Higher minimum wage for tipped employees after many struggle for well over 20 years with frozen wage

For well over 20 years the minimum wage for tipped workers has been frozen at $2.63 per hour, While in the 1980s that may have been acceptable in the year of 2015 I'm afraid it’s not. The rising prices and cost of living are just 2 reasons people have been fighting this over time but now we must pay for health insurance in the state of Massachusetts as a mandatory bill added directly to our paychecks. Servers and Bartenders are paying anywhere from $35-over $100 a week for health insurance for themselves or their families. This in turn makes us owe more in taxes at the end of the year which before health insurance was already an issue. So many tipped employees are behind on their taxes because we simply do not make enough money to pay at the end of the year. Also we are in charge of tipping out other employees such as hosts, bussers, runners, and bartenders, 3 of the 4 of these employees already make a minimum wage, then on top of that they are receiving tips. As an example say a server makes $25,000.00 a year at the end of the year they will owe over $2,000.00 in taxes and they will have tipped out the support staff by the end of the year between $2,500.00 - $7,500.00. That brings down their actual end of the year income to under $20,000.00. This amount could mean no support for low income families or individuals. We will not qualify for food stamps, heat and electricity, and help with medical coverage. This has happened to many people and in the end by just raising the minimum wage to as little as $5.50 an hour could help these people get money back on their taxes at the end of the year or not owe all this money in turn helping the IRS not have to chase after all these tipped employees for money. Health insurance could be given to people who actually need it and work hard for it. My Name is Corey Teachout I am a single individual trying to make it with no one to share the burden of living. Most people I know are working to try and pay off school loans and the IRS for taxes that have accrued working while in school and when out. Most of them have to live with their parents or other family because they don’t have the money to live on their own. I however do not have that option and have actually had the opposite happen gaining dependents and debt. Current tipped employee wage petitions have included the cost of living as the only reason to raise minimum wage from the frozen $2.63ph in Massachusetts this petition discusses the other reasons to raise the wages. Heres my personal account of this ongoing fight for change. Last year I made $34,000.00 working over 40hours a week last year. A little over $8,000.00 of that $34,000 was in tips to the support staff that is already claimed into my $34,000.00 that I supposedly earned. I owed $2000.00 on my taxes at the end of the year. I still owe a deductible for my medical insurance for last year of $1500.00 because I could not afford to pay for it. I was denied any insurance help and "made to much money" for food stamps and any health insurance or heat assistance so although I made "$34,000.00" last year on my taxes I really only came home with $26,000.00 and if I had the money to pay the $2,000 to the IRS that brings me to $24,000. That is not including any medical insurance that I have to pay not the deductible and not including the weekly money that comes out of my "paycheck" at $2.63 an hour for the medical insurance that keeps rolling over because my $0.00 paycheck can simply not afford to pay for all the insurance and therefore I end up owing so much money in taxes because they can't take enough from my paycheck because its already maxed out to $0.00 and since they can’t give me a check for negative money the deducting process and brutal beating just keeps on coming. I do not understand why it has taken so long to up the minimum wages for the tipped employees. Please help me and help so many other struggling people and their families that do not qualify for the help they need because of the money that we supposedly make. Is it not time Massachusetts? Over twenty years of a frozen wage many of us think it is and we continue to find reasons that need to be addressed.