NORTH CANAAN — Each summer, Bob Riva looks forward to hiring a half dozen high school students to work the front counters at CA Lindell ACE Hardware.
“I like to bring in those kids from the high school and train them and work with them. They are very cheerful,” as they gain entry-level skills and bring their enthusiasm to the job and to customers, said the Canaan business owner.
But the 4.2% increase in the minimum wage, from $15.69 to $16.35, that went into effect Jan. 1, has reduced the number of summer jobs Riva will be able to offer to students this year.
“We end up getting a lot of kids, but does it make sense to pay someone in high school that large a minimum wage? It comes down to making decisions that you never had to make before,” said Riva.
“You get a little pickier and end up scrutinizing the people you are paying minimum wage to. We want our employees to make a good living, but the kids don’t have a house and are still in school. And for this new minimum wage right now, they’d better be moving, they’d better be doing a good job,” said Riva.
Five minimum wage hikes in four years
In 2019, Gov. Ned Lamont signed Public Act 19-4, which implemented five minimum wage increases over four years’ time, followed by subsequent adjustments tied to the percentage change in the federal Employment Cost Index (ECI).
In making the announcement, Lamont said the new law “ensures that as the economy grows, the wages of low-income workers can grow with it. This is a fair, modest adjustment for workers who will invest their earnings right back into our economy and support local businesses in their communities.”
According to Connecticut Labor Commissioner Dante Bartolomeo, the ECI increased by 4.2% over the 12-month period ending on June 30, 2024, accounting for the 66-cent hourly wage hike on Jan. 1.
“Minimum wage increases help ensure that no Connecticut worker gets left behind,” Bartolomeo said.
From 2022 to 2023, average salaries in Connecticut rose 3.1%, with the state having the fifth-highest average wage in the country, according to the Connecticut Business and Industry Association (CBIA).
State officials estimate 10% of the state’s workforce, about 169,000 workers, earn the minimum wage.
More harm than good?
Several Northwest Corner employers described the state’s method for doling out wage increases as burdensome and broken, and that they have little choice but to shift their hiring focus to employees whose productivity levels match the higher minimum wage.
As a result, the most vulnerable, especially those who may lack on-the-job training and have a lower literacy or disability and are most in need of employment, training and experience, will be negatively impacted.
Others are at risk of losing, or have lost important benefits such as health insurance, food and energy assistance, or even affordable housing because their new raises push them over the maximum income limits to qualify for benefits.
Carolyn Piccirelli, founder of Honeychurch Home in Salisbury, said although her business is not affected by the minimum wage hike as all employees are paid above that level, she supports efforts to increase wages.
However, she said she is aware of people who are being bumped off assistance programs because the latest minimum wage hike put them over the maximum income limit.
“What they have to do is find a work-around like reducing their hours” to maintain assistance, said Piccirelli. “As a result, employers have to hire more people.”
Piccirelli, who is expanding and relocating her business to Lenox, Mass., said she is in favor of a higher minimum wage, even though she feels lawmakers were oblivious to the negative impact the raises would have on small businesses.
“I don’t think any minimum wage is enough, frankly,” she noted. “It’s very common for the government to do things and not consider the fallout. The affected small businesses have to be part of the solution,” she said.
Lindell’s Riva had this warning for Connecticut lawmakers: “You are putting a lot of businesses out of business,” as California did when it raised its hourly minimum wage to $20. “Now you have many businesses that can’t make the next payroll and the economy hasn’t been strong.”
A better solution, said Riva, would have been to limit the wage increases only to workers age 21 and older and reserve a lower minimum wage for those ages 16 to 21, giving that younger age group time to gain experience and hone their work skills.
Minimum Wage Threat
According to the nonprofit Employment Policies Institute (EPI), which focuses on issues that affect entry level employment, research shows that raising the minimum wage hurts the least-skilled and least-experienced job seekers the most, “while having little to no effect on poverty rates.”
The EPI noted that a new survey conducted by CorCom Inc., a data management firm, and Carnegie Mellon University asked economists about their reaction to a $15 minimum wage. “It finds that 62 percent of U.S.-based economists oppose a $15 federal minimum wage,” EPI reported.
Three-quarters of respondents (75%) said that a $15 federal minimum wage “would have harmful effects on youth employment levels” and 81 percent of respondents said that a $15 minimum wage would make it more difficult for small businesses to stay in business.
Additionally, research conducted by economists from Miami and Trinity University found that as many as 1.2 million jobs could be lost with a $17 minimum wage
“Sixty-two percent will be among women, and 63 percent will be lost among 16- to 24- year-olds,” EPI reported.
Ryan Craig, owner of the Berkshire Country Store in Norfolk, said the rising minimum wage has negatively impacted his business, as well as some of his workers. Debra A. Aleksinas
‘I can’t be a first job anymore’
On a recent weekday in Norfolk’s quaint business center, Berkshire Country Store owner Ryan Craig greeted vendors, met with customers and assisted his bare-bones staff.
During a quick break, he recalled not so long ago when he had two store locations and 18 employees, 12 of them in Norfolk and a half-dozen in Canaan, which has since closed. Now he has six employees working full- and part-time.
Just days earlier, Berkshire Country Store marked its eighth anniversary, but its owner said he fears for his business’ future, as well as other small businesses in Northwest Corner, with no end in sight to the wage hikes.
“I think small towns are going to be in a world of hurt,” Craig predicted.
“When we opened the minimum wage was less than $10 an hour. That kind of stayed put for a while, and now it is $16.35,” he noted. To survive, the entrepreneur has raised costs and reduced hours of operation and staff. But it’s still a struggle, he said.
Like Riva in Canaan, Craig said he has stopped hiring high school students because “I can’t be a first job anymore.”
The Norfolk business owner said he is not against better pay for workers. He just thinks the system for handing out the raises is broken.
“Look at the cost of living here, and the struggle to find employees. They can’t afford to live in Norfolk,” said Craig, whose current staff commutes from Winsted. “And, soon, they may not be able to afford to live in Winsted.”
“If we are giving them a raise and they do better, that would be one thing. But because of the rising minimum wage, some of them are getting pulled off state benefits. So for that $1 an hour raise, they are now paying $500 a month for insurance, and also the deductibles.”
Craig said he feels like workers are being set up to fail.
“I feel like I’m doing something for the employees that is not helping them. And if it’s not helping me, then who is it helping?
Each piece makes a gift, a note or even a Christmas tree seem more personal, more considered, and more connected to humanity. Since then, demand for her personalized, hand-lettered tags, ornaments and cards has only grown, appearing in mailboxes across the region and at shops like the Cornwall Whale and Marton & Davis in Chatham, New York. Her precision is remarkable, and to watch her create these one-of-a-kind pieces is an art all unto itself.
In recent months, we’ve seen a deluge of stories on digital replacement. Data managers, bankers and even therapists are being replaced by computer programs in mass waves of layoffs. But what many still find surprising about the proliferation of nonhuman competitors in the job market is how it’s affecting the arts. Illustrators, animators, photographers, musicians and even on-screen actors are being supplanted by bots touted as “artificial intelligence agents.”
But calligraphy — and handwriting in general — has been in the crosshairs of mechanical progress for centuries. There was a time, if you can believe it, when writing anything required ink, paper and sometimes even a living, breathing human scribe. No typewriters, no word processors, no voice-to-text programs.
Then came Gutenberg’s printing press. Sure, it changed the world for the better, ensuring a greater distribution of ideas, and helping spark some of the most important political movements in history. But it also marked one of the first moments when technology replaced the artistic work of the human hand. Over the centuries, printers, designers and technologists have continued to innovate. Today, with Photoshop or Illustrator, an entire universe of alphabets exists, from ornate and embellished to precise and futuristic — all designed to replace the human hand.
Melissa Gamwell, crafting custom Valentine’s Day cards in her office in Cornwall. Kevin Greenberg
Yet, despite this centuries-long assault from technology, Gamwell has found her own way to thrive. Largely self-taught, she combines her drawing and industrial design background with an old-school New England childhood in Maine that involved “very tangible, hands-on, creative problem-solving using many materials.” Raised by “parents who loved antiquarian books, often filled with hand-written dedications,” hers was the kind of upbringing in which “traditional practices were cherished and flaunted” — a time and place with “hand-painted lettering on churches, street signage, the stones in beautiful churchyard cemeteries, and log books.”
Those early impressions have stayed with her, heightening her appreciation of sometimes overlooked details.
“There’s so much ephemera floating around with traces of beautiful handwriting to see everywhere, even now in Connecticut,” she said.
Even in a digital age, she keeps technology at a distance.
“You will not find ChatGPT on my phone, and you will usually not find my phone on me,” she said. Instead, she opts for a notebook, a scrap of paper or the back of a receipt. Sometimes, she goes even further, gathering black walnuts from trees on her property to make the specialized ink for her practice.
Gamwell’s approach to her craft is also philosophical. “There is no better feeling than working through something with your own brain and your own hands, even if you find it less exemplary than you would hope. And it only uses the water you’re already consuming. Do you need to convey an idea? Draw it, however horrific or childish. Write it, even if you never learned proper grammar — because you’ve always had programs do it,” she said.
“Sometimes I think that everything I like is ‘historic’ but it’s really that I just find more value in the traditional methods, which are still alive and well, and desperately in need of stewards for the future.”
After nearly 400 years of pressure, it’s encouraging to see handwriting — an art form that once seemed destined for obsolescence — still thriving, one careful stroke at a time. And thanks to Gamwell, perhaps there’s a new generation of observers, collectors and future calligraphers ready to carry it forward.
D.H. Callahan is a voice actor, creative director and trail steward. He lives with his wife, artist Lane Arthur, in West Cornwall, Connecticut.
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New works on display at Kenise Barnes Fine Art in Kent
An intricate woodcut print by Eve Stockton and the organized chaos of Margaret Neill’s abstract drawings dazzled the eye. But much of the show’s distinctive texture came from its sculptural works.
Catherine Latson’s wire structures, tightly wrapped in hand-dyed threads, bring to mind pastel- hued sea anemones and become more impressive upon closer inspection. Translucent, hanging cast-resin vampire bats by Tristan Fitch blend into the ceiling until viewed up close, when they become an inescapable presence.
Detail of“Specimen 42” by Catherine Latson at KBFAD.H. Callahan
An intriguing sculpture by Julie Maren features acorn caps affixed to the wall, filled with vibrant, shimmering colors.
Paintings and a sculpture crafted from reclaimed wood by Maine-based artist Matt Barter demonstrated the range of mediums represented by a single artist.
While some of the works are already spoken for, all are on view through late April.
For more information, visit kbfa.com
Harriet Newman Cohen
Provided
Cohen writes fearlessly, with a good dose of wry humor, about her own struggles balancing marriage and divorce, raising four daughters, entering Brooklyn Law School in 1971 at age 38, and her ensuing legal career. According to Bernstein, “Passion and Power” is as much about the reshaping of American cultural norms as it is about one remarkable woman’s role at the forefront of legal and social transformation.
Cohen’s work in the legal profession has been pivotal to social change. A 2021 HBO documentary, “Nuclear Family,” directed by Ry Russo-Young, chronicles the landmark custody struggle of Russo-Young’s parents, a queer couple who hired Cohen as their lawyer.
Cohen is an honest storyteller, unflinching in admitting her mistakes and rightly proud of her accomplishments. Her story ranges from tales of her father’s fortune made producing the Hula-Hoop to her memory of schoolmate Kiki Bader — Ruth Bader Ginsburg — as a cheerleader waving pom-poms in Brooklyn. She also writes of her deep love of family, the stultifying suburban life of her first marriage, mentorship by legal icon Louis Nizer and riding the wave of social revolution that buoyed her career.
Norfolk author Gillian Linden writes of her step-grandmother, “Harriet Newman Cohen is a funny, edifying guide — precise, curious, warm. Entirely unsentimental. Marriage and its many paths is rich territory. This book is filled with the strange, glamorous, desperate and sadistic characters you hope to meet in the very best novels.”
For details, visit norfolklibrary.org
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