(CBS News) Cities all over the United States have been boosting their minimum wage. It’s up to $15 an hour in Seattle, but it’s going in the opposite direction in St. Louis, Missouri.
Amer Hawatmeh’s family-owned restaurant in downtown St. Louis is struggling.
Along with rising sales taxes, and meat prices, a minimum wage hike to $10 an hour two months ago made it expensive to stay open. So he’s cut back from five to two days a week for lunch. His hamburgers are smaller, his entrees pricier and his customers scarcer.
Hawatmeh believes it’s not the government, but a combination of worker determination and customer demand that should set the correct wage.
