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Saturday, February 27, 2021

The fifteen buck minimum wage, question - a proposal pending since it was first timely back in 2015 when the phrase was, "Fifteen in '15." Seattle being where the slogan was born, yes/no?

 Fifteen in '21 - it is shameful people have waited that long - 2015-2021 - while continuously denied such a rock bottom labor wage an employer would be forced to pay. Howie Klein:


Regardless of Biden's bullshit about a stand-alone minimum wage bill, it is impossible to find a pathway to overcome the GOP filibuster of this approach to the minimum wage increase, especially with conservative Democrats-- Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema-- making common cause with the Republicans against it. You need 60 votes to bust the filibuster in order to get to the underlying issue and vote on that. 48 Democrats might be joined by 4 or 5 Republicans-- 6 tops-- and that doesn't do it. The enemies of the working class-- and that includes Biden-- are getting their way on this. Abolishing the legislative filibuster would be much easier-- 50 votes would do it. But, again... Manchin and Sinema. And Biden. Jacobin writer Branko Marcetic doesn't beat around the bush when it comes to the way Biden wants to be seen as an ally of working families-- "we included the $15 minimum wage"-- while stabbing them in the back behind the scenes. At best, you could say that Biden sure isn't fighting as hard for the minimum wage as he is to confirm reactionary OMB nominee Neera Tanden.

"A longtime priority of the labor movement and the broad Left," wrote Marcetic of the $15 minimum wage, "the measure was one of the few big-ticket items Joe Biden had agreed to adopt from Bernie Sanders’s platform after vanquishing him in the Democratic primary. Though its impact would be seriously eroded by inflation compared to when it was first proposed, getting it passed would have still been transformational and life-changing for many, given that it would raise wages for 32 million workers, narrow the racial pay gap, and boost incomes for single-income parents, disproportionately mothers.

If Biden had it in him, he'd keep the campaign promise. The opera ain't over.