By Howard Fischer | Arizona Capitol Times
Business interests are using arguments supplied by the Ducey administration in their bid to quash the minimum wage hike approved last month by voters.
But the governor’s press aide said his boss, who opposed Proposition 206, is not trying to kill in court the wage hike for hundreds of thousands of Arizona workers that he could not defeat at the ballot.
In legal arguments Tuesday, attorney Brett Johnson representing the Arizona Chamber of Commerce and Industry cited claims by officials of state’s Medicaid program that it has a legal obligation under federal law to pay its private contractors more once the minimum wage goes up on Jan. 1 to $10 an hour. Johnson said without the state increasing what it pays contractors, they will default because they can’t afford to pay their workers more than the current $8.05 an hour now required.
