As of midnight Saturday, the minimum wage goes from $6.25 to $7.15 an hour and this jump is gaining mixed support.
A 90 cent hike in minimum wage is definitely something to talk about especially among those who will see the benefits in their paychecks like some employees at Waldameer.
"With the hours we work here it should be pretty beneficial to me obviously."
"It’s a job on the side and I have to pay my rent somehow so minimum wage going up is a good thing for me."
But employees at Saras Restaurant feel differently. Theyve seen first hand the pay wage affects because almost all of their menu prices have recently creaped up about a dime.
"I think its a bad idea, it hurts the business and the community ya know all together because all the prices for all the things are gonna go up."
"Its making all the prices go up too so i dont know, probably it will cancel each other out in the end."
Other area businesses are seeing a backlash as well. Both Waldameer and the Erie Zoo had to increase some rates in anticipation.
Paul Nelson, the owner of Waldameer says they actually have to cut jobs because of the minimum wage increase.
"In some places were eliminating some jobs, the training jobs that we had where the kids were really learning the jobs and now they have to come out and do the jobs, like wed give a committee gofers, go for this, go for that and now they dont go any place."
With 80 to 100 minimum wage workers annually at the erie zoo, spokesperson, scott mitchell says this increase is having a huge impact on them.
"the best number we can put to it its gonna be something over 100 thousand dollars."
The zoo is primarily watching their employees hours and not cutting jobs so the numbers on the time sheets dont add up.
"There are x number of positions that kinda have to be filled but were trying to do things like instead of two people in a spot well have one or have them for the main part of the day not early not late."
The increase will affect about 400 thousand workers in the state of Pennsylvania.
The federal minimum wage is also going up on July 24th which will take the increase up another 10 cents to $7.25 an hour.
