Owning up to a mistake
When the California Chamber of Commerce claimed earlier this summer that it had found a hidden, $7 billion cost associated with an increase in the minimum wage, it was an astonishing claim that seemed, well, too astonishing to be true. Turned out it wasn't true at all.
An examination of the claims, spurred in part by reporting by The Ventura County Star (see story), showed that the estimate was off by at least a factor of 10. Chamber lobbyist Julianne Broyles brought the mistake to the attention of the author of the bill to raise the minimum wage in California, Assemblywoman Sally Lieber.
Now, in its most recent "Action Alert," the Chamber has taken another step to set the record straight. On the front page, it features a story headlined, "Correction on Minimum Wage Hike Analysis."
Those of us in the newspaper business, who take a certain amount of institutional pride in a commitment to publicly correct mistakes, know that such prominent corrections can be embarrassing. But it's always the right thing to do. Give the Chamber of Commerce credit; the correction gives some credence to the article's opening sentence: "Accuracy is important to the California Chamber of Commerce."
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