WASHINGTON, D.C. – Senator Marsha Blackburn (R—Tenn.) hosted a virtual roundtable with Tennessee small business owners to discuss the impact of increasing the minimum wage to $15 an hour.

“A $15 minimum wage would destroy small businesses and job opportunities in our workforce,” said Senator Blackburn. “Some politicians are trying to fit their radical agenda into the already massive spending bill.”

Putting People Out of Work

“I’d have a hard time staying in business if minimum wage went to $15 an hour, I would have to cut several employees and try to do it by myself and with my family.”—Danny Todd, Owner Monterey Foods in Monterey

Drastically Increasing Operating Costs

“[The minimum wage increase] could easily be in a year’s time $250,000 in added expenses…We’ve got to institute some kind of plan to recoup that – is that cutting people, cutting hours, increasing prices, somehow that’s got to be recouped.” —Jim Caldwell, Owner of Ladd’s in Memphis 

Devastating Economic Competitiveness

“That adds $44 per unit to our production items and we build over 400,000 a year. That's the impact it will have compared to the China imports…we become non-competitive, plain and simple.” —Terry England, President of England Manufacturing

*Click the photo above or here to watch*