[daviddennis]

There's another problem with the living wage that is, perhaps, a bit less obvious.

It's often sold by saying "Gee, these people can't even afford half-decent housing, and yet they work at shiny new hotels. Shouldn't we pay them enough to live near where they work?"

That has a lot of appeal, no?

The problem is that it increases demand without increasing supply. So rents will go up by almost the amount of the increase, leaving people getting the money with the same troubles they had before, only with their employers paying them more.

The answer to our housing problems is, well, to build more housing. And, strangely enough, the left tries to make this as difficult as humanly possible, through their various growth restriction laws. This reasults in a truly appalling outcome, for the poor and everyone else who lives in the area.

D

[Carry_Okie]

The Tides Foundation (currently lending financial support to groups opposing war in Iraq) has given hundreds of thousands of dollars to local and national living-wage groups.

The Tides Foundation operates out of the San Francisco Presidio, so that should clue you in right there. It is basically a money laundering operation for other foundations who wouldn't want to be tied to some of the target groups. Tides provides funds to such radical activists as the Ruckus Society. Their biggest donor is the Pew Charitable Trusts. Consider them hard communists and a danger to the nation.