The Ontario Chamber of Commerce says any suggestion that businesses aren’t doing their fair share is “offensive,” following the release of a new report that shows income inequality grew over between 2000 and 2015.

The report by the research institute Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives found the highest earning half of Ontario families raising children shared 81 per cent of earnings in 2013-2015 while the bottom half shared the remaining 19 per cent — a more uneven divide than the 78-22 split seen in 2000-2002.

The Losing Ground report called for employers to do their part to address rising inequality in earnings and offered support for proposed labour law reforms outlined in Bill 148, the Fair Workplaces, Better Jobs Act, which include raising the minimum wage to $15 by 2019 from the current $11.40.

The Ontario Chamber of Commerce, though, says the reforms outlined in Bill 148 will have unintended consequences.

“If you thrust these types of costs onto businesses there will be repercussions that will be paid for by most vulnerable people in our society,” said Karl Baldauf, the chamber’s vice president of policy and government relations.

Employers can only do what the broader business environment allows, he said, explaining they are providing jobs despite high costs to do business in Ontario.

“We can have all these philosophical conversations all we want but at the end of the day you’re going to people with very small margins . . . and you’re asking them to effectively implement social programs in an environment where they are finding it challenging,” Baldauf said. “We think that’s unfair.”

If government wants to raise the minimum wage by more than inflation each year, Baldauf said it should happen over a longer time period.

Sheila Block, who wrote the Losing Ground report, says years of academic studies show fears over job losses from increases to minimum wages haven’t borne out, though there may be a small negative impact on jobs for teenagers.

The general level of economic activity is “much more important than a minimum wage increase,” she said.

What an increase to the minimum wage will bring are decreases in poverty and inequality, and increases to local spending, she said.

Consumer spending accounts for 60 per cent of Ontario’s gross domestic product, Labour Minister Kevin Flynn said.

Flynn said the government wants to work with the chamber as well as other business groups that support an increase to the minimum wage on the proposed reforms. The bill was referred to committee earlier than is normal in the legislative process to allow for input, he said.

While Ontario’s economy is doing “very, very well,” not all Ontarians are sharing in the prosperity, Flynn said.

“There are people out there today in Ontario that are working very, very hard, they’re working as long as anybody else, they’re working 35-40 hour weeks, and they’re living in poverty,” he said. “If you need clearer evidence that there’s an imbalance out there that needs to be corrected, this report should drive it home for you.”

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Though the report shows government policies and programs have helped make up for the growing wage gap, Flynn said people don’t want to rely on government, they want to be rewarded for their work.

Government needs to be “firmly in the corner of those people that are simply not sharing in the prosperity,” he said, adding though that any new initiatives need to be undertaken in a way that allows for continued economic growth.