Minimum wage hike and low-income subsidies

Cara Michele posed some interesting questions in a recent post at Ed Cone's site:

Re: Minimum wage and social services
Some individuals and families in the Food Stamp and Medicaid programs would be affected, as would some individuals and families in voucher or grant-based housing programs. When you raise income, some people will lose benefits. Some of the benefits may be offset by the rise in income, some may not. (Medicaid is a good example. If your income rises and you lose Medicaid, but you don't have insurance, then you stand to lose much more than you gain.) I wonder if anyone has looked at how all this ties together? Will minimum wage workers who lose government food, medical and housing benefits make enough in increased income to help them, or will it hurt them? I'd like to know.

I'm no expert in social services, but I've tried to ask around and do a bit of superficial internet research. What I've found is that the requirements to receive benefits like Medicaid, Medicare, food stamps, etc. are such that recipients basically can not work a full time job. For example, according to this state website, the two sets of requirements for getting food stamps are as follows:

Low Income Subsidy --- A program that provides additional assistance for Medicare beneficiaries with income less than 150% of the federal poverty level for the Medicare Part D program.

Medicaid Family Planning Waiver (FPW)--- A program for men, ages 19 through 60, and women, ages 19 through 55, with income at or below the 185% of the poverty level, to receive family planning services.

Medicare is reserved, as I've been told, for people who are over 65 or who have a disability that basically prevents them from working. Medicaid requirements, set by the state, are such that it looks like one would also have to basically not work (at least full time) in order to receive those benefits. (Check out cryptic table that only makes a little bit of sense to me here.)

Affordable housing programs may be different. I will try to research that question with folks at the Housing Coalition soon. But when it comes to Habitat for Humanity, I know that there is no requirement that a homeowner maintain a low wage. In fact, HfH wants homeowners to be able to provide for themselves. Helping them with purchasing an affordable house (which they actually work quite hard for), is actually one step in that process of increasing self sufficiency. And other private (non-profit) housing assistance programs I've worked with outside of Greensboro have the same philosophy. I do not know about section 8 housing and would like to hear from a reader who knows more about this area about whether/how a minimum wage hike might impact those residents.

Overall it would seem to me (though I'm open to being proven wrong) that our campaign is aimed to help folks who are largely in a different income bracket than those who qualify for these subsidies. I am sure that there will be some overlap, but the general consensus of folks with whom I spoke yesterday was that the overlap would be quite small.

New minimum wage study released

A new study about the impact of raising the minimum wage in Canada has just been released by the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives. Again, even though the report is about Canada, the arguments seem quite similar to those in the US.

Some highlights from the report (which I'm still reading so could be adding more thoughts later):

Critics typically make three types of arguments against increasing minimum wages: there are so few people working at the minimum wage the problem is trivial; because most minimum wage earners are young people living at home, we shouldn’t be worried about what they are paid, and; negative employment effects from increasesin minimum wages are so substantial that higher minimum wages will actually hurt more than they will help.

This study debunks those myths.

...

Some critics characterize minimum wage policy as strictly an antipoverty measure and dismiss the minimum wage as a “blunt instrument for dealing with poverty.” This study, by contrast, sets minimum wage policy in its appropriate context as labourmarket regulation. It argues that the minimum wage is a reflection of the value our society places on work.

While a decent minimum wage would help alleviate poverty, it cannot be expected to eliminate poverty. Minimum wage policy is but one tool in a toolbox of policy options which, taken as a whole, can go a long way to addressing Canada’s persistent poverty problem.

This study finds many positive effects of a higher minimum wage, including:
• Increasing the minimum wage benefits all low-wage workers. It helps those who earn between the current minimum wage and the new higher minimum wage. And it helps those who are paid close to the level of the new minimum wage.
• Good employers who pay decently (or want to), but who compete with firms that don’t, will find themselves on a more level playing field.

• Employers will also benefit from less turnover and easier recruitment. Workers can easily be lured away from employers that provide low pay. The negative consequences of high turnover include added staffing and training costs, administrative costs, operational disruption, lost productivity, and low morale.
• A higher minimum wage can increase the independence and self-sufficiency of teens and youth — enabling young adults to leave home, and helping to reduce post-secondary education debt loads.
• Finally, increasing the total wage bill for those at the bottom end of the labour market can also lead to positive health outcomes. The broader trend is that poverty increases illness and health costs.

20% of New Mexico's workers are getting a raise

And New Mexico raises its state minimum wages again, this time to $7.50 by January 2009:

"The Congress goes ahead and gives themselves pay raises, but for 10 years they have not increased the minimum wage, and we are not waiting," [NM Governer Bill] Richardson said at a news conference.

Victor Montoya, a grocery store owner in Anthony, applauded the new law.

"It costs $4 for a gallon of milk, $3 (per-gallon) for gas — how can people survive if everything else is going up?" he said. "It's a progressive bill for New Mexico."

The new law will not impact the higher wages already in place in Santa Fe ($9.50) that could be raised to $10.50 next year, but it will prevent other communities in NM from raising their minimum wages above the state floor until at least 2010.

Minimum wage, Taiwanese style

Another LTE yesterday about the minimum wage. It all sounds very familiar when you read this line:

The fact that this pittance has not risen for 10 years is another shocking expose of this country's values.

But the letter is actually about the minimum wage in Taiwan, some of the arguments around which seem to be the same as they are in Greensboro even though theirs is currently a minimum monthly wage rather than hourly. An interesting soundbyte:

It is no excuse to quote company bosses who complain about competition from China and other Asian countries. The Japanese learned this lesson, and through hard work they developed high quality products while managing to pay a decent wage.

LTE writer calls for further minimum wage hikes

In a Letter to the Editor in yesterday's N&R, Melissa Kraskouskas writes:

The 2006 N.C. General Assembly should be applauded for increasing the state's minimum wage to $6.15 per hour; yet, their work is not over because the minimum wage is still not high enough to provide for the basic needs of individuals and families . . .

Individuals who earn a living at minimum wage are often the most marginalized and are subject to a wage that has not sufficiently increased with inflation. Women, minorities and low-income workers are typical minimum-wage earners. . .

Without greatly harming the economy, a further increase in the minimum wage would help alleviate poverty by providing disadvantaged, low-wage adult workers with a fair wage that is sufficient to meet their basic needs.

Minimum wages are rising (Tubby is leaving)

In all of the mourning about Tubby leaving UK, Kentucky residents might have missed the news that they are getting a raise.

A little farther north, minimum wage will be rising to $10.25 in Ontario.

N&R Column

Here is our column in today's News & Record (not available at their website):

Community Shows Respect for Workers by Raising Minimum Wage

by Malcolm Kenton and Fahiym Hanna


According to Gandhi, one of the eight blunders of humanity is “commerce without morality.” A market economy may be able to provide benefits to a great many people, but if it acts without moral restraint, it tends to leave a great many people unable to afford life’s necessities. Rather than relying on taxpayers and charitable organizations to provide for the poor, it makes more sense for the law to give the poor a fair wage so they can provide for themselves. As the market raises the price of everyday goods from food to gasoline, it is unfair not to raise the minimum wage to allow everybody to afford these things. The Greensboro Minimum Wage Ordinance, which we seek to place before the City Council as a citizens’ initiative, aims to make a positive, democratic statement about the kind of community we want to live in. Should the Council reject the Ordinance, the voters will decide its fate this November.


Raising the minimum wage to a level that allows working people to provide for their basic necessities is a way that the citizens of Greensboro can show respect for working people and for the dignity of work. Some have argued that municipalities have no authority to set a minimum wage above that of the state or the federal government. The people of Santa Fe and San Francisco, however, have enacted higher minimum wages without a successful challenge in court. As citizens in a democracy, we have the power to help shape our community. Enacting the Greensboro Minimum Wage Ordinance sends a powerful message that we envision ourselves to be a community where no one who works a full-time job should have to live in poverty.


Given the increasingly global nature of the economy, some say that raising Greensboro’s minimum wage will make us uncompetitive and drive jobs away. Dire predictions from some economists that raising the minimum wage eliminates low-paying jobs and destroys businesses have not proven true in US states and cities that have raised their minimum wages well beyond the federal minimum of $5.15 per hour. Small businesses have actually grown faster in states with a higher minimum wage than those that follow the federal baseline. But also, we must ask ourselves whether the jobs the city may lose are jobs we really want in the first place. For the unemployed, it is reasonable to hold that any job is better than none at all. But that does not mean that we cannot also declare that the kinds of jobs that only pay the current minimum wage are the kinds of jobs we do not want to attract to our community. We have a right to demand more gratifying labor and healthier workplaces.



Even in a market economy, communities, acting through the democratic process, ought to establish certain limits on the behavior of businesses to ensure that they act in the public interest. Fair labor standards, public health and safety protections and environmental safeguards are all ways in which our governments keep the reins on the wild stallion that is the market. Most Americans agree that there is a dollar amount below which it is unfair and unethical to compensate people for their labor. For these Americans the only points of contention are (a) what that dollar amount should be and (b) who should decide. The Greensboro Minimum Wage Ordinance states that the amount of $9.36 per hour equals the purchasing power of the federal minimum wage in 1968. Since the federal and state governments do not have the willpower to enact such a reasonable wage, it is up to the local communities to act.



For those of us who make at or near the minimum wage, this will represent a significant change in our income and consequently our ability to participate more fully in the life of our community. For the majority of Greensboro workers who make more than $9.36 per hour, supporting the citywide wage increase should be seen as a sign of support and respect for our neighbors and for those who perform the tasks that keep us comfortable, offer us conveniences and keep our city moving. Your signature and vote for the Greensboro Minimum Wage Ordinance is a vote for a healthier community, improved quality of life and respect for the dignity of labor.

Other cities can raise minimum wage, too

GMW committee member Billy Jones commented in a thread below:

For those who may be dropping in from other cities I just wanted to add that almost every city in the United States of America has the legal right to set a minimum wage above that which is set by the state and Federal governments? Your local government probably doesn't want you to know that but you heard it here. If your city is granted "police powers" by the state in which you live then Federal Appeals Courts have already ruled that you have the right to raise minimum wage.

Looks like Sarasota, FL is one of those cities contemplating such a step. City Commissioners there are pushing for a minimum wage of $9.96. It looks a little different than the ordinance in Greensboro, but the arguments for it (and against it, I suppose) are basically the same.

N&R column tomorrow

Check out the News & Record's op-ed page for a column by the Greensboro Minimum Wage Committee tomorrow.

Then, make sure to read Sunday's Idea section for stories of local people who are currently earning something close to the state's minimum wage of $6.15 and a column on the topic of minimum wage by Andrew Brod (who previously shared thoughts here).

Morality of the Minimum

I was inspired by my conversation with Tony Ledford (in the comments section here) to share these quotes from a January article in The Nation:

Despite the media's conclusion in 2004 that "moral values" appealed only to people who oppose abortion, gay marriage and stem-cell research, the minimum wage emerged as the clear values issue of 2006.

Katy Heins, an Ohio organizer, said the issue was particularly resonant in Ohio, which has been ravaged by job losses in recent years. "People were working hard and still lining up at food pantries--and this showed that there was something not right economically, but also wrong morally," said Heins. "It led to a strong surge of people of faith who are saying, 'I'm concerned with poverty and the war and other things that are going on in our country, rather than just the gay marriage issue and the abortion issue.'"

"We think we succeeded, along with others, in making the minimum wage issue the values issue of the 2006 campaign by appealing to people's better instincts," says [Rev. Paul] Sherry. "We helped people of faith see that if their faith was to be genuine, the minimum-wage issue was a significant vehicle to translate their convictions into a functioning reality. While other issues might divide people of faith, this one united them."

Understanding low wage work in the US

A new report from The Mobility Agenda begins:

Over 40 million jobs in the United States—about one in three—pay low wages. Unlike good jobs, most low-wage jobs do not offer employment benefits such as health insurance or retirement accounts, tend to have inflexible or unpredictable scheduling requirements,and provide little opportunity for career advancement. Globalization, automation, outsourcing, and other economic forces have all contributed to a changing domestic labor market. All too often low-wage jobs are replacing jobs that have traditionally supported a broad middle class. While there is considerable public concern about the erosion of the middle class, national policy-makers have done little in the last decade to improve the pay and conditions of low-wage work.

The next decade could be one of considerable progress for improving low-wage jobs. In November 2006, voters in six states boosted state minimum wages, and voters in even more states elected candidates who pledged to increase the federal minimum wage and take steps to improve the economy for everyone. Yet relatively little agreement exists about the policies (beyond raising the minimum wage) that can improve these jobs, even among experts studying low-wage work.

Lunch with the League

The League of Women Voters will present a program this Tuesday, March 20 at 12:15 on The Impact of the Minimum Wage. The program is free. Lunch is optional at $8. For more information go to lwvpt.org.

Details:

Lunch with the League
Tuesday, March 20, 2007
12:15 p.m.
Holy Trinity Episcopal Church
607 N. Greene Street, Greensboro
$8.00 Reservations: 378-4457 or LWVPT@earthlink.net

Raising the minimum wage builds social capital

I attended the Community Foundation's community dialogue yesterday about the 2006 National Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey. The room was full of some powerful people who care a great deal about Greensboro.

The first of many charts Walker Sanders (of the Community Foundation) showed us was shocking to some. It showed that Greensboro's median household income had dropped from $39,661 in 2000 to $36,773 in 2005. This was compared to the national levels of $41,994 in 2000 that grew to $46,242 in 2005.

The second chart showed that the number of individuals living below the poverty level in Greensboro grew from 12.3% in 2000 to 17.3% in 2005. That's compared to the national averages which grew from 12.4% in 2000 (about the same as Greensboro during that year) to only 13.3% in 2005.

During the discussion section of the meeting, former Mayor Jim Melvin said (as quoted in the News & Record): "The statistic there that's most damning is the per-capita income, and we ought to be shocked at this . . . The trouble is ... we spend so much time talking about what we disagree on, not what we agree on."

Personally, I don't think it such a bad thing for us to talk about things about which we disagree. I even think it could be healthy (and certainly more interesting). For example, the former mayor and I would likely disagree about what to do about the shocking statistics on poverty in Greensboro, but I would welcome a chance to discuss that with him and I would probably even learn something through that discussion.

But I can agree with the former mayor's sentiment that the statistics on poverty in Greensboro are "damning" and we need to do something about them.

I also agree with Dr. Goldie Wells' statement at the meeting in response to another shocking statistic related to our lack of trust for government institutions including the police department (Greensboro ranked the lowest in this category of all cities studied). "Trust begins with truth," the city councilwoman said.

Our citizens intitiative to raise the minimum wage ties Wells' concerns to Melvin's (as I imagine Dr. Wells might agree). Distrusting or feeling unrepresented by government institutions is a sign of a democracy that needs some work.

City Manager Mitch Johnson told the group yesterday that the new police chief's #1 priority would be to rebuild trust with the community. Great.

This citizens initiative is working on the issue from the other end. It is getting citizens involved in the democratic process in a way that isn't just focused on voting in November. And it is also an effort to expand democracy because better paid workers are more able to participate in their communities, including their government institutions.

And if folks are actually a part of these institutions, then it only makes sense that they are going to feel more trust for them.

Raise minimum wage to boost economy

Oren M. Levin-Waldman and Charles J. Whalen, guest essayists for the Rochester Democrat and Chronicle, wrote this column about a proposed federal wage hike. Some highlights:

In 2005, Florida initiated the first in a series of scheduled increases to its minimum wage. According to a recent study by Bruce Nissen of Florida International University, the wage hike had no negative impact on Florida jobs. In fact, in the wake of the minimum-wage hike, unemployment plummeted statewide. . .

As in Florida, the institute found no negative effect on jobs [in Rochester], which is, of course, good news since the Rochester area has seen scant job growth since the U.S. expansion began in late 2001. The extra federal wage hike certainly won't pinch western New York employers, but area wage-earners will surely welcome the added pay.

The minimum wage findings in Florida and New York are good for the poor and for business. The key to the success lies in the fact that the minimum wage is a broad labor-market issue — a middle-class issue. Chalk it up to wage contours or hard-nosed economic reality, but it is time for Congress to raise the minimum wage for the sake of the middle class.

N&R talks about impact of minimum wage hike in Greensboro

Alright, so the headline above is a little misleading. The N&R article to which I'm pointing you was actually written by Jason Hardin in January and was about the impact of the state hike of the MW to $6.15. But the arguments in the article don't seem so different from the arguments about our current campaign, so I thought it might be worth a look now.

The article starts with this:

A dollar an hour — or less — might not sound like much of a raise.

But maybe it is if you’re working at a gas station and supporting two kids.

Cheryl Davis works at the Texaco on Summit Avenue in Greensboro. To her, getting bumped up to the state’s new minimum wage of $6.15 doesn’t sound that bad.

Davis, who will make an extra 15 cents an hour, said she’ll use the money to buy more things such as clothes and toys for her children. The increase, she said, was long overdue.

"It’s not fair to make so little," she said.

Minimum wage hike as a civil rights issue?

In a statement introducing the Joint Center for Political and Economic Studies Report on the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, President Ralph B. Everett writes:

"If the [Fair Minimum Wage] Act is passed [by the Senate] and signed by the President, it will have a significant positive impact on the African American community. . . Although a number of states have minimum wages that are currently above the federal minimum, many of which will continue to rise faster than the federal minimum, African Americans are more likely to live in states that either have no minimum or have minimums equal to the federal rate. Our analysis reveals that the largest number of black workers who would receive wage increases as a result of federal or state minimum wage increases can be found in southern states. . .

"While critics of the minimum wage increase have suggested that it will have adverse impacts on businesses and employment, the weight of the economic evidence suggests otherwise. In fact, we envision a positive economic impact, as most minimum wage workers have no choice but to put their pay raises right back into their local economies as they spend them on the necessities of daily life."

Japan raises the minimum wage to boost economy

"As part of the government's efforts to close the gap between between rich and poor and boost economic growth," Reuters reports that Japan's cabinet voted today to approve an updated minimum wage bill which calls on regional wage-setting committees to raise their minimum wage standards and dramatically raises the fines imposed on businesses who fail to comply with the regional standards.

Reuters writes, "Raising the minimum wage is also part of the government's economic policy to boost the nation's growth potential. The government argues that by raising the lowest wage level, it would help small to mid-sized firms attract able workers and thus increase companies' productivity."

Why is the Japanese government pushing forward such an economic policy? "Prime Minister Shinzo Abe and his administration have been pressed to put forward measures to improve the livelihood of low-wage workers amid growing public outcry that income disparity is increasing despite the current economic recovery."

Sounds familiar.

Ehrenreich on minimum wage increases

On her blog, Barbara Ehrenreich, author of Nickle and Dimed, writes about a recent trip to Seattle. She tried to take a ham with her on the plane, sure that, given the state of Washington's high minimum wage, fast food meals would cost $20 and the soup kitchens would be full of unemployed restaurant employees. Instead she writes:

Overall, 29 states have raised their minimum wages above $5.15 an hour, and – lo!—the sky has not fallen. Could we have some apologies, please, from the economists who predicted a retail apocalypse? . . . There is no moral justification for a minimum wage lower than a living wage. And given the experience of the 29 states that have raised their minimum wages, there isn’t even an amoral economic justification either.

Click here for the full entry.

Elsewhere on her website, Ehrenreich posts a 2005 press release from the Center for Economic and Policy Research which includes this clip:

[B]etween 1979 and 2004 the share of American workers in good jobs remained unchanged at about 25 percent, despite strong economic growth over that period. (The report defines a "good job" as one that offers at least $16 per hour or $32,000 annually, employer-paid health insurance and a pension.) In the last quarter century, the U.S. workforce has become older, more experienced and better educated, but 75 percent of workers are still struggling in jobs that do not provide health insurance, a pension and solid middle-class wages.

WFMY news coverage of petition drive

Frank Mickens joined our committee members on E. Market St. during the petition drive on Saturday and reported on it for WFMY2.

Saturday conversations about the minimum wage

We got hundreds of signatures during our petition drive yesterday and educated even more people about what this campaign is about. Along with Ed Whitfield and Malcolm Kenton, I was stationed at the Farmers Curb Market on the corner of Yanceyville and Lindsay Streets. We had the opportunity there to meet many people who would personally benefit from a minimum wage hike, several small business owners who supported the campaign and many fewer folks who were either on the fence or opposed to the initiative, but who hung around to talk about it for a few minutes. (We also met a vendor who worked for the city and told us that she had called the city attorney's office who told her that we could not be soliciting signatures on city property. I'm no attorney, but that seemed like a strange interpretation of the Constitution to me.)

Marilyn Baird, Donny and Billy Jones were in a local grocery store parking lot commanding a great deal of attention with Billy's plane. I showed up to take a picture right as the police and store management were asking them to leave. Still others were at another grocery store parking lot and at the Flea Market on US-29.

After a morning of a planned petition drive, I met many more people during the course of my day who could benefit from a minimum wage hike.

The first was a man in his 30s with a college degree who is making $7.35/hour at a call center where he has to field calls for, among other companies, Hospice. He said that he received a call recently from a woman who told him that her husband had just died.

Later in the day, I walked into a gas station with a friend. For some reason, I was holding my clipboard which made the cashiers nervous. (They thought I, looking so official, was from ALE and was trying to catch them selling cigarettes or alcohol to minors.) When I explained what the petition was, the men were so excited about how they and their friends could benefit from a minimum wage hike that they signed the petition, called up their friends to get them to come sign it and encouraged customers in the store to sign it as well. Among these folks, I met a young man who is earning $6.75 in a restaurant job where he was worked for a year.

Everyone seemed a bit nervous to talk about wages and I think there are many reasons for this. First, our culture tends to teach us it is impolite to talk about money. (Personally, I think it tends to be people who have a great deal of money who conveniently think it is impolite to talk about their personal finances, but I guess the sentiment works on the whole society.) But some people I met yesterday said that they had even been expressly forbidden by their employers from talking with anyone about how much money they make.

What and whose purpose does either a tacit, cultural taboo on speaking about wages or an official demand that wages not be discussed serve? I am hoping that this campaign can help us in Greensboro to dismantle this barrier to talking about wages which may, in turn, give us some insight about other barriers and divisions we, as a community, seem to be unable to overcome.

Reminder: Saturday petition drive

Details here.

Question and answers

A question submitted to askquestions.org:

To what extent are the profits earned by minimum-wage employers like Walmart and Mcdonald's subsidized by the other tax payers? And why hasn't the government raised the minimum wage in so many years? Who's blocking a raise for minimum wage workers?

The response can be found here. A few highlights:

[I]n 1975, CEOs earned only 78 times the minimum wage earners of their day. But today's average Chief Executive earns 821 times what a minimum wage worker earns.

Who are the minimum wage workers? . . . 60% of minimum wage earners are working in restaurants and bars. Two thirds are women (65.6%), 73% are white, and 70.2% of them have a high school diploma. Only 26% of minimum wage earners are teenagers between the ages of 16 and 19 while 47% are age 25 or older. Nearly 60% work part-time.

Reason #4 to raise the minimum wage

The following is a reflection from Turner Battle, GMW committee member, about why the minimum wage should be raised in Greensboro:

Imagine the following conversation:

Person 1 - Labor costs make up about 60 to 70 percent of a company's total operational costs. One obvious way to cut costs when a business is going through a losing period is to trim labor expenditures. Usually this is done by cutting wages or instituting lay offs. Wage cuts usually aren't very popular with employees and workers may adjust their productivity accordingly...much to the chagrin of the firm which may suffer a net loss in profits. Companies will often favor lay offs. The remaining workforce will not be angered by a cut in salary and remain motivated and productive.

Person 2 - Wait a minute! Often companies will expect much more productivity from the retained work force. What begins with a sigh of relief and a firm congratulatory pat on the back from a foreman usually ends with a manager expecting a dramatically higher level of productivity from you and consequently, your realizing a lower life expectancy. Things really get gooey when outsourcing is involved. The employer can actually compare the output of the outsourced slave labor to that of the retained worker. Guess who gets the (non monetary) kudos? Resentment = unpredicted drop in productivity from a smaller work force = profit loss.

This type of back and forth is typical in discussions about topics like this. Laymen compare figures, rates, and statistics. The intellectual narcissists gather and pontificate. Enter the number crunchers who, in the end, crunch more people than numbers. When the dust clears, things are just as bad if not worse. After all ... time is passing and with each tick of the clock, 1968 becomes more distant. Folks enlist math and logic to help provide respite in life's dilemmas and find something less desirable than raw sewage.

Why not err on the good side of ethics and pay a fair wage for a day's work ... adjusted for inflation and location. If an heiress to a hotel fortune can make extra millions in pocket change simply because she's more wacky than her other female tax bracket mates then morality dictates that a person who works a daily eight hour shift performing brutal manual labor in sweltering temperatures should not be obliged to objectively describe his/her week ending check as being a mere pittance. Skeptics would describe this idea as another pathetic example of "Do-Gooders Gone Wild." I say, BUDGET IT IN! $9.36/hr. After all….this is America.

European minimum wage

Not everyone has the same minimum wage. Check out the rate (in USD) that other countries have set for 2007:

Luxembourg $11.53

England $10.43

Ireland $10.17

Netherlands $9.80

Belgium $9.47

France $9.33

Why can’t we do better for our working people in the United States?

(Source. Figures adjusted using Euro exchange rate 1.3.)

Who benefits from a minimum wage hike?

Click here for an October 2006 MSNBC article about economists - over 650 of them, including 5 winners of the Nobel Prize in economics - calling for a minimum wage hike in the US. Sure, there are some differences in calling for a hike in the US and calling for a hike in a local city, but some of the quotes in the article are relevant to our discussion here.

First, with regards to who benefits from a wage hike:

The economists wrote, “While controversy about the precise employment effects of the minimum wage continues, research has shown that most of the beneficiaries are adults, most are female, and the vast majority are members of low-income working families."

And second:

The economists wrote that they share the view of a 1999 Council of Economic Advisors Economic report that found “the weight of the evidence suggests that modest increases in the minimum wage have had very little or no effect on employment.”

Petition Drive/Voter Registration - Saturday (3/10)

Interested in signing the Greensboro Minimum Wage Petition? Need to register to vote or transfer your registration?

You've got four opportunities this Saturday, March 10 from 8:00 - 11:00a.m.:

• Flea Market (on US-29)
• Farmers' Market (across from War Memorial Stadium, at the intersection of Yanceyville and Lindsay Streets)
• Food Lion (at intersection of Market and English Streets)
• Food Lion (at intersection of Alamance Church Road and Martin Luther King, Jr. Blvd.)

FDR's 1944 State of the Union Address

Excerpt from Franklin D. Roosevelt's 1944 State of the Union Address:

This Republic had its beginning, and grew to its present strength, under the protection of certain inalienable political rights—among them the right of free speech, free press, free worship, trial by jury, freedom from unreasonable searches and seizures. They were our rights to life and liberty. As our nation has grown in size and stature, however—as our industrial economy expanded—these political rights proved inadequate to assure us equality in the pursuit of happiness. We have come to a clear realization of the fact that true individual freedom cannot exist without economic security and independence. “Necessitous men are not free men.” People who are hungry and out of a job are the stuff of which dictatorships are made. In our day these economic truths have become accepted as self-evident. We have accepted, so to speak, a second Bill of Rights under which a new basis of security and prosperity can be established for all—regardless of station, race, or creed.

Among these are:

• The right to a useful and remunerative job in the industries or shops or farms or mines of the nation;


• The right to earn enough to provide adequate food and clothing and recreation;


• The right of every farmer to raise and sell his products at a return which will give him and his family a decent living;


• The right of every businessman, large and small, to trade in an atmosphere of freedom from unfair competition and domination by monopolies at home or abroad;


• The right of every family to a decent home;


• The right to adequate medical care and the opportunity to achieve and enjoy good health;


• The right to adequate protection from the economic fears of old age, sickness, accident, and unemployment;


• The right to a good education.

All of these rights spell security. And after this war is won we must be prepared to move forward, in the implementation of these rights, to new goals of human happiness and well-being. America’s own rightful place in the world depends in large part upon how fully these and similar rights have been carried into practice for our citizens.

Boyett responds to Brod, Part 2

Here is the second part of Jim Boyett's response to Andrew Brod's comments here earlier in the week:

I was glad to see that Andrew Brod took the time and effort to comment on the proposal to increase the minimum wage in Greensboro. We need a broad discussion of the issue from all points of view My hope would be this will lead to a better decision by the people when they make their decision. I want to comment on several points that he made. . .

Brod said: "But in a market economy like ours, the price system is such a delicate and informative mechanism that I'd rather we just left it alone."

Whenever I hear someone talk about " The Market" my first reaction is to grab my wallet and hold on tight because I know the next thing I hear will be an economic expert explaining why I should pay more for something like prescription drugs or electricity. In my opinion we have never had a market economy. We have a managed economy. There is no market without the government writing the rules that allow the market to operate. Business pays lobbyists billions to write rules favorable to them. Favorable patent laws have more to do with the price of prescriptions than " The Market". The fraud and legislative action that created Enron had more to do with the outrageous cost of electricity in California than "The Market". According to Slate Magazine, 35,000 lobbyists spend $2 Billion per yr to influence Congress. Why is all this money being spent? Don't these businessmen know that if they just leave the delicate market system alone it will magically solve all their problems?

It is not the action of science and markets that causes poverty, it is the fear, greed and actions of men that causes poverty. The purpose of an economic system should be to serve the people and when the economic system doesn't serve them well they should change the economic system and their representatives.

I intend to put my faith in the promise of democracy, not the market. Direct democracy at the local level will allow people an opportunity to propose changes that can improve their lives without having to spend billions of dollars.

Yes! Weekly coverage of Minimum Wage blog

Although only a couple weeks old, this site is getting news coverage from Yes! Weekly already.

An excerpt from the article:

[Jill] Williams said she does not expect to win many converts through blogging, but said it's good to get the discussion out in the open.

"The majority of the people who visit the blog will not be impacted by a raise in the minimum wage and may not be its biggest supporters," she said. . . And the message the minimum wage campaign blog wants to convey is simple."The message is: six-fifteen is not enough," [Committee leader Mairlyn] Baird said.