Gov. Jerry Brown signed into law Monday what is now, along with New York, the highest minimum wage in the country.

The bill, which sailed through the Democrat-controlled Legislature, raises the minimum wage to $15 an hour by 2023 for businesses with under 25 employees and 2022 for everyone else.

The state minimum wage, which currently stands at $10 an hour, will be raised to $10.50 in 2017, $11 in 2018, and by a dollar more each year from there. After 2022, the wage will rise with inflation.

Last Thursday, Senate Bill 3 passed the upper house 26–12 and the Assembly 48–26, with no Republican support.

Senator Hannah-Beth Jackson, who co-authored the bill, and Assemblyman Das Williams, both of whom represent Santa Barbara County in the legislature, voted for the wage increase.

Hours after the Legislature passed the bill, their New York counterparts approved their own $15 minimum wage plan.

Each September, the governor will be able to decide whether to suspend the increase the following January if the economy begins to sour.

Though an estimated 6.5 million Californians stand to see an increase in their wages, the hike would cost the state about $4 billion a year, according to the California Department of Finance.

Ken Oplinger, the president and CEO of the Santa Barbara Chamber of Commerce, was disappointed in how quickly lawmakers pushed the bill through the legislative process.

“We thought it made a lot of sense to have some sort of carve-out for jobs for young people,” he told Noozhawk.

“The odds come 2023 of most employers bringing on high school kids for summer jobs that pay $15 an hour I think are slim to none.”

In addition to young workers losing early job experience, Oplinger said, the new wage will in fact worsen employment situations in areas with higher unemployment and lower costs of living.

“We wanted some sort of acknowledgement of the fact that the economy, the unemployment numbers, a whole lot of the economic indicators in a place like Santa Barbara, are completely different in a place like Fresno,” he said.

“So to have a blanket $15 minimum wage across the state of California in some cases really doesn’t make a lot of sense.”

Though the fiscally moderate governor had his own reservations about a wage hike, he ultimately came down on the side of the compromise he made with lawmakers and unions.

“Morally and socially and politically, [minimum wages] make every sense because it binds the community together and makes sure that parents can take care of their kids in a much more satisfactory way,” he said.

Jackson touted the law as a crucial boost for working Californians.

“It’s really a bold step to make California and our working families more competitive at a time when families are really struggling,” she told Noozhawk while the law was still in the Legislature.

“It is a recognition that people are working really hard and still not getting out from under the poverty line.”

Peter Rupert, the UC Santa Barbara Economics Department chair and executive director of the university’s Economic Forecast Project, believes many industry workers who have been among the most vociferous in demanding a higher wage will be the ones hurt the most.

“Where it’s going to affect people is basically in retail trade, the service industry and restaurants, and agriculture where they’re paying low wages,” he said. “The problem I see there is … that many businesses already say that it’s too expensive to do business in California, and we’re seeing them pack up and go.”

“If you increase the minimum wage and somebody is only producing $8.50 worth of product, as any business owner will tell you, ‘I can’t afford it,’” he said.

Bruce Corsaw, executive director of the Service Employees International Union’s local chapter, told Noozhawk that the increase was good news for workers living in an expensive state, and that SEIU has been working toward an increase.

With Brown’s signature, the state has potentially averted a politically charged showdown in November by eliminating the need for a union-backed ballot initiative seeking the same minimum wage hike.

— Noozhawk staff writer Sam Goldman can be reached at sgoldman@noozhawk.com. Follow Noozhawk on Twitter: @noozhawk, @NoozhawkNews and @NoozhawkBiz. Connect with Noozhawk on Facebook.