The Canadian Federation of Independent Business has released data showing the vast majority of Alberta business owners say there is a negative impact on their business from raising the minimum wage in the province to $15 an hour by 2018.

The President of the Airdrie Chamber of Commerce Linda Bruce says she isn't surprised by the results of the survey.  

"Small businesses, which often start out as mom and pop shops and struggle to make the first five years to be successful, when their wages they have to pay out are growing in leaps and bounds, sometimes it means owners are not able to even make minimum wage.  We do hear from people that they struggle and they worry and they're more worried about the future as it closes in on the $15."

The data shows 76 per cent of business owners said the rise in the minimum wage would have a negative impact on their business.  22 per cent said the move would be neutral while only two per cent said it would have a positive impact.

According to calculations by the CFIB, a business with just five employees faces an increase of $46,645 in labour costs over a two year period, figures which don't come as a surprise to Bruce.

"Though you might have several minimum wage employees, if you had people who were making $5 above minimum wage when it was $10 an hour, you have to keep them at $5 above, so it really starts to push their salaries up to a point where a small business owner may have to really consider if they can keep that higher, if you like, paid position.  It's a real struggle so I'm in many ways not surprised to hear those numbers."

Bruce says she knows what the government was trying to do when it announced the minimum wage increase.  

"Certainly for people who are on the receiving end of fairly low wages, $15 an hour can at least seem like a bit of an uplift in a lifestyle.  I do believe that every small business owners or anybody who employs a minimum wage earner would love to make sure they can pay a really strong, healthy wage to their employees to keep them.  But at the same time, it's very difficult when that side of the ledger is going up and up and up and sometimes business owners don't end up making much themselves because they pay the majority of the costs to their employees."

 

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