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PLAINS TWP. — Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center employee Katlyn Wolfe recently took a second job before her company’s minimum wage hike announcement last week.
“This job (full time in the hospital’s food service department) pays the bills,” Wolfe, 20, of Nanticoke, said. “I wanted extra spending money and to build a savings.”
The news of Geisinger’s wage hike reached many ears.
Wage hike
Wolfe along with over 1,000 other Geisinger Health System employees learned how raising its minimum wage to $10 would affect them. The monetary impact, which will range from $500 to $4,000 annually, was a voluntary move that management said will enable the organization “to take care of their employees.”
Full-time employees will receive an average income increase of $1,400 per year, according to the press release.
The wage hike effective Sept. 6, an initiative that will cost the regional health care provider $3.3 million annually.
Some of the fields included in the wage increase are dietary aides, housekeeping aides, care assistants, image scan operators, receptionists, file clerks and food service workers to name a few.
“Our decision to increase these rates as part of our overall competitive compensation and benefits program will help us to continue to retain and hire the best employees,” Amy Brayford, chief human resources officer at Geisinger Health System said in a written statement.
The health care provider’s wage increase could be considered a controversial move as debates between lawmakers on raising the state’s minimum wage have not resulted in any changes.
Business for a Fair Minimum Wage, a national network of business owners and executives, uphold the belief of raising the minimum working wage. The organization proposes an increase to the “federal minimum wage to at least $12 by 2020.”
On their website they state, “Stuck since 2009 at $7.25 an hour – just $15,080 a year – the minimum wage impoverishes working families and weakens the consumer spending at the heart of our economy.”
“I applaud the Geisinger Health System, a great corporate citizen, for raising their minimum wage to 10 dollars. It’s time for Pennsylvania to do the same,” state Sen. John Yudichak, D-Plymouth Township, said. “Raising Pennsylvania’s minimum wage would improve the lives of more than one million working Pennsylvanians.”
Workers grateful
Wolfe, who is a full-time nursing student at Luzerne County Community College, said she had been working in the hospital’s Food Service Department since February.
“I moved into my own apartment in April,” she said.
The increase in her hourly wage is roughly about 10 percent.
“I will worry less about finances,” Wolfe said.
Karen Eaton, 58, of Lehman, has been employed by Geisinger Wyoming Valley Medical Center for five years. For the past seven months, she has worked with the Environmental Services Department as a housekeeping team member who cleans the operating rooms.
When she heard the news Thursday morning, she was unsure if the wage hike would affect her.
“I was told everyone would see an increase,” Eaton said. “I think this is great. It is so hard to find a job that pays well.”
The extra money will help her household. Eaton is the primary wage earner because her husband, Kenneth, is ill.
“Our insurance does not pay for everything,” she said.
Expenses such as food, doctor bills, prescriptions and gas money adds up, she said.
Eaton would take an extra shift — when offered — to help meet her household budget needs.
Both Eaton and Wolfe believe Geisinger’s initiative to increase the hourly pay rate will have a positive effect.
“I believe the pay increase will make more people want to work here,” Eaton said. “You feel appreciated and want to do more.”
“Geisinger is always doing something good for their employees,” Wolfe said.
