TD Bank estimates increasing Ontario’s hourly minimum wage to $15 could cost the province up to 90,000 jobs.

“Ontario’s bold plan to raise the minimum wage by one-third over the next 18 months has fueled much debate about its potential impact on Canada’s largest economy,” the bank reports in its economic assessment released Tuesday.

“Raising the minimum wage can potentially generate more benefits to society than costs in terms of any resulting job lost. However, the relatively rapid speed of the implementation and its timing within the economic cycle are two factors that will likely accentuate the negative hit to Ontario employment,” TD warned.

“Our baseline job forecast builds in a net reduction in jobs of around 80,000 to 90,000 positions by the end of the decade,” said the bank, conceding the overall workforce would continue to rise after the $11.40 hourly rate jumps to $14 next year and $15 in 2019.

“The estimated job impacts would still leave employment expanding over the next few years, but, at a tepid clip of around 0.5 per cent annually.”

TD, which last month reported its quarterly profits skyrocketed by 17 per cent to $2.77 billion, recommends to “extend the implementation period by at least two years, to 2021.”

As well, it recommends “differentiated minimum wages across Ontario in order to alleviate adverse side effects.”

That would say a $15 rate in Toronto, where the cost of living is higher, but “in Windsor, an $11-$12 level would be more appropriate.”

Premier Kathleen Wynne dismissed the bank’s projections, which come after the province’s Financial Accountability Office estimated 50,000 jobs could be lost.

“We have duelling economists on this issue,” said Wynne.

“I have been very clear that in a province as wealthy as Ontario, to have people who are working full time at maybe two jobs and still having to go to the food bank . . . is unacceptable,” she said.

“And that’s why we’re raising the minimum wage.”

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