San Diego City Council Committee Proposes $25 Per Hour Hospitality Minimum Wage

The San Diego City Council’s Select Committee on Addressing Cost of Living unanimously passed a proposal  to set the minimum wage for all hospitality workers in the city to $25 an hour earlier this week, bringing the ordinance forward to a complete City Council vote.

According to the proposal, the ordinance would create a $25 per hour minimum wage for workers at amusement parks, zoos, event centers, hotels, and other locations like stadiums that center on hospitality services and tourism. Hotel workers would only receive the amount if the hotel they work at has 150 guestrooms or more. If passed, the pay raise would take effect on January 1, 2026.

Currently, San Diego has a $17.25 minimum wage, higher than the state minimum wage of $16.50 per hour. However, Councilman Sean Elo-Rivera, who wrote the proposal, said that workers are currently living under the minimum cost of living amount. The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) Living Wage Calculator estimates that a single person living in San Diego County needs to be making a minimum of $30.71 an hour to survive in the county.

Many businesses and business leaders in the city have fought hard against the ordinance proposal, as the wage increase would seriously impact businesses. They argue that such a rapid change in minimum wage could lead to a huge number of layoffs and lead to increased costs for consumers as a result.  Groups and companies like the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce and the San Diego Padres have countered that it needs to be rejected. Instead, some have said that alternate options would fare much better, including a much more modest raise that is slowly increased into over a matter of several years.

“The Padres are proud to be a major economic contributor and a committed community partner,” said chief operating officer of the San Diego Padres Caroline Perry. “We pay the highest mandated wage in Major League Baseball through the city’s Living Wage Ordinance, which adjusts annually for inflation.

“We believe in fair, competitive wages, but this proposal is too extreme. It would drive up the cost of living, make it harder for San Diegans to attend games, and hurt the local businesses that rely on Petco Park. We urge the City Council to reject it.”

“San Diego is an expensive city to live in,”  added president and CEO of the San Diego Regional Chamber of Commerce Chris Cate. “This will not make it easier to afford to live in San Diego.”

A fight over $25 an hour minimum wage

However, Councilmembers have ignored these pleas, saying that businesses could easily afford them and that businesses carry empty words of layoffs.

“Big corporations on our waterfront are not small businesses,” said Councilwoman Marni von Wilpert. “They are doing fine, they can pay a living wage.”

“This is not radical, this is what basic dignity demands,” argued Elo-Rivera. “This proposal would not cost tens of thousands of jobs. We’ve heard these scare tactics before. Every time they say the sky will fall and every time they are wrong.

“Being San Diego’s team means standing with San Diegans, not against them.”

Despite their insistence that the minimum wage is needed, a critical issue is looming over the next Council vote: California’s fast food wage law, AB 1228, which increased the industry minimum wage to $20 per hour last year. Passed in September 2023, the law went into effect in April 2024, the fast food minimum wage was created for the same reasons as San Diego’s proposal, but has been a disaster for the state. In only 14 months since implementation, the state has lost over 36,000 food service positions and fast food prices increased over 15%. Many stores also raised prices, affecting both store sales and the cost to the consumer, while increased automation at stores has meant that many of the jobs lost are permanent losses.

Even with this major warning that affected businesses, and affected workers, may be looking at the same fate, the Council will still be voting on the ordinance later this year.