Interesting news from the Tampa Bay Times:
According to Stephen Nohlgren, the Rays will increase the pay of nearly 500 part-time workers to $10 an hour. This is an average increase of $1.75 per hour per employee.
With many other companies in the Tampa Bay area increasing their minimum wage, this is good for the Rays. It is a low cost effort, gives good public relations, and you never want to be the last company doing something like this.
But how much will they be spending total?
Of course, the amount of hours worked will vary on how many games are played that week or how long the games go. But let's assume the average employee works 35 hours a week.
35 hours x $10 = $350/week
Baseball season is approximately 24 weeks.
$350/week x 24 weeks = $8,400 per season per employee
$8,400 x 500 employees = $4,200,000
Or $200,000 more than the Rays are paying Alex Cobb this season.
How much more are the Rays spending on employees by raising their minimum wage?
35 hours x $1.75 per hour = $61.25/week
$61.25 x 24 weeks = $1,470
$1470 x 500 employees = $735,000
Or $220,000 more than the Rays are paying Jake Odorizzi.
No one will be rich working for minimum wage for the Tampa Bay Rays. But raising their bottom wage level is a good move for the team. Especially when player payroll was lowered over $12 million (or 15.6%) over the offseason. Now the Rays can say some of that (approximately 6%) went back into the pockets of the workers.