[Sixstrings]

5 arguments people use against raising the minimum wage, and one mom's beautiful reasons for it.
http://www.upworthy.com/5-arguments-people-use-against-raising-the-minimum-wage-and-one-moms-beautiful-reasons-for-it

She's a manager at Subway, yet only makes $8 an hour. Gets 36 hours a week and has two children to support:

Chrisanna Capshaw testifies for $15 an hour
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WXGK0_hhGq8

Minimum Wage Hike? GOP Candidates Say No
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=B6U2Zua9gh8

[Plantagenet]

She's a manager at Subway, yet only makes $8 an hour. Gets 36 hours a week and has two children to support

Thats terrible. How about Dad? How much does he make?

[Sixstrings]

She's a manager at Subway, yet only makes $8 an hour. Gets 36 hours a week and has two children to support

Thats terrible. How about Dad? How much does he make?

I would guess he is unknown or missing or jobless or on drugs or in prison -- in this "Obama" / Republican policies economy, and the societal breakdown this poverty is causing.

The wages are too low, they should go up. US is the richest country in the world, and in the history of the world, and there's no good cause for poverty like this. The big corporations and wall street has all the money, that's just the literal and honest truth about it.

[Cog]

How about the good reason that this money doesn't belong to the people you want to lavish it on? It belongs to the shareholders. Sixstrings is trying to impoverish me.

[augjohnson]

For those who don't remember it or don't want to; there once was a time, back in the 50's and 60's and even into the 70's, that one person could support a family and even possibly buy a house on the salary paid to a restaurant or store manager. As the cost of living went up and the wages paid didn't, that situation changed. I guess we finally stopped "lavishing" that money on someone who it didn't belong to.

[Sixstrings]

For those who don't remember it or don't want to; there once was a time, back in the 50's and 60's and even into the 70's, that one person could support a family and even possibly buy a house on the salary paid to a restaurant or store manager. As the cost of living went up and the wages paid didn't, that situation changed. I guess we finally stopped "lavishing" that money on someone who it didn't belong to.

EXACTLY, you're right.

This trickle-down tax cuts for the rich stuff combined with NAFTAS and tpp's and job offshoring and so much immigration and then wage stagnation and a "great recession" and housing crash and inflation over all these years.. and they stopped raising the min wage. Enough's enough, already.

Bernie Sanders is telling the truth, all the income gains have gone to the top 1% and we've had inflation over 30 years so yeah.. people got squeezed from one earner households to then both parents working to then people losing their house and nobody working, now hours are less and less and the wages get lower..

Two people in a household, working today, make less than one did forty years ago. (inflation adjusted)

Every single thing that was ever good for middle class people, has been under assault and chipped away and taken away.

Good jobs, where you don't get laid off and downsized and offshored or corporate mergered..

And pensions.. stability.. it's just all gone, for a lot of this country.

Even government jobs, those used to be good, but then Republicans went after those -- in my state, they changed the pensions a while back, it used to be our gov workers had really good pensions. The gov workers still have good benefits otherwise, like sick days and vacation time. But those are getting chipped away, too.

One thing after another, it just gets worse, making people poorer with fewer benefits.

[Plantagenet]

US is the richest country in the world, and in the history of the world, and there's no good cause for poverty like this.

I'm always puzzled when people say this. Actually, the US is far from being the richest country in the world. The federal government is currently over 18.6 trillion dollars in debt and much of the rest of the US economy is also under water. Each US citizen owes over $57,000 just for their share of the federal debt and US taxpayers paid out 223 billion dollars last year just to service the interest due on our debt.

We aren't really rich----it just seems like we're rich because we've borrowed lots of money. Now we either have to pay back those loans, or keep refinancing them and paying interest on them forever.

If we didn't have to pay the interest on the huge federal debt that Obama and others have run up we'd have 223 billion more dollars every year to spend on social programs or going to Mars to save Brad Pitt or on body cameras for police officers or on urban light rail systems or free college education, but as it stands now we're broke. We can borrow more money, yes, but then the interest payments on our debt get bigger and bigger in perpetuity.

usdebtclock

[Sixstrings]

How about the good reason that this money doesn't belong to the people you want to lavish it on? It belongs to the shareholders. Sixstrings is trying to impoverish me.

I'm sure you could afford to pay another fifty cents for a sub at subway, and then their managers could get paid something like $12 an hour at least.

And then maybe the manager wouldn't be in total poverty, and then she wouldn't hold the line up at piggly wiggly trying to buy ice with food stamps.

[Sixstrings]

I'm always puzzled when people say this. Actually, the US is far from being the richest country in the world. The federal government is currently over 18.6 trillion dollars in debt and much of the rest of the US economy is also under water.

Debt is relative to other nations and their debt. The US is also in the special position of being world reserve currency, and our dollars are in demand around the world. Over 50% of all us dollars are actually held by foreigners, overseas.

US debt doesn't really matter, what matters more is what everyone ELSE's debt is and what their GDP is and what our GDP is.

rojected GDP Ranking (2015-2020)
Rank Country GDP
1 United States 18125
2 China 11212
3 Japan 4210
4 Germany 3413

See, that's #1, we're the richest country. We actually could afford Australian style minimum wages and national healthcare and free uni.