Fast-food workers just won a huge and unexpected victory in New York

*According to Rep. Gwen Moore (D-WI), 58 percent of Latino workers across the country earn less than $15 an hour. This is an important context for NY Gov. Andrew Como’s decision to raise the minimum wage for fast-food workers. VL

By Matthew Yglesias, Vox

New York Governor Andrew Cuomo announced Wednesday evening that he will raise the minimum wage for the state’s fast-food workers.

The announcement came in the unusual form of a New York Times op-ed.

Cuomo plans to exploit a provision of state law that “empowers the labor commissioner to investigate whether wages paid in a specific industry or job classification are sufficient to provide for the life and health of those workers — and, if not, to impanel a Wage Board to recommend what adequate wages should be.”

The current minimum wage in New York state was raised to $8.75, set to rise to $9 by the end of the year because of a 2013 law Cuomo signed.

In his latest budget, Cuomo proposed a further increase to $10.50, with a special higher $11.50 minimum wage in New York City.

Given Cuomo’s record of aloofness from progressive economic causes and the specific focus on minimum wage workers, this is clearly a victory for the “Fight for $15” activist campaign, though Cuomo does not mention it.

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