GOP lawmaker kills $12 min. wage bill to protect jobs… queue hypocritical Democrat outrage
Republican State Senator Michael Baumgartner—chair of the Senate’s Commerce and Labor Committee—last week defied the threats made by Seattle billionaire Nick Hanauer. As Shift reported, Hanauer attempted to blackmail lawmakers into passing a House bill that would raise the state’s minimum wage – which is already the highest in the nation – to an even higher $12 per hour by vowing to pursue a statewide $16 minimum wage initiative in 2016 if they did not. Baumgartner conducted a public hearing on the bill, and then decided not to advance the legislation.
The Freedom Foundation points out that Baumgartner’s decision prompted outrage from Democrats. The Senate Democrat Caucus tweeted,
Senate GOP kills #RaiseTheWage, #PaidSickLeave, #EqualPay bills. They stood w/ corporate special interests, against working families #waleg
— WA Senate Democrats (@WASenDemocrats) April 1, 2015
Of course, Democrats’ outrage is despite the fact that they would not give the state Senate’s pro-worker reform bills the time of day. House Democrats did not even give the bills the courtesy of a public hearing, as Baumgartner did with the wage bill. The Freedom Foundation,
“Sponsored by Sen. Randi Becker (R-Eatonville), SB 5226 passed out of the Senate on a bipartisan vote. The legislation would require unions representing public employees in Washington (like the 80,000-member Washington Education Association) to be financially transparent with the public and the members they represent.
“Once in the House, however, the legislation died quietly without a hearing in the Labor Committee. Rep. Mike Sells (D-Everett), the committee chair, is past president of the WEA-affiliated Everett Education Association and currently serves as the secretary-treasurer of the Snohomish County Labor Council.”
You can check out similar bills House Democrats completely shunned this legislative session here.
Thank you!
GOP lawmaker kills $12 min. wage bill to protect jobs
What’s the connection between lower wages and keeping jobs? Washington state has raised our minimum wage every year, starting in the last century (!), and rising to become the highest minimum wage of all fifty states. In all of that time, has anyone ever shown so much as a single job lost as a result? (Especially in far Eastern Washington, which borders Idaho, home to the lowest minimum wage in the country.)
Baumgartner conducted a public hearing on the bill, and then decided not to advance the legislation.
Initiative 688, which has driven Washington state’s minimum wage to the aforementioned heights, started as a bill during the legislative session in 1998. I don’t recall if the Republican-controlled committee ever actually held a hearing on it, but like Sen. Baumgartner, they did deny it debate on the floor of the chamber. Perhaps Republican legislators believe we give them paychecks to not pass legislation we want?
In the 1998 general election, we voters went on to enact I-688 by a 2:1 margin; we’ll see if “$16 in ’16” can beat even that high standard.
If you were a businessman, you would understand the connection. However, since you don’t get it, I have to assume you’ve never run a business.
Business owners know what it take to maintain a successful business…their minimum wage employees do not, nor do they care (though they should).
If you were a businessman, you would understand the connection.
Still don’t have any real-world examples, do you? (Why not just admit it?)
Business owners know what it take to maintain a successful business…
Indeed, they do. Makini Howell owns the hugely successful Plum Bistro in Seattle. She advocated for Seattle’s laws on paid sick leave and the $15/hour minimum wage. On the former, she had this to say:
“I’m here to tell you that the sky didn’t fall,” Makini Howell, owner of Plum Bistro, said at a press conference held in her dining area this morning. “Offering paid sick days didn’t have a negative impact on my business… I’ve seen a 25 percent increase in business, hired seven new full time employees, started a food truck, opened a new location, expanded that location, and all without losing an employee.”
Plum already pays each employee at least $15/hour, and it’s still crowded.
Good. $12/hr is ridiculous for a minimum wage. Next, they’ll be screaming for $50/hr. I don’t care who you are, flipping a burger is not worth $12/hr.
And isn’t it just a like a hypocrite Democrat to ignore other labor-related bills to protect their union buddies, while demonizing the companies who actually employ the ones the Dems think deserve $12/hr with no skill sets.
$12./ hr. (now) is well below the value of $1.25/hr. when I started to work full-time back in 1968. It would be entirely reasonable IF we were still a country that produced our own necessary consumer goods and enough extra to sell overseas to get the money paid for imports back from other nations. We are no longer productive and as such should be planning on living like the third-world nations who can’t produce. Add into the equation that our labor market has remained flooded with exploitable, illegal mexicans for thirty-five years and it is obvious why we will never return to first world status.