Pay Workers A Living Wage Act

[LWolf]

Senator Bernard Sanders (I-VT), Rep. Keith Ellison (D-MN), and Rep. Raul Grijalva (D-AZ)

The Pay Workers a Living Wage Act phases in a $15 minimum wage by 2020 over 5 steps, increasing to $9 in 2016, $10.50 in 2017, $12.00 in 2018, $13.50 in 2019, and $15 in 2020. After 2020, the minimum wage will be indexed to the median hourly wage. The tipped minimum wage will be gradually eliminated.

http://www.sanders.senate.gov/download/15-minimum-wage-fact-sheet?inline=file

It looks like Sanders is already paying MORE than the minimum wage in this bill that he introduced to move us toward a $15 an hour minimum wage.

HRC has had her own problems with paying her staff: expecting field organizers, not volunteers, to work for free this summer.

In the big picture, though, a lot of people are working for free and for cheap for all the candidates. It takes a lot more people power than professional career campaigners.

[Agschmid]

1. If the candidates want $15 a hour...

They should pay it now, this applies to all of them.

[seaglass]

3. I agree, there is no excuse. n/t

[LWolf]

4. Only one of the candidates

has actually ACTED to begin the process of achieving a $15 minimum wage. And that candidate is ahead of his own curve in the process that he has introduced.

[stevenleser]

6. Except he isn't paying his own campaign workers $15/hr.

http://www.democraticunderground.com/1251479793#post7

And I am sure you realize that whatever discussion you and I have on this is moot. Should Bernie somehow win the nomination, the Republicans would make a big deal out of this and it looks bad.

[LWolf]

9. I'm sure you realize

that actually reading his plan to achieve $15 an hour, and noting that he is ahead of that curve, would be too painful for some Democrats as well as Republicans to acknowledge.

It doesn't look bad to be ahead of your own plan.

[stevenleser]

10. None of that will matter. The short soundbite is that he says workers should be paid $15 an hour

and he isn't doing it.

[JaneyVee]

12. I can see the RNC attack ads already...

"Socialist Bernie Sanders wants the state to plunder the wealth of small businesses but won't put his own money where his mouth is!"

[stevenleser]

14. Something very close to that. It's not hard to predict what the GOP will do most of the time.

This basically neutralizes the minimum wage issue for Bernie if he gets the nom.

[LWolf]

16. So we let short soundbites rule, or

we answer with substance?

He does a pretty good job handling the media. I think he'll handle short sound bites just fine. The real work will be to make sure that he gets to speak, and that people get to hear his responses to those short soundbites.

[stevenleser]

18. Of course, you fight it like hell. But we know from 40+ years of experience what the outcome of that

will be.

[LWolf]

20. I'm thinking that

my choices are to fight like hell, or to roll over, offer up my belly, and accept defeat, which is simply not in my make-up.

Or to take myself home, shut the door, and not show up at all.

I'll fight like hell.

[Agschmid]

21. So fight like hell...

Heck, do it now.

Demand our, candidates all of them, pay the wage they preach.

If anything it will show where Hillary really stands.

[Cheese Sandwich]

22. 1) Bernie has introduced a bill to raise minimum wage to $15 by 2020, raising gradual over the years

not all at once.

2) Hillary Clinton pays her interns zero.

[LWolf]

24. Those are 2 short, simple soundbites

that should be clear enough.

[cyberswede]

23. What will this soundbite be?

http://abcnews.go.com/Politics/hillary-clinton-campaign-hires-unpaid-labor-tackles-youth/story?id=31830227

[stevenleser]

25. Not nearly as devastating as the hypocrisy of Bernie not paying his staff $15/hr. nt

[cyberswede]

27. Because paying people $0 is better than a paying people couple bucks over the current minimum wage?

I find the notion that only people with means can afford to work for the Hillary campaign for free to be more upsetting than Bernie interns earning $10 an hour.

The Guardian [1] has reported that professionals are working for free on the Clinton campaign as ‘interns’ in hopes of a future job. This is yet another example of how unpaid internships promote inequality. What makes it worse is that those with enough privilege to quit their job to work for free are getting a leg up as a Washington DC ‘insider’ down the road. This is exactly how the political establishment stays richer, whiter, and more corporate friendly.

http://petitions.moveon.org/sign/hillary-clinton-dont.fb47?source=s.fb&r_by=5482506

When Hillary announced her second run for the White House, I felt my passion for politics reignite. I quickly applied for and was offered a position as a Hillary for America fellow to work on the campaign. I couldn't have been more excited — until I was told I'd have to move to Nevada and work full time on my own dime.

I couldn't believe my ears. I did not apply as a routine volunteer but as a fellow. Its application process with an elaborate screening and interview process was now revealed to be an ugly lie. If Hillary hopes to inspire young people, to prove she understands our interests she should offer substance to earn our votes.

http://www.usatoday.com/story/opinion/2015/06/23/hillary-clinton-unpaid-intern-millenials-column/28936259/

[Agschmid]

11. A lot of companies are ahead of his plan too...

Sure not all of them, but a bunch and some are major U.S. Employers.

The plan is good don't get me wrong but why not do it now? What's holding him back?

ETA: Or any of them?

[LWolf]

13. I can speculate.

Not that speculation is really worth anything.

What's holding him back?

His campaign, in not accepting big corporate donations, is running on a shoe-string budget. I think we're all aware of that, and that's probably a factor.

What do you think is holding any and all candidates back?

[Agschmid]

15. Apparently they are all paying what the market will bear...

IMO that really isn't the right thing to do... Yet here we are.

[Agschmid]

7. Any of his workers at $10.10 could get entry level jobs at Costco...

And be better off.

It's embarrassing for ALL our candidates.

[BainsBane]

26. He's the only one in congress at the moment

The others have no ability to introduce legislation. Though I think you well know it has a snowball's chance in hell of passing. Bernie certainly knows that.

[LWolf]

29. O'Malley is a governor.

Has he attempted to raise the minimum wage in Maryland?

Oh, yes, he did. Last year. To $10.10 an hour. But that doesn't take effect until 2018.

http://www.washingtonpost.com/local/md-politics/md-gov-omalley-signs-minimum-wage-increase-hundreds-of-other-bills-into-law/2014/05/05/98df84de-d46a-11e3-8a78-8fe50322a72c_story.html

Hillary Clinton, to her credit, worked to raise the minimum wage while she was in the Senate. She co-sponsored the bill that raised the minimum wage to $7.25 an hour. I'm sure that, were she in Congress at the moment, she'd support raising the minimum wage above that $7.25. She doesn't have to, though. She just has to talk about it.

[JaneyVee]

8. Bingo.

[PoliticAverse]

28. Should any candidates use unpaid volunteer help? n/t

[Agschmid]

36. All candidates do.

Some people like myself gladly volunteer our time, I don't think volunteers are the issue here?

[JaneyVee]

2. KNR! But maybe stop using debunked rightwing memes...

http://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/7117620

[LWolf]

5. Thanks for the link. nt

[JaneyVee]

17. You're welcome, but...

I find it odd you would use debunked RNC talking points to try and smear our possible Dem nominee.

[LWolf]

19. That talking point

is out there all over the place, not just from right-wing sites.

Please note that I took your link, which, ironically, is from HuffPo and often criticized here at DU (not by me,) read it, and took that part of the OP off.

It's not a smear if it's true. If it's not true, I'm not going to use it; hence the OP edit.

When someone formulates an OP about the candidate who is opposing their candidate of choice, is that a smear, or is that a comparison? It's campaigning either way. I'm sure you know that this OP, about Sanders, is in response to another OP by someone who would like to take him down. Is that OP a smear? Or a legitimate point? I'd think, if it were an attempt at a legitimate conversation, the information about Sander's work for a $15 minimum wage would be included. It wasn't; another DUer down the thread posted it, and it was mostly ignored. So I offered it upfront.

I did not start an OP about HRC's issues paying her staff this summer, although I could have. I did point out that NONE of the current candidates are paying their staff that $15, and that Sanders has actually introduced specific legislation to make that minimum wage happen, and is ahead of the curve on his own legislation.

Those are points that should be acknowledged.

[unapatriciated]

30. Thank you

Critical thinking seems to be forgotten during primaries

[Adrahil]

31. No one is mentioning this, but that approach to minimum wage is wrong.

It adopts a one-size-fits-all wage structure that affect urban and rural workers disproportionately. Also, it's tied to a "this is the wage" mentality that has us with a minimum wage that steadily decreases in real value.

What we need:

1. Establish a nominal national minimum wage based on the average national cost of living. This would be a living wage so that the worker and 2 dependents could live without public assistance. I won't give the number here, but I'm guessing it's in the $10-12/hr range.

2. The local minimum wage would be adjusted for cost of living. Higher cost of living areas get a boost, lower cost of living areas would be pared back. The idea is establish a relatively normalized standard for minimum wage standard of living. For example, where I live, $15/hour is above the mean household income (which is currently about $13/hr). OTOH, $15/hr in NYC is peanuts.

3. Every two years, both the nominal national minimum wage and the local cost of living adjustment would be made to the minimum wage. Increases would be automatic, and could only be stopped by a 2/3rds majority vote of Congress and the President's signature. Automatic reductions would not occur.

The idea is to ensure that the minimum wage at least maintains pace with inflation.

[LWolf]

32. In it's current form,

the act links the minimum wage to the median hourly wage. When the median goes up, so does the minimum.

I like the idea of a local COLA adjustment.

[Adrahil]

33. Glad to hear the current proposed act has automatic increases... my mistake.

I DO think we need the locality adjustments to really make it work, though.

[LWolf]

35. That's not a Sanders staff member.

That's me. I'll PM you a link, because that's not what this OP is about, and I'd like to avoid turning this thread into a focus on HRC.