A stately minimum wage increase:
One day after President Obama called for a $9 an hour federal minimum wage in his State of the Union address, efforts to raise the lowest hourly pay allowed in Minnesota are gathering strength.
Gov. Mark Dayton, House Speaker Paul Thissen and Senate Majority Leader Tom Bakk all say it is time for Minnesota to lift the minimum wage, which now stands at $6.15 -- one of only four states with a wage less than the federal minimum.
"We want work to pay," Dayton said Wednesday. "It's long overdue."
A vision, in a dream. A fragment.
House Rep. Melissa Hortman, DFL-Brooklyn Park, and Sen. David Tomassoni, DFL-Chisholm, on Wednesday introduced a bill that would raise the state's minimum wage to $9.50 an hour and index it to inflation. That bill has drawn the support of House Majority Leader Erin Murphy, DFL-St. Paul, and a host of other DFL committee chairs, though critics say the bill could threaten a still-fragile economic recovery by making workers unaffordable.
Hortman said the increase is needed. "The more you raise the minimum wage, the more people you raise out of poverty," she said. Supporters say that as many as half a million Minnesota jobs pay less than $9.50 an hour.
It was a miracle of rare device,
A sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice!
10 comments:
"The more you raise the minimum wage, the more people you raise out of poverty"
I love this. But it raises a moral question. If Hortmann believes this, then why does she hate the poor so much? Why give them $9 an hour, which is a pittance? Why not $25 or $40?
Demographics and lack of qualified employees will take care of the minimum wage. I'd like to see a study of how many jobs vs. the entire job pool actually are at minimum wage.
This move won't bump anyone out of poverty, it may put some more dollars in the hands of part time student types, but if these people are at all saavy, they aren't making the minimum anyway. More feel good crap from our feel good politicians. Meanwhile Rome burns.....
I think Republicans should offer an amendment, assuming that sort of thing is even allowed in our "democratic" legislature, bumping the minimum wage to $100/hour. Why not? The same logic applies to %9.50, just to a lesser degree.
One fellow called into talk radio the last time this was discussed and said something like "I'm a conservative, but I'm all in favor of a minimum wage hike." And to the obvious next question he answered, "because I'm in the automation business, and every time the min wage goes up, my sales go through the roof." You can of course imagine what happens to those employees "lifted out of poverty" by being replaced entirely. Hmmmm, maybe we could replace the DFL legislature with a robot? It would have to have artificial intelligence, of course.
J. Ewing
What on earth makes you think that you'd need an intelligence function of any kind if you replaced the DFL legislature witha robot? I'm thinking poo flinging monkeys could do better!
What on earth makes you think that you'd need an intelligence function of any kind if you replaced the DFL legislature witha robot? I'm thinking poo flinging monkeys could do better!
Strikes me as a distinction without a difference, Bubba.
Could be you're right, BB. An infinite number of poo-flinging monkeys with an infinite number of typewriters might not only write "Wealth of Nations" but also understand it. The odds are at least better than the Dems and most of the Republicans in the state lege ever figuring it out.
I've always loved the infinite number of monkeys reference!
My first reaction when I read poo flinging monkeys was to think of the Twins 2012 pitching staff. But I am a National League guy first so I will defer to you over taxed Lakers as to whether hope springs eternal for 2013.
nothing says 'out of poverty' like 18k a year.
UN PRESIDENT TIM KALEMKARIAN, US PRESIDENT TIM KALEMKARIAN, US SENATE TIM KALEMKARIAN, US HOUSE TIM KALEMKARIAN: BEST MAJOR CANDIDATE.
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