake in even more in sales tax. The state would also collect more in payroll tax from the employer. This is an interesting and skillfully devised cover for increasing state revenues.

So let’s not get things confused. This isn’t about the working man and woman, this is about increasing tax revenues for the state. The governor’s proposal doesn’t help the workers. In fact, many are protesting because they know that it will harm, not help, them. The state of Maine tried this in 2016 and ended up reversing its decision the following year.

With all of the criticism of this proposal, the various stake holders clearly opposed and a road map of what not to do as evidenced by the state of Maine, I have to wonder why the governor is continuing to push forward. Does he love fast food or just hate small business? After our local mom and pops are forced to close up shop, all that will be left is the golden arches.