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CA Congresswoman: Raise State Minimum Wage to $26 an Hour
Breitbart's Big Government ^ | May 4, 2014 | Staff

Posted on 05/04/2014 11:33:17 PM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet

One of the most liberal Representatives in Congress wants California to raise its minimum wage to $26 an hour.

Appearing on Crossfire on Friday, co-host Newt Gingrich asked Rep. Barbara Lee (D-CA) whether it was a good idea for the mayor of Seattle to propose a minimum wage of $15 an hour. Lee said, "good for him."

"In California, more than likely from what I remembered, a living wage where people could live and take care of their families and move toward achieving the American dream was about $25, $26 an hour," Lee said.

When pressed further, Lee said she would "absolutely" support it for California and claimed it would not cause more unemployment....

(Excerpt) Read more at breitbart.com ...


TOPICS: Business/Economy; Culture/Society; Government; US: California; US: Washington
KEYWORDS: barbaralee; california; democrats; economy; gingrich; minimumwage; newt; newtgingrich; seattle; unemployment; washington
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To: RginTN

Careful what you wish for.


21 posted on 05/05/2014 2:38:52 AM PDT by GeneralisimoFranciscoFranco (I love liberals. They taste like chicken.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Has anyone bothered to notice that by raising the minimum wage, besides eventually lowering buying power, lowering the numbers of people employed it also raises workers into higher tax brackets and the government will happily fleece them of more of the wages through income taxes.

Also another side effect that to maintain parity the ones on Welfare must have their monies and benefits increased too.

Once a person understands this then you will also understand that the eventual goal must be the total destruction of the middle class and the economy?


22 posted on 05/05/2014 2:40:31 AM PDT by The Working Man
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Unions wage scale is based on the Min Wage as a starting point. $x higher than the Min Wage, That is why they are for it. They get a pay raise.
That causes prices to rise to cover the $$ and layoffs to keep cost in check..
Want good wages? Learn a skill and become good at it,and be reliable and it will happen,
Flip burgers and you get what you reaped. . . .
23 posted on 05/05/2014 2:54:59 AM PDT by DeaconRed (I don't know, where I'm a gona go, when the Volcano Blow! ! ! ! ! ! ! ! Not to DC fer sure. . .)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
More than Santa Monica " Living Wage The City of Santa Monica Municipal Code Chapter 4.65, Living Wage Ordinance establishes a minimum wage for certain employees of contractors providing services to the City in excess of $54,200. •Certification Form ◦For July 1, 2013 to June 30, 2014, the rate is $14.08 per hour ◦For July 1, 2014 to June 30, 2015, the rate is $15.37 per hour •Amended Ordinance - Equal Benefits (adopted on May 10, 2011) •Amended Ordinance (passed on April 22, 2008) •Ordinance (passed on March 8, 2005)

http://www.smgov.net/Departments/Finance/content.aspx?id=11969

24 posted on 05/05/2014 2:56:59 AM PDT by SMGFan (Sarah Michelle Gellar is now on twitter @RealSMG)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Babe:
Why stop there? Hell, shoot for the stars and make it college education money @ $100 per hour.


25 posted on 05/05/2014 3:17:45 AM PDT by Vendome (Don't take life so seriously-you won't live through it anyway-Enjoy Yourself ala Louis Prima)
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To: ronnie raygun

> You can tell they have never run a business

In their world, businesses don’t exist to make a profit. They only exist to serve their needs with the permission of the king. It really makes you wonder how our younger generation can be so full of knowwledge yet can be so stupid and lacking in wisdom to understand the error in this type of thinking...


26 posted on 05/05/2014 3:34:20 AM PDT by jsanders2001
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

The net result of people discovering they’re going to pay considerably more for their fast food burger is more people not buying the fast food burger. More unemployment. And more people going from skilled (and harder) jobs with the same wage taking easier minimum wage jobs. Bad all around.


27 posted on 05/05/2014 3:43:56 AM PDT by driftless2
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To: jsanders2001
That reminds of when a new business opens in the area, some local labor leader or the local rag will ask the new business owner how many people he or she plans to employ. In short, they think businesses exist to hire people.

Businesses exist to make money. If any business owner could make their business a success without having to hire help, they would do so. Why would you add an extra, unneeded cost to your business? You wouldn't. Including all the sanctimonious civic leaders who want the businesses to hire large amounts of people.

28 posted on 05/05/2014 3:50:33 AM PDT by driftless2
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I think California should raise the state minimum wage to $1M an hour and finish the job of driving out all businesses.


29 posted on 05/05/2014 3:54:17 AM PDT by Pecos (The Chicago Way: Kill the Constitution, one step at a time.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

I actually WOULD like to see California or some other loser state just do that.

Then the people that live their can see the REAL EFFECT of their vaunted “living wage”, and have to deal with it. At that point, they’d likely get it thrown out...perhaps invalidating all local/state and maybe federal minimum wage laws - which should not exist in the first place.


30 posted on 05/05/2014 4:00:05 AM PDT by BobL
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To: pepsionice
At $26 an hour....a McDonalds menu-meal (typically $6.99 now), would end being around $15.00. A coke would run $2 minimum. A Pizza Hut large pizza would likely run near $50.

Your numbers are off, way off. Labor now is 25% of the retail price on average in the food industry. The other 75% is overhead, food, electricity etc.

So if a 4 dollar hamburger was made with labor making say $8/hr and that wage was tripled, only the labor portion triples. So the hamburger costs goes from $4 -> $7 dollars. A huge increase but not the increase you suggest. A $7 -> $10 etc. Bad yes, but keep it real.

31 posted on 05/05/2014 4:06:06 AM PDT by central_va (I won't be reconstructed and I do not give a damn.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

$26 per hour?! They want a full time burger flipper to make $54,000 per year?!


32 posted on 05/05/2014 4:15:33 AM PDT by al_c (Obama's standing in the world has fallen so much that Kenya now claims he was born in America.)
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To: The Working Man; central_va; pepsionice
Has anyone bothered to notice that by raising the minimum wage, besides eventually lowering buying power, lowering the numbers of people employed it also raises workers into higher tax brackets and the government will happily fleece them of more of the wages through income taxes.

So if a 4 dollar hamburger was made with labor making say $8/hr and that wage was tripled, only the labor portion triples.

An increase in wages also causes an increase in the employers’ expense to employ; over and above just the increase of the wages themselves – anywhere from 30% to 40% - the so called “loaded rate”, the true cost to employ someone. In addition to the employer’s share of Social Security and Medicare, there are Federal and state unemployment taxes (FUTA & SUI) and workers compensation insurance premiums, all of which are based on a percentage of wages paid along with other waged based premiums like basic group term life insurance (GTL) which is taxable to the employee over $50k of coverage.

Then there is overtime pay at 1.5 times the base hourly rate which in California is paid not just for hours worked in a week over 40, but also over 8 hours on any day. California also requires employers to pay out at termination all accrued PTO (vacation) hours at the rate of pay at termination whether that termination is voluntary or for cause. So if I have a terminating employee making $10 per hour with 20 hours of accrued PTO, I have to pay out $200, but if their rate of pay is raised to $26 per hour, that payout now becomes $520. And keep in mind also that value of accrued PTO has to be carried as a liability on the employer’s books and such an increase in on the books liabilities devalues the company’s worth.

So not only will employers do more with less workers (and/or incorporate more “self service” and automation), and utilize more part time workers working under 30 hours a week, they will also eliminate overtime where ever possible and eliminate benefits not required by law, such as company paid life insurance and paid vacations.

Another cost to consider is that if you raise the hourly rate of the lowest paid, the least qualified, most inexperienced or entry level workers to $26 per hour, what will an employer be forced to do with those workers already making $26 per hour? You don’t think they will want to make more than the people they are perhaps training and supervising? If I am a manager or supervisor and I’m not making anymore or just barely more than this new minimum wage, what is my motivation to work for “minimum wage” for doing more than a minimum wage job. It just won’t be the minimum wage workers getting wage increases but it will have to “trickle up”.

Unless of course Ms. Lee is proposing a full out old school Soviet/Cuban/Venezuela full out Communist model of worker compensation where all workers regardless of skill, experience and ability make the very same wage in which case everyone from the CEO down will be paid $26 per hour and no more.

The flip side of these so called “living wage” initiatives is the “why should anyone be entitled make more than a living wage” and I think that is just where this is eventually going.

Of course Ms. Lee and others in the highest ranks of favored political classes will get their special perks and live well. The rest of us will be lined up and shot for gathering firewood to keep our families from freezing or exceeding our monthly bread rations.

33 posted on 05/05/2014 4:41:26 AM PDT by MD Expat in PA
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Do I hear $100? This is what allowing absolute idiots to vote will get you….at least in CA.


34 posted on 05/05/2014 5:27:13 AM PDT by txrefugee
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
"Why not one hundred billion dollars..."


35 posted on 05/05/2014 5:28:51 AM PDT by Caipirabob (Communists... Socialists... Democrats...Traitors... Who can tell the difference?)
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To: txrefugee

Why not a thousand dollars or a million? If you got go, go first class.


36 posted on 05/05/2014 5:29:57 AM PDT by sport
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

$1 million per hour...let’s make everyone a millionaire. That is equality!!


37 posted on 05/05/2014 5:39:27 AM PDT by ExCTCitizen (I'm ExCTCitizen and I approve this reply. If it does offend Libs, I'm NOT sorry...)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet
Government meddling with their regulations and outrageous taxes are some of the reasons we are shutting our (much needed) services business. Not only do we have every government entity imaginable with their hands in our pockets, they (with no idea what we do) are telling us (under penalty of law and fines) how to do it.

At the end of this month, we are Going Galt, putting 2 part-time workers out of work and ending services to close to 200 people who need it...

Thanks zero & company...you got what you wanted. Small business, the lifeblood of this country, is now ending...

38 posted on 05/05/2014 5:49:40 AM PDT by Dubh_Ghlase (Therefore, send not to know For whom the bell tolls, It tolls for thee.)
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To: 2ndDivisionVet

Because they are more chimps than people who vote.


39 posted on 05/05/2014 6:55:25 AM PDT by Vaduz
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To: AdmSmith; AnonymousConservative; Berosus; bigheadfred; Bockscar; cardinal4; ColdOne; ...
Thanks 2ndDivisionVet.
"In California, more than likely from what I remembered, a living wage where people could live and take care of their families and move toward achieving the American dream was about $25, $26 an hour," Lee said.
From what she remembers? Oh yeah, represntatives live high on the public hog, give or take any kickbacks or "campaign contributions".
40 posted on 05/08/2014 4:34:32 AM PDT by SunkenCiv (https://secure.freerepublic.com/donate/)
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