Is a $15 minimum wage high
enough? Will it cover what’s needed?
How does an increase
in the minimum wage affect higher wages? Maybe there should be a “maximum
wage.”
Is a minimum wage
increase a good solution to income equality? What is the fundamental problem
underneath our current inequality?
Low-wage employers would
rather pay higher wages than have a unionized work force.
How are our wages
affected by the choices we make about careers, or how do wages affect the
careers we choose?
Raising the minimum
wage won’t solve the long term problem, though I’d never vote against
increasing it. We actually work too much.
After brief
background information on Penny U and introducing ourselves to each other, about
20 of us pursued conversations on wages, income, and equality in groups of four.
Questions to Prompt Discussion
Edward
started the conversations by first referring to a few of the many programs and
speakers at Town Hall that have offered perspectives on this topic – from Andy
Stern in January to Robert Reich and Naomi Klein more recently. Then to provoke
more specific thinking, he offered us three sets of questions as options for
discussion:
• Sea-Tac, Seattle, and $15
Did
you follow the political process towards the $15/hr legislation in Sea/Tac and
Seattle? Did you support any of the proposals, and are you happy with how they
turned out? What do you think will
change in Seattle as the law phases in?
• Income inequality, nationally
and globally
President
Obama announced a goal of $10.10/hr minimum wage nationally at his last State
of the Union speech. Though it seems politically infeasible for the near future,
it might signal a shift nationally towards greater focus on wages and income
inequality generally. Do you think that minimum wage increases are a good
solution to income inequality? Is income inequality a problem at all, ethically
or otherwise? Why? What about looking at income inequality as a global issue?
• Your personal story: the
relationship between work and compensation
What
has been your personal relationship to wages in your life? How have you
balanced looking for work you enjoy or care about and looking for work with the
highest compensation? Have you had that privilege, and what values guided you
if so? Have you ever hired someone, and how did you determine what they should
be paid? If not, can you imagine how you might decide? Finally—if you see
income inequality or wealth inequality as problems, how do you think about your
own wealth or income in that context?
Conversation – observations &
more questions
Each of the
groups took the topic up in a different way. One of the challenges we were
given was to identify a question that warranted further discussion with the
full group. One person at each table agreed to be a note taker. What follows is
a slightly edited version of those notes.
Table 1
• What
do we think of the fact that Alaska Airlines isn’t honoring the $15 minimum
wage set by the city of SeaTac? It’s a battle between the City of SeaTac and
the Port of Seattle.
• Raising
the minimum wage doesn’t solve the long term problem. As a whole, we actually
work too much. We need to reconsider the way society works. At the same time, I’d
never vote against increasing the minimum wage.
• People
at the bottom of the wage scale need the money and often don’t get the hours
they need. At the same time, we are in a surplus society. There is so much
consumption. We need to begin emphasizing building relationships rather than
accumulating more goods. And relationships take time not money.
• Scarcity
is artificial. Famines are not a result of a shortage of food, but are a
question of distribution. Our surplus capital capacity doesn’t know where to
go, and it often goes outside the U.S. where it can earn even more.
• There’s
a huge return on capital here, but it doesn’t go to workers. Worker productivity
is up and should generate more money for workers. This is wage theft.
• I’m
anti-growth right now. I want to go backwards; today’s 2.8% growth is too much.
We can’t continue endless capitalist growth. We can do things on a local level;
change our lifestyles, slow down on our consumer spending.
• In
my work I’ve hired people, and I’ve never paid them just the minimum wage,
always more. I wanted them to take pride in their work and to stick around. I
was being intentional and wanted to responsibly allocate resources to people.
• The
decade of the 1950s was the era of the middle class. Around 1968 we had,
proportionally, the highest minimum wage. If it had kept up with inflation, it
would be $18 now (another person said it would be $23 now).
• At
the same time, there’s a huge increase in the difference between CEO’s wages
and workers’ wages. In the 1960s CEOs earned about 40 times what a worker did;
now it’s around 500 times as much. Because their earnings come from the stock
market, CEOs interests are aligned with stockholders’ interests, and they’ve
squeezed profits out of the bottom line.
• The
main problem with capitalism is one of stagnation (referring to the Monthly Review), combined with the fact
that in the 1950s finance was a small part of the overall economy; now it’s
about 40%. We’ve removed the brakes put in place by the New Deal. Keynes hadn’t
anticipated that stagnation and inflation could coexist.
• In
1971, before Lewis Powell was a Supreme Court justice, he drafted a memo for
the U.S. Chamber of Commerce to respond to the Chamber’s concern that labor was
too strong, that the expansion of government regulatory power was a big problem,
and that corporations had to organize and lobby government. The aim was to increase
the political power of business and change the country’s ideology around
corporations, workers, and the government. It worked. Among many other things,
it represents the beginning of corporations being called “job creators” and the idea that the business of business is
making profits. (Reference: The Powell Memo)
• We
need to raise consciousness. Our conversation is not large enough. In her talk
at Town Hall (and in her book) Naomi Klein proposed that climate change can be
the “big tent” under which many of these concerns can be brought together and
gain strength.
• Question for the whole group:
Is
there a way to change the ideology around both income inequality and climate
change so that we can deal with the system holistically?
Table 2
• This group took up Edward’s initial
question #2, about income inequality nationally and globally.
• What
is inequality? Is a living wage a good
goal? Does a minimum wage address
inequality?
• A
living minimum wage is a solid issue. While other issues arise, they are more difficult
to address and it’s good to have enough money to survive.
• Wage
demands are important. Do people get what they demand? There isn’t enough
advocacy by and for poor workers. Being able to advocate for themselves is
important. If nobody pays attention, it is easy for nothing to be done. At the
same time, in some contexts, self-advocacy can lead to an “imposter syndrome.”
• Low-wage
employers would rather pay higher wages than have a unionized work force.
Unions might be a way to galvanize workers to make demands.
• We
have to think about the discrepancy in social safety nets for people in poverty
and people of wealth?
• Does
minimum wage address the real problem? What is the fundamental problem? Does
building wealth address the same issue? Could the real problem be better
addressed through a universal basic income? What’s the difference between
income and wealth? Would wealth be as important if we had a better social
safety net?
• How
do Americans feel about work? They like earning money more than just being
cared for, as in the “nanny state.”
• Why
do people volunteer? Does this keep wages down?
• What
is the cultural framework for this? And how does expertise play out? How are
our wages affected by the choices we make about careers, or how do wages affect
the careers we choose? Some career decisions inherently mean low wages. Do
people really make what they demand?
How can we overcome historical relationships (or lack of relationship) between
values and wages?
• Changing
values is a complex task. It takes long term commitment.
• We
have to look locally, things like education levies in the city, as well as
initiatives for transportation. Timing for the $15 campaign was right, and it
generated a real discussion. The Occupy Movement led to today’s advocacy. WTO
was 15 years ago.
• In
the 1930s, Roosevelt gave us a social safety net. How do we facilitate a new
uprising? Or do we not facilitate it and let it grow in a decentralized way?
• The
consumer mindset is a cultural phenomenon. How will the economy/quality of
services be in this new order? Are we willing to have lower quality for
solidarity?
• Question for the whole group:
What is the fundamental problem
underneath our current inequality?
Table 3
• Is
a minimum wage increase a good solution to income inequality?
• If
the poverty level for a family of 4 is $23,850, how many hours would it take at
$15/hour to earn that much?
The
scribe says, if this were take-home pay (that is, not accounting for reductions
for taxes, social security, holidays, sick days, vacation days, etc.), it would
take 1,590 hours, or about 199 days, or 40 (5-day) weeks. And at the Federal minimum wage level of
$7.25 it would take about twice that many, or 3,290 hours, that is, 411 days or
82 weeks – 30 more weeks than there are in a year. Maybe my logic is wrong, but the implication
seems clear.
• Why
is there so much debate about raising the minimum wage and not about other wage
levels?
• A
discussion of the ratio between the lowest and highest wages is a necessary
part of a package solution.
• Question for the whole group:
Instead
of pushing to raise the minimum wage, should we push instead for a minimum
ratio between the lowest wage and the highest? How do we move from a discussion
of minimum wage to a discussion of wages at all levels?
Table 4
• An
optimistic spirit is rising; a general desire to address this is finding
traction.
• What
are the effects of a higher minimum wage, or of the current extreme economic
inequality, on the cost of goods?
• How
does the minimum wage affect higher wages? How does it affect the cost of
living?
• The
national minimum wage is $7.25; Washington state’s is $9.25 (as of January 1,
2015, it will be $9.32). Is $15 high enough? Will it cover what’s needed – housing,
transportation, and everything else?
• We
should talk about distribution. Maybe there should be a “maximum wage.”
Graduated tax rates used to do more of this. The marginal tax rate on upper
incomes was about 90% from the mid-40s after WWII through the early 60s; it was
a time of economic stability and a strong middle class. Obamacare is a
touchstone for economic redistribution.
• This
group invoked David Stockman, Reagan’s budget director (who spoke at Town Hall
last year). Stockman debunked economic myths associated with Reagan, what some
call “Voodoo economics.” The group also referred to the “logical fallacy of
aristocracy.”
• In
a context where the wealthy need an economy with cycles of cost increases, how
do we legislate values?
• Where
are the public advocates? We need debates on money, media, and accountability.
Can we galvanize more voting?
• Elders
face great instability as pensions are taken away, and they are forced into the
stock market with their savings.
• The
range of people and topics discussed at this table was broad: Elizabeth Warren,
Naomi Klein, the role of the Federal Reserve, debt, inflation, Kentucky as a
contradictory state, and small businesses.
• Questions for the whole group:
What
is the real nature of the problem?
Is
there a way to change opinions about climate change and income inequality?
What
adjustments should the wealthiest make in their habits?
Whole Group Wrap-up Conversation
Individual
conversations were so animated and engaging that it was hard to come back
together. Each small group did, though, bring back questions for the whole
group to ponder:
• Is
there a way to change the ideology around both income inequality and climate
change and to deal with the system holistically?
• What
is the fundamental problem underneath our current inequality?
• Instead
of pushing to raise the minimum wage, should we push instead for a minimum
ratio between the lowest wage and the highest? How do we move from a discussion
of minimum wage to a discussion of wages at all levels?
• And
a set of three questions: What is the real nature of the problem? Is there a
way to change opinions about climate change and income inequality? What
adjustments should the wealthiest make in their habits?
With very
little time to get into such big topics, a few observations were made.
• If
we want to change the prevailing ideology, Robert Reich suggests we need to go
back to the 50s and push for a real balance of power.
• So
much change is needed now it will take revolution. We’ve reached a threshold
where that’s necessary to wide spread change of the geist, or zeitgeist.
• A
question for Penny U is, can we or how can we take this discussion to a
practical level. The potential is there and has a legitimate intellectual core.
• Is
it possible to talk of a maximum wage, and an “idle aristocracy”?
