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Richard Pfeffer is the founder and owner of Gritty McDuff’s, Maine’s original brew pub.
2025I’ve lived in Portland my entire adult life. I’ve worked hard, paid my taxes, raised my family, operated a small business, and stayed here through good times and bad. But I’ve never seen city leaders so determined to drive away small businesses and burden taxpayers as they are with this proposal going to voters to raise Portland’s minimum wage to $19 an hour by 2028.
It’s clear to me that this is not about fairness or lifting people up. I believe this is about pushing a democratic socialist agenda that ignores economic reality and leaves seniors, families, and workers footing the bill.
If passed, Portland would become the highest minimum wage city on the entire East Coast. Higher than Boston, New York City, and Washington, D.C., cities with higher incomes and deeper pockets than Portland.
Yet somehow, we’re expected to lead the nation in wage mandates? That’s not leadership — that’s fiscal suicide.
The numbers don’t lie. According to city budget estimates, this wage hike would cost $3 million to $3.5 million in new payroll expenses for Portland’s own employees. That’s not for businesses; that’s just City Hall.
Where do you think that money comes from? From Portland’s taxpayers. For seniors, already struggling with rising property taxes, heating oil, groceries, and medical costs, this is a direct hit. Fixed incomes don’t rise with Portland’s political experiments. Yet the city will likely have to raise taxes again to pay for this policy.
Businesses won’t escape either. Restaurants, shops, childcare centers, and social service agencies will all be forced to raise prices or cut jobs. Some will simply close or move out of Portland. That means fewer places to eat, shop, and work. The irony is that this mandate, meant to help workers, could leave many of them unemployed.
And it won’t stop at $19. This proposal includes automatic increases tied to the Consumer Price Index (CPI). That means the minimum wage could climb even higher every year, regardless of whether the economy can handle it. In other words, it’s essentially a blank check written on the backs of Portland’s taxpayers and businesses.
This is not compassion. I think it is reckless. It is policymaking by ideology, not reality. Portland cannot afford to be the test lab for every progressive experiment dreamed up by activists who apparently don’t understand how fragile our economy really is.
As a taxpayer, I am angry. Portland is already one of the most expensive cities in Maine to live in. More people could be forced out of their homes, more families will likely struggle to make ends meet, and more businesses could disappear if we let this happen.
We need real solutions that strike a balance between fair pay and economic sustainability. Portland’s future depends on policies that strengthen our community, not ones that drive it into the ground.
This November, voters have a choice. We can go down the perilous path of higher taxes, job losses, and failed businesses. Or we can stand up, reject this reckless mandate, and say loud and clear, Portland is not for sale to political ideology.
For the sake of our seniors, our families, and our future, I urge my fellow Portlanders to vote “no” on the $19 minimum wage ballot question.
Election notice: The BDN will stop accepting letters and columns related to the Nov. 4 election on Wednesday, Oct. 29. Not all submissions can be published.
