Seattle’s socialist city council member – at least the only one that will call herself that publically – stunned some of her supporters by abandoning her rallying cry of an immediate $15 minimum wage for all employees inside the city limits. Her 15 Now demand is no longer $15, and no longer now.
Perhaps the freshman council member is learning from her process and poll-driven peers already, and had read the Bloomberg survey from the previous week that showed overwhelming support for raising the national minimum wage, until people were told that such an increase would cost some people their jobs. Turns out a majority of people don’t like that tradeoff.
Or maybe Sawant read the front page of the Seattle Times recently, which pointed out that Seattle has the sixth highest teenager unemployment rate in the country – along with the nation’s minimum wage. Teenagers are among those hit hardest by a high minimum wage, because they have fewer of the skills that employers are looking for.
Or maybe her minimum wage co-conspirator David Rolf, leader of the SEIU 775NW union, let her know that her demands are not going to be met, so she should change them. Because, after all, Rolf was the one [link to the Rolf profile in Seattle Met] who devised a way to exempt unions from the $15 minimum wage he spearheaded in SeaTac.
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