This bill isn’t too much; it’s too little.

“I am afraid the intentions of the author will backfire and this will hurt the middle class and working poor the most. It is clear California is not a business-friendly state, but this act will not just hurt businesses – it will drive up payroll costs so those businesses hire fewer people, or even worse, cut the hours of hard-working Californians trying to raise their families.”

According to David Mitchell, who operates a number of small businesses in California, “AB 10 is another gift to the unions in California that will make our state less competitive. Ironically, it hurts the very people it is designed to help by increasing costs for all items purchased in California and incentivizes employers to replace unskilled labor with machines or otherwise reduce hours to remain in business. The timing of AB10 is particularly bad because we are trying to cope with the implementation of the Affordable Care Act which effectively raises the cost of a minimum wage employee by over $2 per hour. When fully implemented AB 10 increases the minimum wage by $2 per hour, so when coupled with the ACA, the actual cost of a minimum wage employee will have increased by at least $4 per hour or over 50% by January 2016. What business can absorb a 50% increase in their labor costs in such a short period of time without massive changes to their business model? AB 10 is a bad deal for Californians and a death knell for California business! Look for California’s already outrageously high unemployment to go up. Once again California will lead the nation in this grim statistic.”