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Socialism Comes To Seattle
Submitted by Pater Tenebrarum via Acting-Man blog,
Seattle Bows to Demand of Socialist Councilwoman Kshama Sawant
Economic science has long shown that labor is not magically exempted from the laws of supply and demand. Therefore, minimum wage laws hurt rather than help workers, especially those with few skills or those just starting out, who are on the lowest rungs of the ladder. If one wants to raise youth unemployment and price unskilled workers out of the market, there is no surer way than introducing a minimum wage – especially one that is far higher than what the market can bear.
Note that a great deal of so-called 'pro labor' legislation that instituted wage minimums has only belatedly adjusted the legal minimum wage to levels the market economy was already able to provide, due to the increase in capital invested per worker. If the extent of the legally mandated minimum wage does not exceed what the market can bear, it mainly serves to polish the image of politicians, while the harm is at least limited. This is however not to say that there is no harm done at all by the introduction of such wage price controls, even if the levels seem reasonable.
After all, the economy is subject to frequent booms and busts under the current monetary regime, and if wages are inflexible to the downside, unemployment will tend to soar during the bust phases. The huge unemployment rates during the Great Depression were a direct result of president Hoover 'persuading' companies not to drop wage rates, in spite of a sharp fall in prices and a genuine money supply deflation.
Seattle is one of the few municipalities in the US boasting of an openly socialist council member, Ksahma Sawant. As the author of this article at Forbes rightly notes, it is quite astonishing that this purveyor of bad economics (she not only supports minimum wage laws, but also rent controls and it seems she wants Amazon to be nationalized as well) is actually teaching an economics course at the Seattle Central Community College.
As a politician, one of her central demands was the introduction of a $15/hr. Minimum wage in Seattle. The city council has now bowed to this demand, a decision that is likely to prove extremely destructive, especially to small businesses (interestingly, businesses have been allowed to 'phase the wage in over a three to seven year period', a fact that immediately belies the assertion that this legislation won't hurt business. If it is so harmless, why can it not be adopted right away?). NBC reports:
“The Seattle City Council on Monday unanimously approved a $15 hourly minimum wage — the highest in the nation.
The ordinance, which phases in the increase over time, passed a committee last week with a few changes. It would take effect next April and allow a sub-minimum wage for teens.
The ordinance was drafted by an advisory group of labor, business and nonprofit representatives convened by Seattle Mayor Ed Murray. It would phase in wage increases over three to seven years, depending on the size of the business and employee benefits.
The City Council voted 9-0 in front of a sometimes raucous audience that frequently interjected cheers, applause and shouts of "Shame on you!" as the council debated several changes to the measure. Seattle's higher minimum wage would surpass San Francisco's minimum of $10.74 an hour.
[…]
Some small business owners worry that a higher minimum wage could put them out of business.
Meanwhile, a group called 15 Now led by Socialist Seattle City Council member Kshama Sawant is collecting signatures for a ballot measure that would create an immediate wage hike for large businesses and a three-year phase-in for small business.
"Our victory is not complete, but we have fought until the last day, the last hour, against all the loopholes demanded by business," Sawant said before the council vote. "$15 in Seattle is just the beginning."
(emphasis added)
Ms. Sawant has actually studied economics, which makes this all the more astounding. Anyway, she and her followers are certain to be taught a real life lesson in economics now. Unfortunately, many small business owners and their employees will lose their livelihood as a result. Ms. Savant herself has of course nothing to fear in this regard, as her income is paid by taxpayers.
Kshama Sawant, raising her fist in the well-known socialist greeting
(Photo by Elaine Thompson, AP)
The Downward Spiral is Already Underway
Seattle seems eager to become the next Detroit. As 'United Liberty' reports, the negative effects of the minimum wage law can be ascertained already, as the $15 minimum wage has been introduced in advance in the Seatac suburb of Seattle. Predictably, the groups that suffer the most from the negative consequences of the new legislation are workers themselves and small business owners.
“The Emerald City may witness the economic dangers of hiking the minimum wage to $15/hour sooner rather than later. SeaTac, a suburb of Seattle, hiked the minimum wage for certain service industry employees to $15 at the beginning of the year, and there are already signs that the sudden increase is having a negative impact.
Earlier this month, Seattle voted to raise its minimum wage gradually to $15 by the year 2020. Unlike the SeaTac wage hike, Seattle’s hike will apply to all businesses.
But 15 minutes south near the Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, employees are already seeing the negative effects of such a hike. A February report from the Seattle Times revealed:
“At the Clarion Hotel off International Boulevard, a sit-down restaurant has been shuttered, though it might soon be replaced by a less-labor-intensive cafe… Other businesses have adjusted in ways that run the gamut from putting more work in the hands of managers, to instituting a small “living-wage surcharge” for a daily parking space near the airport.”
[…]
“Are you happy with the $15 wage?” I asked the full-time cleaning lady.
“It sounds good, but it’s not good,” the woman said.
“Why?” I asked.
“I lost my 401k, health insurance, paid holiday, and vacation,” she responded. “No more free food,” she added.
The hotel used to feed her. Now, she has to bring her own food. Also, no overtime, she said. She used to work extra hours and received overtime pay.
What else? I asked.
“I have to pay for parking,” she said. I then asked the part-time waitress, who was part of the catering staff.
“Yes, I’ve got $15 an hour, but all my tips are now much less,” she said. Before the new wage law was implemented, her hourly wage was $7. But her tips added to more than $15 an hour. Yes, she used to receive free food and parking. Now, she has to bring her own food and pay for parking.
[...]
The Washington Policy Center, a free market think tank, said the passed-but-not-yet-implemented wage hike is already affecting small businesses in Seattle:
“After decades in Seattle, Northwest Caster and Equipment recently made the difficult decision to move the business to unincorporated Lynnwood, according to a report by KOMO news. The owner of the family business blames Seattle’s increasingly difficult business climate for the move: “It just seems like increasingly the city’s become a more difficult place to do business.”
The city’s proposed $15 minimum wage was tops on the list of complaints. “If I’m going to bring someone in on an entry level, I’d prefer to start them out where I’d like to start them out, rather than having that dictated to me.”
A commercial property landlord echoes those concerns about the $15 minimum wage, noting several tenants have signaled they may not renew their leases if it becomes law: “It’s just too expensive to operate in the city.”
And in a story today, KUOW reports that small businesses throughout the city are panicking over the super high minimum wage. Multiple small business owners told KUOW they are holding off on opening new business or expanding their current business in Seattle, while others said they are delaying plans to hire new workers.”
(emphasis added)
The problem with minimum wage laws is not only that they are economic nonsense bound to lower growth and destroy job opportunities for young and unskilled workers. A major problem is that they represent an infringement of liberty. As Dr. Machan writes on this point:
“[...] being entitled to a minimum wage is actually unjustified, even if the law affirms it, because it violates the rights of individuals to trade freely—one of the implications of their right to liberty. If people freely enter into an employment relationship that specifies certain work provided for a certain wage, this isn’t something the law may void, since it is their right to do so; the minimum wage law violates this right.”
Most people look at minimum wage laws only from the perspective that they force employers to pay a certain wage to the least productive employees. They forget that they also force workers not to offer their labor services below the prevailing minimum wage rate. And yet, such workers undoubtedly exist, especially in light of the fact that they may otherwise simply not find any employment at all.
Conclusion
Seattle's city council has made a grave mistake by bowing to the demands of the socialist faction. Many small businesses will be forced to close or move somewhere else. Since small businesses create the vast bulk of new jobs, the Seattle city council may eventually not only find itself with a shrinking tax base, but also a growing unemployment rate. This can be expected to be accompanied by rising crime rates and growing strains on social services.
Politicians cannot repeal the laws of economics. They might as well try to repeal gravity or order the sun not to shine. And yet, basic economic lessons seemingly need to be retaught over and over again. Unfortunately, this usually happens at a great cost, as these interventions inevitably cause misery for countless people.
Socialism – ideas so good, they have to be mandatory.
(Cartoon by: Mike Lecter)
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Your misrepresentation of people who happen to agree with Ayn Rand, as "adoring" her, and the implication that this "adoration" is the basis for their agreement, suggests a severe mental aberration on your part.
The principles she espoused were about personal freedom AND responsibility for one's life without theft from others. You apparently can't debate the principles, so just attack anyone who supports them.
The problem with Rand, in the end, was that she supported the existence of government. Therefore, Rand was a statist.
No one is perfect, least of all people whom are capable of great insight.
YUUUP.
If she had disappeared after publishing Atlas Shrugged, she would have a bigger following. But she went full retard with the personality cult, and it was all downhill from there.
Characterizing Atlas Shrugged by her later words and actions is like characterizing Star Wars (ie A New Hope) by the prequels.
you have absolutely no idea
I just love me some leftists that spout this garbage. Of course, it's usually spoken by the dumbest of the dumb. It ranks right up there with the left wing idiot's canard, 'you (on the right) vote against your self interest'
A minimum wage is wrong.
A living wage is right.
Well then fortunate for me it takes a Ferrari, several 10,00 sq ft homes, yacht, about $50,000 per diem just to live (and I'm not including those I will have to support as well).
Can't wait for the checks to come rolling in!!!
As long as we all get the same benefits!
Please find another website
One that has a minimum $15 fee for posting comments
even misguided foolish people should be allowed to post their views on zh.
how else do you expect people to learn and better themselves?
When my Dad was teaching me something it was 'STFU and listen and you might learn something'.
Usually the progtards are too busy flapping their stupid gums to learn anything.
In a free market, the price of labor is determined by supply and demand, just like other prices. If wages seem to be too low, the answer is to reduce the supply of labor. However, both the Democrats and the Republicans are wedded to increasing the size of the labor force with their present open borders policy.
"both the Democrats and the Republicans are wedded to increasing the size of the labor force with their present open borders policy."
in a ponzi scheme (social security), if you don't keep adding new participants, the whole thing will come crashing down.
Under the current system of government, if the worker isn't paid what is considered a living wage, then the taxpayer gets to pay the difference.
How is it fair to the non-fast food customer to be required by the government to subsidize the low wage fast food industry?
It's about as fair as getting us non-believers to subsidize the god-freaks' religious activities (which I'm required to do thanks to their tax exemptions).
It ain't fair, I say!
How many people do you employ? Do you make more than those who work for you? I assume you're a business owner, or you wouldn't be stupid enough to post that without being prepared to answer a few questions.
That's up to the owner of a business to decide.
Did you know that you can live off of flour, water, a little salt and a few leafy greens that grow in the sidewalk?
"Living wage", far from being right, is arbitrary.
A "living wage" is even more idiotic than a minimum wage.
I'm trying to understand why you think "wage arbitraging" to China is a bad thing.
Seems like that is a great thing for Chinese people who get the jobs, and also for the people who consume the produced goods at lower prices than would otherwise be available.
Or are you one of those insecure people who is worried "all the good jobs are going to leave". If you are so concerned about "good jerbs fer mericans" why don't you go out and create some yourself?
Oh yeah, because unlike Galt, you don't have that special sauce.
You should of read "Telemachus Sneezed" instead -it paints a more accurate picture than Ayn Rand ever could have.
Just dyed-in-the-wool GOPerrrs here...move along.
Who gives a fuck?
So if my daughter or son went to school at the University of WA would they be criminals if they offered to work at some establishment for $10 / hour? And would a business that hired them be prosecuted?
Yep.
Kshama has never "worked" a day in her life, but none of the hipsters present seemed to care.
I doubt that anyone in O's administration have ever signed the front of a paycheck.
They probably don't even know you can do that.
Isn't there an iPhone/Tablet App for that?
Or do they just talk to their XBox in Seattle these days?
Is "Xbox" some kind of code word for a bong or hookah in Seattle ?
The best way to maintain an unflinching belief in one's socialist ideology is too never expose yourself to reality.
That is true of any ideology that seeks the control of others.
Too many fucking Indians taking over like cockroaches.
Nice post!
FTIW? Nothing against Indians! (gaming the system for votes) Really pisses me off! That's why you left the "Mother land" NO?
Go gobble David Duke's knob some more, cross-burner. The problem with her is not her race, but her ideology.
$11 x 40 = $440
$15 x 29 = $435
$0 X 168 = $0
Stop with the examples
Democrats can't do math.
I know you, don't I?
Absolutely. Effectively cut the number of hours in the work week with Obamacare then raise the wages so that people work less for about the same income.
Voila...better employment stats for .gov as businesses switch to a workforce with a higher number of workers each working less hours all without driving up .gov benefit payments due to a fat increase in minimum wage.
Sounds like a plan to me.
And small business? They will go to paying for more labor with cash under the table if they are smart. Better to get folks that don't speak English too. Tougher for the big boys to get away with that.
If Minimum wage had been raised in equal proportion to the bloated salaries of City officials, it would be about $105/hr.
Move all the small biz to Texas.
Proiblem solved.........
Is she American? Or, mid east/American. Probably the latter.
" Im a ______________ American" Fill in the blank.
Always something else first, then, American.
U either American, or you aint.
Fuck government. Fuck nationalism.
Don't confuse the two. As Thomas Paine once said, "it is the duty of a patriot to protect his country from it's government."
My tribe is better than your tribe. So either be part of my tribe or I will treat you like an enemy.
That is the nationalist/statist view.
This is some of the best news I've heard today and Seattle should be rightfully proud. They have just hung out the "Get the fuck up here" welcome sign to every uneducated, untrained, non-English speaking fence climber in the nation. I intend to do my part to help Seattle out by launching the official "Professor Fate's Buy a Bus Ticket to Seattle for an Illegal" program. Let's all dig deep to help Seattle on its journey to becoming the next Detroit.
Fate the Magnificent
"Push the Button, Max"
I'm in. Flood the suckers. They want their socialist paradise, we need to help them achieve it. Couldn't happen to a nicer collection of liberal white screw-ups.
All I can say to the small business owners is: all hands abandon ship. Camden, NJ is probably still ahead of Seattle in the race to Detroitification, but not by much.
don't forget Shit-cago please !
Oh, I haven't, believe me; the Windbag City will end up Detroitified as well, just as soon as it runs out of other people's money (i.e. Federal subsidies for its failed regime) in 2017.
Oh, I do know you ;-)
Seems as though it would also hurt the higher performers as if I had to pay the worst folks 15 bucks per hour I don't feel as though I could reward the motivated, higher performers. Or I damned sure wouldn't put up with subpar or average performers. Why would anyone hire an entry level employee? This is tantamount to creating an onerous barrier to entry in the work force. High barriers to entry have benefitted companies in certain industries as it is too expensive for a new company to come in and create competition. Seems like an economic tenant that someone who claims to have a degree in economics would understand. We appear to be the generation of "unintended consequences". Never heard that term more than I do now. Perhaps that is a sign that we have too many rules and regulations?
Perhaps Kshama, the economics genius, should introduce herself to the "Law of Diminishing Returns" as we could be experiencing that as it pertains to government intervention in busniess and life in general.
If this becomes an epidemic it will certainly do away with the stealth inflation that we experience now. Nothing will be stealth about the inflation at that point.
Back in my day, yes I'm old, minimum wage was a whopping $3.35 per hour. No one I knew thought of it as anything but a starting point and didn't view a minimum wage job as a means to raise a family. Times they are a changing.
Back in your day, it only took one member of the average family working to support the family in a decent life style (even including medical care). Those days are long fucking gone!
Bullshit, back in my day when I was making 3.35 per hour I didn't do anything stupid like start a family that I could not afford. I actually used my brain and worked my way through different jobs, went to school at night, then went for got my 4 year degree in corporate finance. Then worked my way up that ladder before I did any family stuff. But the deal is I grew up abandoned, poor and not knowing if where I would be from 1 night to the next which gave me perspective. I knew I damned sure didn't want to be responsible for putting a child in the same position I was put in so I actually used my brain to determine when I did things like start a family.
I didn't grow up with medical insurance, not sure where you get your "fucking" information about the era I grew up in but "Leave it to Beaver" was just a show on TV and never existed in real life. Educate yourself before you spout off about "back in the day" especially when you have no clue or experience about that day!!!
Lucky for me I was educated about some parts of life by my grandparents, part of the "greatest generation" that knew hardships you can't seem to fathom. They didn't whine or complain, they just did what they had to fucking do to survive and never looke for someone else to guarantee them anything and never bought anything they couldn't pay for. Damned you pissed me off late at night!
Where the fuck did he talk about "medical insurance"?
"...including medical care" I took to mean medical insurance. Perhaps I jumped to the wrong conclusion but in today's verancular "medical care" and "medical insurance" are interchangeable terms. If I misunderstood, mea culpa. If he didn't then I would argue there is more "medical care" now than ever before. I suppose "take two asprin and call me in the morning" is lost on today's youth. That was the extent of medical care and maybe that is what we should go back to.
Nation full of pill popper's pushed hourly on TV by Big Pharma for every "syndrome" imagineable. Of course taking 1 pill to cure one syndrome leads to needing 4 more to take care of all the side affects the first pill caused. But I digress and ramble off topic. Insomnia will do that to a person.
Sorry your personal situation wasn't great. Doesn't change that it was still pretty common for families then to make it fine on one income.
My first job payed 3.35 an hour and my grandparents lived through the Depression. They kept pretty much everything. Bought cheap groceries, cooked and ate at home more than 90% of the time. Wore the same clothes for decades.
Maybe that is how I personally got drawn into this before the actual big public event. Tried to warn friends...they got annoyed with me. Dropped it after Lehman as a waste of effort. And here we are with the plates still spinning, so who fucking knows...
. "back in my day when I was making 3.35 per hour I didn't do anything stupid like start a family that I could not afford."
Back in my day, when I was making about $3.00 an hour working for the state highway dept. on a survey crew, I had to get a family because the President of the United States said he would send me to Vietnam to crawl in the rice paddies and get shot at in a civil war there. I was pretty stupid then but not stupid enough to get involved in that quagmire. And NO, I'm not ashamed that I didn't go. I believed it was my moral responsibility NOT to go. I wouldn't have gone to Iraq or Afghanistan either. You must be a goddamn, brain-washed whippersnapper.
"Educate yourself before you spout off about "back in the day" especially when you have no clue or experience about that day!!!"
Fuck you. I lived through that period of time. The first faux election I voted in was LBJ vs. Goldwater. I knew then that we were fucked and the future outlook was grim.
"Lucky for me I was educated about some parts of life by my grandparents, part of the "greatest generation" that knew hardships you can't seem to fathom."
My grandparents were World War I vintage. My grandmother's beloved brother died in France as part of the American Expeditionary Force. My great-grandparents lost two brothers in Lincoln's War to Prevent Southern Freedom. My grandfather hated Wilson and Roosevelt for what they did and their part in killing the "greatest generation" that knew hardships you can't seem to fathom."
"Damned you pissed me off late at night!"
Cool! I hope you stay that way.
Sorry but I didn't stay pissed off. Much bigger issues than ZH banter. Current health issue has me taking many mind numbing substances so it was quickly forgotten.
When you replied "back in your day" I inferred that you were not of that era but apparently you were. You had a your life experiences and I had mine. . Given your comments I did make assumptions that you were much younger. Mea culpa.
Good for you in your choice of not participating in Vietnam. Took much courage to go against conformity and peer pressure of the day that was not acknowledged in the time. Hell the soldiers coming home didn't get much of a break either come to think of it. Much better to be telling some douche on ZH "fuck you" in 2014 then being a name on a sacred wall in DC.
The "CNN" junior spalding crew is out as usual.
Seattle will either become a mostly service automated city for the upper middleclass or it will end up like detroit, but in either case the people left without jobs will be toast.
Statelessman? Really? Seattle will become a giant cesspool full of moronic thespians!
You sound like a real (botanist- horticulturalist) of the nano-particle type.
What are the demographics? That's going to affect how much it comes to resemble Detroit.
This article is blatant hit whoring.
Downward spiral has begun for people caught at the bottom of the wage ladder, and some American douches are calling every effort, no matter how feeble, to ease their plight, 'socialism'. Give me a fucking break. Junked!
Spare us
I will be in Seattle for about 1.5 weeks at the end of the month. I will report back.
Please do. The snarky propoganda I've heard saying this is great and all of the false equivalancies to back up 'why' have been very annoying. Thanks.
One such article:
http://www.vice.com/read/why-seattles-15-minimum-wage-plan-is-probably-n...
Kshama Sawant is not a socialist. She's an avowed Marxist and gave a speech advocating the nationalism of Microsoft (where she was fired ), Boeing, and Amazon. Even Wikipedia still admits to her Marxism:
"Kshama Sawant is a member of the Socialist Alternative party, the United States section of the British-based Trotskyist international organization the Committee for a Workers' International (CWI). She has referred to herself as a Marxist."
Thanks for the reference Danno. The ultimate destination according to Dr. Sham Savant:
"Sawant maintains that a socialist economycannot exist in a single country and must be a global system just as capitalism today is a global system."
That was view pushed in the mid-90's when I was in school. Can't believe that "genius" of a woman bought that BS hook line and sinker...
It always just has to be larger and have more people forced to buy into it for it to work. These utopians are ridiculous with their utopia just being one more sacrifice away, just as long as it's YOUR sacrifice and not their's.
You'd think with all the people with their different ideas about how we should be all united and working as one they would have figured out how to have just one single Marxist group instead of a million of them trying to push their own "true message" of Marxism.
These assholes can not even get along with each other, what makes anyone think they could get along with non-believers.
If she's advocating the nationalism (nationalization?) of Microsoft, then she can't be all bad!
ALL Public servants earn a whole lot more than minimum wage for doing minimum work.
How much do Seattle City Council members earn? Three years ago they earned:
"As of September 28, 2010, Seattle Council members Sally Bagshaw, Richard Conlin, Nick Licata and Mike O'Brien earn $117,533.52 annually. Councilmembers who were re-elected in 2011, Tim Burgess, Sally J. Clark, Jean Godden, Bruce Harrell, and Tom Rasmussen, will earn an annual salary of $119,976.48, effective January 1, 2012. Their salary will remain at this level through December 31, 2015.
Among the nation's 40 largest cities, only Los Angeles pays its council more — $149,000, according to a survey by The Seattle Times.
Please stop with the "Public Servant" phrase. Very tiresome to hear elected politicians who have their snouts deep in the public trough talk as if they are making some huge sacrifice to be a "public servant". Politicians with negligible net worth when elected to Congress who retire as multi-millionaires after a couple of terms are not "serving the public".
"Servicing the Public" similar to how a bull services a cow is much more accurate.
My feelings on the stupidity of what the socialist morons in Seattle have done is best expressed verbally by "Bonnie" in 5 seconds :)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQFAq063aPM
Where is all the outrage from Demicans and Republicrats, from progressives and conservatives, about banking/corporate/insurer bailouts and welfare?
Oh, right...in their pockets.
I stopped reading when the author said that minimum wage law hurts the poor. Sorry, this is pure BS. One only has to open any history book to see how poor did before minimum wage : it was a race to the bottom and each day you could get fired because someone more hungry than you could take your job. Its symptomatic of this kind of new-old far-right propaganda that it build its vision on pure ideology rather than facts.
BTW, raising minimum wage is not socialistic. As much as I like socialism, it is simply a good idea and other cities should do the same as we need to get in a race for the better rather than a race for the toilet.
I think that you are confusing minimum wage laws with fair labor practices.
I just think he's confused. "I like socialism" pretty much sums up that retard.
so if raising it is a good idea, then raising it higher is a better idea. Better yet raise it again tomorrow, then again the next day. Soon you will see that your concept that a minimum wage is good will lead to the conclusion that a higher wage will be even better. The end result is that minimum wage should rise until it equals the wage of the highest paid CEO. Since more is better, more more, is better better.
If you are going to show your wisdom and great concern by instituting a minimum wage, why not show yourself to be truly great and give us all a wage equal to the wage of the CEO of each of our respective companies? If your concern is so great why stop at a minimum wage? Do you hate workers so much that you are willing to pass laws that only grant us minimum wages? I thought you cared. If you truly care, make my wage equal to the highest wage in the company.
"As much as I like socialism" Fuck socialism. Even my friend Bonnie knows it's a dumb philosophy...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HQFAq063aPM
There is no such thing as "Socialism" or "Capitalism" or "Fascism" anymore.
All the "ism's" are dead, they only serve now as bludgeons for political distraction.
While the banks are being bailed out by the public treasuries, and the corporations growing larger to crush small business, the apparatchiks are busy signing up the lower classes for social services or higher wages.
It's all a part of "Kill the educated middle class at all costs!". It serves the goals of both the capitalists and socialists, the progressives and the conservatives.
People get distracted by the labels, the monikers, the political discussions. Meanwhile, real people get paid less for their labor, savings, and have their freedoms taken away.
BTW, raising minimum wage is not socialistic. As much as I like socialism, it is simply a good idea and other cities should do the same as we need to get in a race for the better rather than a race for the toilet.
I hear ya balz, If there are infinite resources then socialism isn't really taking, "money" out of someone else's pocket. The problem is that, contrary to popular opinion, resources are not infinite. The idea that resources are infinite has been popularized by governments that are wanting to grow indefinitely into the future.
What really bothers me is that a lot of the people that have down voted you actually believe in infinite technology, resources and various other platitudes such as, "there is plenty of oil".
Here is a good PDF on the debates 100 years ago over capitalism vs socialism. http://debs.indstate.edu/b262b3_1914.pdf
The participants were Henry M. Tichenor arguing for socialism and John Basil Barnhill arguing for capitalism. There are some very good "traps" as Barnhill calls them in which he asks his adversaries (there were several opponenets as he debated many times) questions which they cannot answer or explain away. Here are some exerpts:
"You say the state can guarantee you and every other man a job at good wages, a steady job all the time. You draw up a contract of this character with the state. In the first place, the state could not possibly fulfill the terms of this contract. Fire, flood, famine, disasters by land and sea, all these spell nature’s insecurity, and any attempt to realize a legal and artificial security in defiance of nature’s insecurity will result in failure. Any farmer will tell you that nature does not guarantee her crops, and if a state undertakes to
guarantee security of income that state is a fraud and a liar, but even if it could guarantee your wages at a steady job, on what terms could such a contract be drawn
up? It is as plain as day that no person and no set of persons could undertake to be such a father unless at the same time it reserved absolute control of your life,
your expenses as well as your income, your actions to the minutest detail. I have just described a condition of slavery."
"I have repeatedly put to Socialists the question: “If there is no private capital under Socialism, how could a privately owned newspaper exist ?”
As a rule, Socialists dodge this question or emit a mass of verbiage in a vain effort to avoid a fatal collision. But a few have been more candid. J. B. Osborne, the
blind orator, gave this answer : “We could run a little paper under Socialism.” I asked him if he thought a little sheet,’ printed on a 9x12 job press, would be able to
fight those titanic agencies of corruption which, as Jefferson points out, always accompany a concentration of power.
J. W. Slayton gave the answer that no well-meaning man would want to run a private newspaper. Yet the most successful Socialist newspapers are all privately
owned. I was not surprised when the Socialist chairman remarked to me at the close of the debate with Slayton that I had certainly “knocked him out” on the freedom
of the press. An equally candid reply is found in the Conference of the New Jersey Socialists-S. P. and S. IJ. P.-in which it is asserted that under Socialism such a thing as maintaining a privately owned newspaper would be a crime. When I asked Mr. McDevitt whether in a panic he would rather have a million in ready cash or a million in
some other form of wealth, he replied: “I will take it in land, and when I want cash I will exchange the land for cash.” I thanked him for his mental suicide, and ex- ’
plained to him that it was just because he could not make such exchange that we have the panic. Other Socialists admit that they would take the cash, but when asked to
explain the special privilege which is back of that preference, the question is perfect Greek to them."
"The surest way to make a scoundrel out of a saint is to give him the power of spending other people’s money-and Socialism would multiply infinitely such opportunities."
"Socialists tell us that private monopoly spells stagnation and death, but my dear Socialist, you do not change your indictment by changing your adjective. All
. experience declares that you can prove an even stronger case against public monopoly. In other words, monopoly is the grave of nations. Monopoly means death, as competitions means the life of civilization."
http://debs.indstate.edu/b262b3_1914.pdf
This will be a great experiment for all to see play out. It couldn't have happened to a better city. A lot of uppity hipsters who got rich with the tech boom. Will their shangri-La fall apart or will it take off to the stratoshpere?
Exactly my view as well.
Or most likely .... Chug along with less working poor than the rest of the nation, and a somewhat more vibrant economy.
Dingbat.
Have a look in the mirror sometime, wise guy.
Sorry for being so rude. Lets say I own a coffee shop in Seattle and have a dozen employees that cover all of my shifts. I pay them between $9 and $12/hr depending on experience, skill and competency. Now the new law kicks in and I need to cut some costs. After some deliberation, I decide that I really do not need two of my employees. Now I have 10 people who make $15/hr. Which two did I get rid of? The two least skilled/competent. The other 10 will now need to work a little harder and people may need to wait a little longer to get their coffee.
My prices may have to rise, I may defer some maintenance, I may cut back on some benefits. Employees may now have to pay for their coffee and food that I once provided free as a benefit.
This law will help the larger businesses and hurt the smaller ones who are less efficient. This will hurt the least skilled. Why take a chance on a marginal person if I must pay them $15/hr? I will look past them to a more competent person. I will hold out and make due with less staff.
I will also need to consider maintaining a spread in my wages between my best and more mediocre employees. The most competent will not be happy if they are making the same as the bumbling newbie. So now we have the era of the $20/hr barista.
There are people who work for the government or who work for universities and so forth who do not see an issue with this law. They live in a world where there is usually a little extra money to be found somewhere. Raise some taxes, add some fees. The private sector does not work that way. There is no Santa Claus or Easter Bunny.
Sorry little guy, it doesn't work that way. We don't live in a magical world. We don't live in a Disney movie.
they're not raising the minimum wage to $15 for several more years. plus, there will be all kinds of exemptions. it's totally watered down. the local pols didn't have the guts to just raise it up to $15 overnight, no exceptions. as it turns out, it's mostly rhetoric. plus, what about bellevue, kent, lynnwood, etc... all of the neighboring towns? looks like another clusterfuck, basically.
Kinda like Obamacare? Interesting, they know it won't work, but must pander to their base?
When you're bending someone over, you never go in full force.
You ease it in.
I don't have the answer but the question definitely is NOT how high should the minimum wage be. That is something best left to market pricing mechanisms. As has already been said you cannot repeal economic reality. It is that it is and that is all there is.
Left to themselves, markets will price unskilled labour progressively lower, asymptotically to zero. Pray that you never end up in that situation of having to bargain while your opponent has a superior hand.
"Pray that you never end up in that situation of having to bargain while your opponent has a superior hand."
Are you referring to the position we always have versus the government.
Unfortunately, liberals and conservatives are both blind to that.
How do you propose to improve the lives of the bottom 99%? Forcing the 1% to pay a living wage to the rest of us isn't 'socialism' any more than providing roads for us all to drive on is 'socialism'.
But you don't get massive polarisation about new roads, electrical wiring and water supplies. Nope, the best bitching is done at the expense of those with absolutely nothing in their pockets. Easy pickings.
You actually think the small businesses that employ entry level workers are part of "the 1%"? Boing Boing is right.
To H**l you and this old blatant lie that paying a living wage is "socialism".
F*** O*f
and burn in He**
Define "living wage". Define what each person should be allowed to own while your at it.
Now after you do that ask someone else to define a living wage. I doubt any defintiion will match anothers and I would have a problem with giving anyone the power to define what my living wage should be.
living wage: a wage that negates a citizen's eligibility for direct government subsidy
If the government is going to subsidize private sector employment then as taxpayers it seems reasonable to require said subisdized employment is beneficial to the public at large and targeted toward things like competition to lower prices, or increasing employment in depressed areas to help reduce crime and government dependence.
Perhaps the government should get out of the subsidy business. Think well beyond a subsidy paid fund to a poor person before you all get into a twist.
The average University grad has $130,000 in debt and the average starting paycheck after graduation is just over $14,00/hour.
Why bother with a university degree?
I am with a financal service industry (leasing contracts) which require a university degree and a minimum 3 years work experience. The starting salary is $15.20 an hour and if you survive after a year you are up to $15.70.
Why bother? Just buy a bus ticket to Seattle...get $15.00 an hour simple job with no student debt...much happier life.....(you think?...)
These socialists never think of the outcome......amazing!
So sounds like Seattle would attract ambitious self starters. And maybe fewer people would be sucked into student loan debt. Not so bad...
Forcing a small business to increase it's minimum wage is directly tied to our crony capitalism system that has concentrated nearly all wealth at the top.
The author of this article is a fucking idiot. Forcing a $15.00 minimum wage is a symptom, not the disease. Pull your head out of your ass and address the problem, not the fact that some mega-liberals have taken matters into their own hands.
I used to think that free market economics had the tendency to take care of wealth inequality on it's own, but our market is very far from being fucking free.
If this worked, why didn't they make the minimum wage $30/hr?
The arguments are all exactly the same.
Never mind that only the most wacko of commies would ever propose such...
yeah, who is to say what it should be? $15 is nothing, especially the way it is playing out in seattle (not really $15, but more incremental over the next several years, with loopholes). they should have gone for at least $50, $75, $100. it's all fake to begin with; why not actually pay people? lol
Guillotine list just got longer.
The .1% is riding high, the Fed is printing to the end of time, military contractors enjoy fat warfare contracts, but the minimum wage increase in one affluent city will trigger the end of the Republic.
Fuck off. Posts like this are pure horseshit.
When a major city voluntarily destroys its business and middle class base, simultaneously punishing its retirees and Social Security recipients, then yes, this is cause for national alarm.
The theory that raising the minimum wage will raise all boats is a false theorem. It simply raises all prices but sinks the boats of those on fixed incomes or fixed wages who lose their purchasing power, and businessmen who can’t meet the wage increases.
"Just print more money. That will fix everything."
In short, the purpose of raising the minimum wage is to wipe out the purchasing power of Social Security benefits.
In the end, the accompanying rise in prices will wipe out the extra purchasing power of the inflated wages; but it will devastate those on fixed incomes not indexed to inflation, as well as creditors.
It is an underhanded way for the anti-capitalist forces such as the Obama government to monetize the debt and reduce Americans’ spending power. Thus, as the money comes due that is owed by a profligate government to social security recipients and to receivers of insurance payouts, annuities and pensions et al., the purchasing power of that money is decimated.
A $15 an hour minimum wage is $31,200 a year. The average monthly SS benefit for a retired worker in April 2014 was $1,252 monthly, or $15,024; the average survivor benefit, $1,083 monthly as of April 2014. Thus value of Social Security is now much lower than the minimum wage for unskilled workers in Seattle.
Raising the minimum wage above market rates is a form of wealth transfer at the expense of America’s working middle class – a further wipeout of middle class assets by socialism.
Kshama Sawant represents class warfare. It is a cultural attack which involves race and generational differences. Sawant represents the socialist mob.
See my comment above
It’s called Zimbabweanism. Here’s how Obama and Mugabe socialism works…
These are the facts, culled from a Bloomberg article on Zimbabwe by Brian Latham on May 27, 2014 :
"Production had slumped following Mugabe’s 2000 land reform program that saw the government seizing commercial farms owned by white landowners to give to black Zimbabweans, many of who were subsistence farmers….
“Finance Minister Patrick Chinamasa has said a law that forces foreign and white-owned companies to cede 51 percent stakes to black Zimbabweans will be eased…
“Five years after Zimbabwe emerged from recession, ended hyperinflation by abandoning its local currency and spurred farming production, the economy is at risk of contracting again. Foreign currency needed to pay wages and buy imports has dried up, Mugabe’s government has given investors mixed signals on plans to seize company stakes as part of its 'indigenization' policy, and factories are operating at just 40 percent of capacity.
“Hyperinflation, estimated by the International Monetary Fund to have peaked at 500 billion percent in 2008, came to a halt when authorities dropped the Zimbabwean dollar, ending the central bank’s ability to print money to pay the government’s debt. Zimbabwe now uses a multi-currency system that includes the U.S. dollar and South African rand….
"For cross-border traders like Takavarasha, remaining in South Africa as an undocumented immigrant is becoming more promising than trying to sell goods in Zimbabwe. The Johannesburg-based University of Witwatersrand estimates that as many as 1.5 million Zimbabweans, or more than a 10th of Zimbabwe’s population, live in South Africa.
“'The profit is less and less and there’s no work in Zimbabwe,' he said. 'The economy is going down. Maybe it’s best to leave for a couple of years and wait and see.'"
http://www.bloomberg.com/news/2014-05-26/zimbabwe-heads-for-recession-as-factory-shutdown-spurs-deflation.html
Sawant's minimum wage is the same thing; it’s just a matter of degree. It’s turning the economy over to the State and letting the state experiment with you.
J.R. this isn't an issue of minimum wage. This "internal destruction" was started in the late 70's and early 80's.
J.R. we're living in the very scenario our ForeFathers warned us about!
That’s absolutely correct, Yen. All these things are wealth transfer – from warfare to Obamacare, the minimum wage is just one of the details in a program of dissolving the power of the American middle class.
In this way, government can become larger and more powerful in order to more tightly corral the citizens and manage them more "efficiently" with whips in the hands of the socialists and the bankers.
The noose is tightening around our necks.
Just because she's ignorant doesn't mean she's not stupid and vicious, too.
But she's not ignorant. The article says she's studied economics.
That proves it.
This might be the single dumbest post in this thread and that is saying something. Federal spending is overwhelmingly already focused on elderly transfers through SSI, Medicare, and Medicaid (who single biggest expense is assisted living care for the elderly) and your stating that a rasing a program in place since the mid-30s sole purpose is to destroy the purchasing of SSI?
Good luck you douch bags in Seattle for voting in a bored transplant from somewhere where they answer customer service phone calls. You deserve what you get. Can you spell D-E-T-R-O-I-T? $15 for some numb nuts slinging sandwiches who flunked gym class??!....you should be really proud. Bend over and put some Vasoline on that Space Needle!
Economics 101, supply and demand. That is how you raise the wage. get rid of all the illegals and h1-B visa holders and there will be a shortage of people who work for slave wages. Then the wages rise. I was making 10-12 dollars in hour in the 80s before the millions of illegals we allowed to flood the country once they came it was cut to 6.
People will vote with their feet...sayonara, Seattle.
She raises her fist demonstrating Marxist power. Nuff said.
Pass the fuckn'popcorn. I am going to love seeing another shithole get created by the progressive / socialist/ communist/NOW fucktards.
Ya might want one of these toys?
Official Site – XactSystem™ Precision Guided Firearms | TrackingPoint
Now as the first amendment to this law Seattle council folks and administrators should now have their salaries mandated to be that equal to what they spend all their time fighting for. 15 bucks an hour. Come to think of it, that sounds like they would be profoundly overpaid!
Why is $15 magical? wouldn't $30 an hour be twice as good? Don't all the alleged benefits of the raise apply to raising it even more?
We are witnessing the systematic destruction of the US and our way of life, and for some reason most people don't seem to get it, or seem to want more of it. Astonishing.
It doesn't matter what the number for "fairness" is as long as it's MOAR!
Ever notice how socialists keep changing their terms to try to sell the same snake oil? A "living wage" = raising the minimum wage = government fixing the price of labor = socialism.
Of course, these snake oil salesmen keep pretending that small businesses will be able to shoulder the burden (instead of going out of business), that big businesses will hire/retain just as many minimum wage workers as before (they won't), and that everyone who has a minimum wage job will still have that job after the increase. (Unemployment will skyrocket. You don't get a "living wage" or any wage at all when you're unemployed.)
Automated fast food machines cost something like $90,000 apiece to install, and supplying and maintaining them costs something too. However, they'll be well worth the money if they can replace any 3 or more of these overpaid $15-an-hour minimum wage workers who are constantly late for work, rude to the customers, and regularly spit in the food. Seattle, say hi simultaneously to $0.50 Happy Meals at McDonalds and a 50% unemployment rate.
I dont support minimum wage nor do I think raising it to $15/hr is a good thing. But on the other side of this I think a minimum wage should be tagged to the real rate of inflation. If anything this could help shed light on the 'loose' monetrary policy of the fed.
Well, that would mean that you support the loss of the currency's purchasing power. Instead, why not advocate increasing the currency's purchasing power? It's not a monetary policy at all. It is a counterfeiting policy. What is loose is the definition of money...
No not at all, we are on the same team.. If the purchasing power of the USD was higher $7/hr would be a living wage etc.
Never in history has printing money created a strong currency or created a propserous country.
Money is a vehicle to assist in the trading of goods and services. The consumer sets the price of goods based on the current/future value of the currency in which it is traded.
This is where the confidence comes in a fiat currency and the 'future' value.
And don't forget to ask why the wages need to go up in the first place.
Hint - Employers are not the bad guys. Instead, the culprit is because of fractional reserve "banking":
"The tyranny of modern economics depends on its victims to not know the difference between money and counterfeit. Therefore, discussing the high cost of wages and whether or not there should be a law to raise them is a ruse, a circus, so as not to discuss the origination of the bread. Is not theft already against the law? Would not the reduction of theft then increase the purchasing power of everyone and by reversing the multi-generational trend of the declining currency thereby leave wage laws long gone and forgotten?"
http://ocsure.blogspot.com/2014/06/debts-and-wages.html
Shitty wages require socialism. So people can survive to work. It is evident in most cases.
Business cheaps out, society picks up the tab.
If society does not pitch in, then the whole area turns to shit. Impoverished. Crime. Sick.
Lax immigration drives down wages, due to cheaper labor. That is not a proper capitalist method of balanced supply, demand, cost. It just results in poverty, crime, sickness.
When power and wealth is perverted in it's use to skew the balances of capitalism. Some socialism and regulation is required.
The ultimate end of capitalism with no regulation is monopoly and totalitarianism. It then completely ceases to be capitalism.
All American cities are on a continuum with Detroit. Cities were once great engines of wealth creation, enterprise, and jobs. Then the opportunity and possibility of enterprise was slowly strangled by rules, regulations, codes, taxes and prohibitions. Now much of the economic activity that you once found in cities, that was the engine that lead to their very purpose, opportunity, is prohibited and illegal. So many cities are not creating wealth any longer; they are creating need, poverty, and failure. They will die a slow death. Detroit is just the forerunner.
Ten principles of the communist manifesto K Marx
1. Abolition of private property in land and application of all rents of land to public purpose. The courts have interpreted the 14th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution (1868) to give the government far more "eminent domain" power than was originally intended, Under the rubric of "eminent domain" and various zoning regulations, land use regulations by the Bureau of Land Management property taxes, and "environmental" excuses, private property rights have become very diluted and private property in land is, vehicles, and other forms are seized almost every day in this country under the "forfeiture" provisions of the RICO statutes and the so-called War on Drugs.
2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax. The 16th Amendment of the U.S. Constitution, 1913 (which some scholars maintain was never properly ratified), and various State income taxes, established this major Marxist coup in the United States many decades ago. These taxes continue to drain the lifeblood out of the American economy and greatly reduce the accumulation of desperately needed capital for future growth, business starts, job creation, and salary increases.
3. Abolition of all rights of inheritance. Another Marxian attack on private property rights is in the form of Federal & State estate taxes and other inheritance taxes, which have abolished or at least greatly diluted the right of private property owners to determine the disposition and distribution of their estates upon their death. Instead, government bureaucrats get their greedy hands involved .
4. Confiscation of the property of all emigrants and rebels. We call it government seizures, tax liens, "forfeiture" Public "law" 99-570 (1986); Executive order 11490, sections 1205, 2002 which gives private land to the Department of Urban Development; the imprisonment of "terrorists" and those who speak out or write against the "government" (1997 Crime/Terrorist Bill); or the IRS confiscation of property without due process.
5. Centralization of credit in the hands of the state, by means of a national bank with state capital and an exclusive monopoly. The Federal Reserve System, created by the Federal Reserve Act of Congress in 1913, is indeed such a "national bank" and it politically manipulates interest rates and holds a monopoly on legal counterfeiting in the United States. This is exactly what Marx had in mind and completely fulfills this plank, another major socialist objective. Yet, most Americans naively believe the U.S. of A. is far from a Marxist or socialist nation.
6. Centralization of the means of communication and transportation in the hands of the state. In the U.S., communication and transportation are controlled and regulated by the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) established by the Communications Act of 1934 and the Department of Transportation and the Interstate Commerce Commission (established by Congress in 1887), and the Federal Aviation Administration as well as Executive orders 11490, 10999 -- not to mention various state bureaucracies and regulations. There is also the federal postal monopoly, AMTRAK and CONRAIL -- outright socialist (government-owned) enterprises. Instead of free-market private enterprise in these important industries, these fields in America are semi-cartelized through the government's regulatory-industrial complex.
7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the state; the bringing into cultivation of waste lands, and the improvement of the soil generally in accordance with a common plan. While the U.S. does not have vast "collective farms" (which failed so miserably in the Soviet Union), we nevertheless do have a significant degree of government involvement in agriculture in the form of price support subsidies and acreage alotments and land-use controls. The Desert Entry Act and The Department of Agriculture. As well as the Department of Commerce and Labor, Department of Interior, the Evironmental Protection Agency, Bureau of Land Management, Bureau of Reclamation, Bureau of Mines, National Park Service, and the IRS control of business through corporate regulations.
8. Equal obligation of all to work. Establishment of Industrial armies, especially for agriculture. We call it the Social Security Administration and The Department of Labor. The National debt and inflation caused by the communal bank has caused the need for a two "income" family. Woman in the workplace since the 1920's, the 19th amendment of the U.S. Constitution, the Civil Rights Act of 1964, assorted Socialist Unions, affirmative action, the Federal Public Works Program and of course Executive order 11000. And I almost forgot...The Equal Rights Amendment means that women should do all work that men do including the military and since passage it would make women subject to the draft.
9. Combination of agriculture with manufacturing industries; gradual abolition of the distinction between town and country by a more equable distribution of the population over the country. We call it the Planning Reorganization Act of 1949 , zoning (Title 17 1910-1990) and Super Corporate Farms, as well as Executive orders 11647, 11731 (ten regions) and Public "law" 89-136.
10. Free education for all children in government schools. Abolition of children's factory labor in its present form. Combination of education with industrial production, etc. etc. People are being taxed to support what we call 'public' schools, which train the young to work for the communal debt system. We also call it the Department of Education, the NEA and Outcome Based "Education", Common Core.
Ive seen this woman on tv, she is truly dangerous. She actually believes the crap she spouts.
Why is this woman smiling? If I thought the oppressed workers of the world were getting the shaft and needed $15 subsisitence pay (economics be damned), I would be angry, pissed, yelling, ranting, raging. But not with a beatific smile on my face, like I think this is some cute political statement that will garner demogogic points.
It's almost as absurd as to think Che, the quintessential revolutionary, would take time off to play a round of golf.
http://www.eclectique916.com/2009/08/12/eclectique-news-9/
When major corporations do not share their profits, such as McDonalds and Walmart, then the tax payer pays the difference in the form of food stamps. Corporations survive on the backs of tax payers even recommending on their websites that their employees should make ends meet by going on food stamps. When corporations do not pay living wages after years of obscene profit, then tax payers pick up the difference to fund food stamp and other programs
These large corporations thrive in Government largesse coming in reponse to corporate campaign funding, these families in these corporations have the greatest feeling of entitlement as they condemn entitlements to those tax payers who continually pay into the system that supports a Corporate Oligarchy.
The unemployed use more govenment programs that those who make minimum wage.
If you can make it on the current minimum wage of $7.25/hour you can complain about this. If you couldn't make it on $7.25/hour shut the fuck up.
That's $15,000 per year, yet all the "proud" small business people and whoever the fuck else down vote and whine and complain and puff up their chests - and and act like dumb-shits, if an article has the word "Socialist" in it act as though they walk on water.
Who the fuck here could make it on $7.25/hour? That's slavery. $15/hour is close to slavery.
And all the chest puffers wonder why people go on EBT and the government dole.
Ascertain? Did the article really just use that word?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KrJYpActs7g
Let me tell you the reader this. Seattle Hit the Wall a long time ago! I'm a life long resident that left the city in 2010. These are 3 things that figures into what is going on right now...
#1 UW study: Rules add $200,000 to Seattle house price
http://seattletimes.com/html/businesstechnology/2004181704_eicher14.html
They regulated the cost of living to unsustainable levels back in 1989.... YES THEY KILLED THE DAMN ECONOMY!
#2 To Hide this fact they were all in on the Tech Bubble that ended badly in the 90's
http://www.seattlepi.com/technology/businessinsider/article/WHERE-ARE-TH...
#3 2000 - 2010 It was the Housing bubble and Easy Credit and Tax and Spend that has kept it afloat next trick? Raise the Wages!
For the Record MS Sawant was my Econ teacher at Seattle Central Community College. The Vast Majority of Teachers at Seattle Central Community College are Anti American and they tend to be Women who were born in another country. I'm a US Veteran so it was only so much I would take and would be into a open disagreement in class with them...
The people of Seattle are Good Liberty Minded people never forget that! Its the ruling class the Community Colleges, Universities, and Some of the City Public Officials that are the problem. Every Event you see take place in Seattle over the next 10 years will be birth in the Community Colleges. This is there power base; make no mistake about that.... You would go to Class and there would be teachers leading Students through the building being LOUD AS HELL THUNDERING!
"well-known socialist greeting"
I thought the raised fist was a Black Panther thing?
'Fist fucking the sky' is vulgar on a man. Hideous on a woman.
"Our victory is not complete, but we have fought until the last day, the last hour, against all the loopholes demanded by business," Sawant said before the council vote. "$15 in Seattle is just the beginning."
The beginning of the end.
Stop with the "socialism" bitching already. Paying workers a decent wage is NOT socialism. And if your economy is so dysfunctional that it can't pay its workers a decent wage while at the same time it has enriched a few beyond imagining, then your system is corrupt and needs to go down.
It certainly is NOT the duty of the average working slob to bend over and take whatever you want to give him, calling it 'market demand', just so the system can keep going, and enriching the few, even longer. Screw that. Do the job your damned self, save a couple of bucks, if your so damned cheap.