Updated at 8:45 p.m.

The SUNY Board of Trustees is expected to approve a minimum wage increase for workers at SUNY Canton and SUNY Potsdam that would take it to $9.75 per hour in February and to $15 by 2021.

The move sets 28,000 employees statewide on a path to earn $15 per hour, including 2,196 in the North Country, at the SUNY units in Potsdam, Canton and Plattsburgh.

Under a new wage proposal from Gov. Andrew Cuomo, which the SUNY Board of Trustees has on its January meeting agenda, the hike will take incremental steps to higher wages for hourly paid staff, student workers, and work study participants, to $9.75 an hour beginning in February of this year, and ultimately reaching $15 an hour on Dec. 31, 2018 in New York City, and July 1, 2021 statewide, mirroring the schedule for fast food workers and state employees.

The hikes cover all such employees of the State University of New York, including those at the state colleges in Canton and Potsdam and around the state, and also at SUNY headquarters in Albany.

The SUNY Board of Trustees is expected to approve this increase in its January board meeting, a press release from Cuomo’s office said. The increase is projected to cost about $28 million once fully implemented, and would be included in the SUNY budget.

A press release from the governor’s office called the plan “the first signature proposal of his 2016 agenda – his push to restore economic justice by making New York the first state in the nation to enact a $15 minimum wage for all workers. While highlighting this proposal, the Governor announced that the State University of New York will raise the minimum wage for more than 28,000 employees. This increase for SUNY employees will mirror the phased-in schedule for fast food workers secured last year, as well as State Workers announced in October.”

“This state thrives when every New Yorker has the opportunity and the ability to succeed. Yet the truth is that today’s minimum wage still leaves far too many people behind – unacceptably condemning them to a life of poverty even while they work full-time,” said Cuomo. “This year, we are going to change that. We are going to raise the minimum wage to bring economic opportunity back to millions of hardworking New Yorkers and lead the nation in the fight for fair pay.”

The statement estimates the number of individuals in all industries in northern New York State currently earning less than $15 an hour is 43,423.

Opponents argue the minimum wage increase leads to job loss, but the governor’s office cites an independent review of 64 studies on minimum wage increases that found no discernable negative effect on employment. Instead, researchers have found evidence of increased employment from increasing the minimum wage. Economists at Goldman Sachs found that the 13 states – including New York – that increased their state minimum wage in 2014 had higher rates of employment growth than the national average.

“We know this to be true from our own experience: New York increased its minimum wage eight times from 1991 through 2015, and six of those times, employment rose following the increase. When the minimum wage rises, productivity tends to increase, and increased worker retention saves employers recruitment and training costs” the statement says.

Some opponents argue it would be better to increase NYS’s Earned Income Tax Credit – a refundable tax credit to low-wage working families based on income, age, and family size – rather than the minimum wage. But these are complementary rather than competing strategies. Without a strong minimum wage the EITC could act like a wage substitute, allowing certain companies to pay poverty wages, and have those low pay levels subsidized by other employers and taxpayers, in much the way that the fast food sector has socialized part of its payroll by having employees rely on public assistance, the governor’s press release says.

The plan includes all full state university units but does not include community colleges.

This story originally indicated City University of New York (CUNY) employees would be among those covered by the minimum wage increase. They will not. NorthCountryNow.com regrets the error.