Of course the $15 per hours wage minimum is what we need now, not some
day in the future. By the time $15 is reached, we will be looking for
$20 minimum in order to barely survive.
While we must fight for the $15 wage minimum, we cannot lose sight of
the fact that it is only a temporary fix. If we are going to continue
on the track of raising the wage minimum to catch us up to the cost of
living, then we need to find some neutral board that can measure
honestly the rising cost of living. Even with the careful
manipulation by our Federal Government, the cost of living has risen.
I recall that in 1951 I was paid the minimum wage of 75 cents per
hour. That was 64 years ago. If we continue our present Capitalist
system, in the next 64 years our wage minimum would be somewhere
around $90 per hour, and the poor would continue struggling to make
ends meet.
We need a replacement for our Corporate Empire. A People's government
where all citizens own all of our government and all of our business
is long overdue. And don't trouble yourselves trying to tell me it
has been tried and failed in countries such as the Soviet Union or
Communist China. Efforts in those, and other countries, were
subverted by power hungry mobsters masquerading as Party Members.
There are solutions that would transition power to the People without
leaving doors open for the Foxes to enter. But given our current
state of mind it is doubtful that any such transition could even
begin.
Of course we are on track to solve many of our problems. Continuing
on the path of our growing Corporate Empires, we will soon see a huge
reduction in our Human Population due to starvation. As food becomes
too expensive and too rare, and as water becomes too polluted or non
existent, mass migrations will begin in seriousness. Millions will be
butchered as they fight to cross borders in search of food and water.
Diseases will take the lives of millions more. Open war between
Corporate Empires struggling to grab off what is left of our Planet's
natural resources will level cities and all who dwell within.
That is the track we are on. $15 per hour wage minimum will be a
fleeting bit of relief, unless we can take control and take a detour
toward a road leading to a, "One Planet, One People" world.
Carl Jarvis
On 8/1/15, Roger Loran Bailey <dmarc-noreply@xxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
http://themilitant.com/2015/7928/792804.html
The Militant (logo)
Vol. 79/No. 28 August 10, 2015
(front page)
Movement to raise minimum
wage gains ground across US
Militant/Sara Lobman
Rally in New York July 22 after state wage board recommended $15
fast-food minimum wage.
BY MAGGIE TROWE
NEW YORK — After three years of growing protests against wages that
don’t pay the bills, the fight of fast-food, Walmart and other workers
for $15 an hour scored a new round of victories and is gaining ground
across the country.
Cheers went up July 22 at a rally outside the hearing of the New York
State Fast Food Wage Board as participants watching the televised
proceedings on a big outdoor screen saw the board unanimously recommend
raising the minimum wage for fast-food workers in the state to $15 an
hour. Acting State Labor Commissioner Mario Musolino, who spoke at the
rally, is expected to accept the increase and implement it.
The increase to $15 for fast-food workers — a 70 percent raise from the
current $8.75 an hour state minimum wage — will be applied in
increments, reaching $15 for New York City workers by Dec. 31, 2018, and
for those outside the city by mid-2021. The wage hike applies to all
workers in outlets that are part of chains of 30 or more restaurants
that serve food and drinks paid for at counters by eat-in or take-out
customers. Some 180,000 people are employed at fast-food restaurants in
the state.
Los Angeles, San Francisco and Seattle have recently implemented $15 an
hour minimum wage laws, also incrementally applied over several years.
University of California President Janet Napolitano announced July 22
that the minimum wage for direct and contract employees working more
than 20 hours a week will be raised to $15 an hour by October 2017, a
move that will have an impact on about 3,200 workers throughout the state.
On July 21 the Los Angeles County Board of Supervisors, in a room packed
with people, voted to increase the minimum wage for county workers and
those who work in unincorporated areas of the county from $9 to $15 an
hour by 2020.
In Washington, D.C., the Board of Elections gave the go-ahead to a
$15-an-hour initiative that will appear on the ballot next year if its
supporters gather 23,000 signatures. The minimum hourly wage in the
District of Columbia is currently $10.50.
The fight by fast-food workers for “$15 and a union” began in 2012 and
has gained support since then. Thanksgiving weekend “Black Friday”
protests at Walmart stores began the same year and also picked up steam.
On April 15 of this year thousands of workers in several hundred cities
and towns across the U.S. and around the world marched in “Fight for
$15” actions, with Walmart, airport, home health care and other workers
joining the fast-food fighters.
Activists from the growing “Black Lives Matter” actions have joined the
Fight for $15 actions, and “Black Lives Matter” is a popular chant and
T-shirt slogan at rallies to raise the minimum wage.
Feeling the pressure, Walmart announced Feb. 19 it would raise starting
pay to $9 per hour in April and another dollar by February 2016. Then on
April 1 McDonald’s announced it would raise wages to at least $1 more
than the local minimum wage for the 90,000 workers employed directly by
the company. Some other retailers, including Target and TJ Maxx, have
followed suit.
Union support
Unionized workers who earn more than $15 per hour have turned out in
force to support raising the minimum wage. Contingents of the Hotel
Trades Council, janitors from Service Employees International Union
Local 32BJ, health care workers with 1199SEIU and members of the
Laborers and Carpenters construction unions joined the march of
thousands April 15 and the July 22 rally here.
“I’m here to support the fast-food workers,” Brandon Brigman, 29, a
porter in a commercial building in Manhattan and a member of Local 32BJ,
told the Militant at that rally. “They need $15 an hour, and they need a
union, too. There’s a big difference being in a union.”
Many at the rally who are not fast-food workers were buoyed by the
increase and confident it can be spread to others.
“I get $10 an hour and I only get 36 hours a week,” home health care
worker Oneka Rock, 37, told the Militant. “I couldn’t pay the $950 a
month rent on the studio I share with my daughter, so we moved in with
my mother.” Still, Rock is optimistic about the fight for $15. “My
friend works in fast food for $8.75. I’m trying to get her to come to
the protests, because only by doing that can we win anything.”
On another front in the fight for unions and higher wages, airport
workers at Aviation Safeguard, a contractor that employs 1,200 baggage
handlers, wheelchair attendants and security officers at Kennedy and
LaGuardia airports, called off a planned one-day strike July 21 after
the company agreed to stay neutral in their drive to be represented by
Local 32BJ. Workers said they planned the strike to protest company
intimidation against those fighting for higher wages and a union.
Deborah Liatos in Los Angeles contributed to this article.
Related articles:
Steel bosses push for steep concessions in contract talks
LA port drivers advance fight for union, wage hike
Verizon workers in 9 states and D.C. authorize strike
On the Picket Line
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