Clinton vs Sanders - "It's the Economy, Stupid" - A Living Wage (Pay)

Part I - A Living Wage (Pay)

Increase federal minimum wage to $15 

Establish equal pay for women

Overtime pay protection  

Labor, Economy, Women’s rights

Increase federal minimum wage to $12

Establish equal pay for women

Overtime pay protection

Part 2 - A Living Wage (Benefits)

Paid family and medical leave, paid vacation, payed sick days

Universal childcare and pre-K program

Strengthen the labor movement

Labor, Economy, Women’s rights

Paid family leave, earned sick days      

Quality affordable child care 

Strengthen the labor movement

Part I - A Living Wage (Pay)

Establish equal pay for women

Overtime pay protection  

Labor, Economy, Women’s rights

Establish equal pay for women

Overtime pay protection

Issue descriptions come directly from candidate websites; they may be trimmed for brevity

Increase federal minimum wage to $15

“Millions of Americans are working for totally inadequate wages. We must ensure that no full-time worker lives in poverty. The current federal minimum wage is starvation pay and must become a living wage. We must increase it to $15 an hour over the next several years.”

“Increasing the federal minimum wage from $7.25 to $15 an hour by 2020. In the year 2015, no one who works 40 hours a week should be living in poverty.”

Increase federal minimum wage to $12

”Hillary believes we are long overdue in raising the minimum wage. She has supported raising the federal minimum wage to $12, and believes that we should go further than the federal minimum through state and local efforts, and workers organizing and bargaining for higher wages, such as the Fight for 15 and recent efforts in Los Angeles and New York to raise their minimum wage to $15.”

”The current minimum wage isn’t enough for Americans to meet their basic needs. Because women represent nearly two-thirds of all minimum wage workers, many women are living that reality every day. A higher minimum wage will help close the gender pay gap, lift millions of women out of poverty, and have a ripple effect across our economy. While we work to raise the federal minimum wage, Hillary will also support state and local efforts to go above the federal floor.”

Actions:

2007 : Voted in favor of H.R.2 - Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, which raised the minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25.

2013 (Sept): Organized a group of 15 senators (including Elizabeth Warren) to urge Obama to issue an executive order to set the minimum wage for federal contract workers  (“lowest-paid of the some 2 million employees of private businesses that last year alone received more than $446 billion in federal contracts”) to $10.10 an hour.

In the Jan 2014 State of the Union address, Obama announced he would do this, and on 02/12/14 he issued the Executive Order.

2014: One of 39 co-sponsors of S.1737 - Minimum Wage Fairness Act, which was an effort to increase the minimum wage for federal contract workers to $10.10 an hour. Status: Introduced (before Obama signed his Executive Order on this topic, which rendered this bill unnecessary).

Press Release

2015: Sponsored/Introduced S.1832 - Pay Workers a Living Wage Act (5 cosponsors, including Elizabeth Warren), which is an effort to increase the minimum wage to $15.  Status: Introduced

Press Release, Fact Sheet, Petition signed by 208 professional economists

Actions:

2007 : Voted in favor of H.R.2 - Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2007, which raised the minimum wage from $5.15 to $7.25.

Related Diaries/URLs: 

- TP (8/28/13): An Unfulfilled Demand From The March On Washington: A $15 Minimum Wage

- NYT (Paul Krugman, 4/13/15): Power and Paychecks

- Huff Po (5/15/15): Bernie Sanders, Elizabeth Warren Tell Obama To 'Fight For $15' With Executive Power

- Huff Po (5/24/15): $15 minimum wage in L.A. is great. But it was only necessary because a Democratic Congress blew it

- Salon (8/4/15): The 7 most dangerous myths about a $15 minimum wage

- Daily Kos (10/1/15): Seattle Raises its Minimum Wage, Jobless Rate Drops--Fox Scrambles for a Ladder to Pick Cherries

- Daily Kos (10/15/15): Study says there's NO state where a single adult can live on less than $14/hr working a 40-hour week

- Salon (Robert Reich, 10/20/15): A $15 minimum wage is the only moral choice

- Daily Kos (11/10/15) Black Lives Matter Joins Fight for $15 Today in the Bay Area

- NPR (11/10/15): Push For $15 Minimum Wage Becoming Part Of Presidential Politics

- Boston Globe (12/4/15): For Ted Kennedy, increasing minimum wage was worth a battle

- TP (12/22/15) — A $15 Minimum Wage Is Sweeping The Nation

- Huff Po (12/28/15): The New York Times Calls For $15 Minimum Wage Nationwide

- Huff Po (4/18/14): How The Clinton White House Played Politics With The Minimum Wage 

- Minimum Wage - The Leadership Conference on Civil and Human Rights

- GAO (7/30/15): Federal Low-Income Programs

- Google search on $15 minimum wage returns about 1,680,000 results

Related Diaries/URLs:

- NYT (Alan Kruegar, 10/9/15): The Minimum Wage: How Much Is Too Much?

- The Hill (11/3/15): Clinton backs $12 minimum wage

- Slate (11/15/15): Hillary Clinton Was Right in That Minimum Wage Fight and Her Rivals Were Wrong

- Google search on $12 minimum wage returns about 435,000 results

Related Tags: LivingWage, MinimumWage, Wages, LowWageWork

Robert Reich states the standard conservative view about increased wages,

“They claim it will force employers to lay off workers worth hiring at the current federal minimum of $7.25 an hour but not at a higher minimum.”

This argument sounds reasonable, which probably explains why so many are persuaded by it.  If you look more closely, though, you can see it omits important parts of the equation.

According to basic economic theory, a business takes action when it senses “demand” that can be “supplied” by making a profit. The equation to remember is this:

PROFIT = REVENUES - COSTS

There are actually two key situations that can have a negative impact on profit:

The trick to keep in mind is that in order to make a profit, supply (/costs) and demand (/revenues) must both be managed properly. Increasing wages affects the “cost” of workers, that is quite true. But at the very same time, it also increases “demand,” which is much less obvious to most. Increased demand is a very, very, very good thing for business and also a very, very, very good thing for the economy. Reich explains,

“a higher minimum puts more money into the pockets of people who will spend it, mostly in the local economy. That spending encourages businesses to hire more workers.” 

To better understand what Reich is saying, first think of an extreme: imagine that all business has been completely automated and thus has zero workers on the payroll. Every sale would most likely be highly profitable, right?, because employee costs are so low. When costs go down, profits go up, most of us understand this. However ... the number of sales would also be highly constrained because the number of workers has also gone down. Fewer workers means fewer people who have money in their pockets, and as we know, money is required in order to buy. Also, think of the efforts — and enormous number of dollars spent — by business on marketing. Why does a business advertise? The answer: they are trying to “Increase demand” for their products/ services. And that is because increased demand typically leads to increased profits (see the equation above).

The dirty little secret that most Republicans either do not understand, or will not admit, is this: businesses hire workers only when they absolutely have to. In other words, they will only hire  when three conditions are met:

Do you see how it works? FYI, John Boehner accidentally let this well-kept secret slip one day in May, 2015: “The economy expands and as a result, you are going to have more employees because businesses have to.”

The economy needs to be thought of as an ecosystem: when wages are paid to workers, those workers almost magically become consumers with money who are then able to buy products and services. On the other hand, when wages are low, fewer “consumers with money” are created; the overall ability of consumers to make purchases is reduced, regardless of how desperate the need. If we have no money, we cannot buy. We all know this.

One last point: when jobs are outsourced to other countries, the ability of Americans to buy is harmed, and that hurts the American marketplace. Business always chases after consumer demand (“that’s where the money is”) — when wages flow to other countries, it creates consumers in those countries, and businesses naturally shift their sales efforts toward those new consumers. Outsourcing literally destroys the American economy. Think of it like arsenic — a little bit isn’t so bad, but too much is deadly.

in 2015, the poverty level for a family of two is $15,930, which means that a single mother with only one child, who has a job that pays the current minimum wage, is living in poverty — even if she is working full time. Hence the existing minimum wage has been called a “poverty wage.” Should anyone who is working full-time be living in poverty?

“People who work full time are fulfilling their most basic social responsibility. As such, they should earn enough to live on.” [...]

“A $15 minimum wage is the only moral choice” — Robert Reich, 2015

“We march today for jobs and freedom, but we have nothing to be proud of.  For hundreds and thousands of our brothers are not here.  For they are receiving starvation wages, or no wages at all.  While we stand here, there are sharecroppers in the Delta of Mississippi who are out in the fields working for less than three dollars a day, twelve hours a day.” — John Lewis, 1963

While writing this diary, I finally connected the dots … and suddenly can see we are still discussing the very same issues, in the land of the free and the home of the brave, that were discussed during the Civil Rights movement more than fifty years ago.

We are discussing … we are actually discussing … in America, in the year 2016 ... whether or not full time workers should be given sufficient wages that will allow them to live. The people we are discussing are not lounging in hammocks, they are working hard but being given miserly wages.

But let me be clear … this is not just the SECOND time we have had this discussion … no, the debate over the minimum wage has been going on for decades, ever since 1938. The basic cycle, for those who are willing and able to see it, is this:

To give you a better sense of this cycle, please look at the following graph. It shows

American laws are currently such that If an employer does not pay enough for an employee to survive, taxpayers provide certain benefits that make it more possible for that person and their family to, you know, SURVIVE. In other words, American taxpayers are picking up the tab when an employer provides a poverty wage, and a business that engages in such shenanigans is actually allowed to keep the “profits” they “earn” by doing so! WTF, WTF, WTF?! What the hell is going on in our country?

According to the GAO,

“In 2012, the most recent year of data available, GAO estimated that 106 million people, or one-third of the U.S. population, received benefits from at least one or more of eight selected federal low-income programs: Additional Child Tax Credit, EITC, SNAP, SSI, and four others. Almost two-thirds of the eight programs' recipients were in households with children, including many married families. More than 80 percent of recipients also lived in households with some earned income during the year.”

Are government supplied “survival supplements” consistent with the ideals of capitalism that are held dear by so many on the right? If a business must rely on government support in order to implement a successful business strategy, can the entity in question actually be considered a viable business?

This is America. Why are we allowing such so-called businesses to operate? Why are taxpayers picking up the tab so that predatory entities such as these can make a profit? This is a horrible and shameless scam; it needs to end.

Fun facts:

- November 29, 2012 - a movement called Fight for $15 begins with over 100 fast-food workers going on strike for higher wages, better working conditions and the right to form a union without retaliation from their managers. “The strike was organized by over 40 personnel from New York Communities for Change, Service Employees International Union, UnitedNY, and the Black Institute.”  One of the earliest reports on the strike comes from the LA Times:

“New York -- A week after hundreds of Wal-Mart employees walked off their jobs to demand better wages and the freedom to form a union, fast-food workers from some of the nation’s largest chains are staging a similar walkout.

Employees from McDonald's, Wendy’s, Burger King, Taco Bell and KFC are staging protests in locations around New York City today, demanding $15 an hour in pay – more than double the minimum wage some receive – and the right to form a union [...]

‘Most workers are being paid minimum wage, they can’t afford rent, they can’t afford to put food on the table,” he said. “Many people rely on public assistance to subsidize their wages.’”

I have not been able to find an explanation about how Fight for $15 decided on the number $15. However, we do know that their second strike was held on April 4, 2013, the 45th anniversary of the assassination of Dr. King; It appears that his influence manifested itself very early in the young movement. It is not so much of a leap, therefore, to suspect that this number was related to the $2 an hour wage that Dr. King sought in 1963. In 2012, the equivalent value when adjusted for inflation would have been $15.01.

- September, 2013 - Bernie Sanders organized a group of 15 senators (including Elizabeth Warren) to urge Obama

“to issue an executive order that would be tantamount to setting a minimum wage [$10.10] for federal contractors.

“In their letter ... the senators said that at least $10.10 an hour should be paid to the lowest-paid of the some 2 million employees of private businesses that last year alone received more than $446 billion in federal contracts.”

Later that year, Sen. Tom Harkin sponsored S.1737 - Minimum Wage Fairness Act, to try to accomplish the same goal through legislation; Sanders cosponsored this bill in Jan 2014. During the State of the Union address later that month, Obama pledged to issue an executive order to raise the wage to $10.10. Less than one month later, Obama fulfilled that promise. Net result:  Sanders led a fight to increase the minimum wage for federal contract workers to $10.10, and Sanders got it done.

- April 30, 2015 - Sen. Patty Murray (D-WA) sponsored S.1150 - Raise the Wage Act to raise the minimum wage to $12; ThinkProgress provides good answers to the questions, “Why $10.10?” and “Why $12?”:

A $10.10 wage would have brought it in line with about where it would have been if it had kept up with inflation since its peak in 1968. But this was, according to economist David Cooper with the Economic Policy Institute who has worked with lawmakers on crafting the $12 wage bill, “the lowest possible threshold for where you could be aiming.” He added, “What you’re saying is that low-wage workers should have seen no material improvement in their standard of living over the last 50 years.” That’s despite the fact that there has been significant economic growth, driven in part by rapidly increasing worker productivity.

Even though the Republican-led Congress is unlikely to take such a bill up, Democrats have recently decided they need to take the debate around the minimum wage further. The new benchmark, Cooper said, is to “return the minimum wage to where the distance between the lower paid worker and typical worker is no greater than it was back then.” If lawmakers use a ratio of the minimum wage to the median wage for all workers, which was 52 percent back in 1968, then a $12 wage by 2020 makes a lot of sense, as it would bring the minimum up to 54 percent of the median wage, which today stands at just over $17 an hour. “It’s essentially returning the minimum wage to the same value it had in 1968 in relative terms,” he said.

- July 22, 2015 - Sanders introduced a bill in the Senate to raise the minimum wage to $15; On August 8, Elizabeth Warren became one of the bill’s cosponsors. Sanders also has provided a signed petition from 208 professional economists, which states

“... the weight of evidence from the extensive professional literature has, for decades, consistently found that no significant effects on employment opportunities result when the minimum wage rises in reasonable increments. This is because the increases in overall business costs resulting from a minimum wage increase are, for the most part, modest. [...]

The economy overall will benefit from the gains in equality tied to the minimum wage increase and related policy initiatives. Greater equality means working people have more spending power, which in turn supports greater overall demand in the economy. [...]

In short, raising the federal minimum to $15 an hour by 2020 will be an effective means of improving living standards for low-wage workers and their families and will help stabilize the economy. The costs to other groups in society will be modest and readily absorbed.”

- November 3, 2015 — Up until this day, Clinton has made supportive comments about the need to increase the minimum wage, but not much in the way of details about where exactly she stands on the issue. On this day, It has been about

… and New York, Oregon and Massachusetts were still actively debating measures to raise the minimum wage to $15 in their states.  FYI: List of $15 Laws & Current Campaigns

Finally, Clinton shares her views:

“’I want to raise the federal minimum wage to $12, and encourage other communities to go even higher,’ she said.”

“Pressed on whether $12 was better than a competing Democratic proposal of $15, Clinton suggested the more modest increase is also the more viable one politically … Her hesitance on the $15 issue may come as a relief to businesses that have been getting bowled over by wildly popular minimum wage campaigns … Despite the success of local campaigns,   there's no clear indication that a $12 federal proposal would be any more viable in the near future than one for $15. 

In recent sessions, the GOP-controlled House has refused to bring any such bills to the floor for a vote, including one that would have raised the minimum wage to an even more modest $10.10.”

Clinton waited a long time before sharing details about her plan; once she finally did, she took $15 right off the table. Why did she take this action at such an early point in the process? The situation reminds me of when Obama took the Public Option out of the healthcare debate very quickly.

On her campaign website, Clinton does a good job of describing the importance of raising the minimum wage, especially for women, and especially for women of color,

“Because women represent nearly two-thirds of all minimum wage workers, many women are living that reality every day. A higher minimum wage will help close the gender pay gap, lift millions of women out of poverty, and have a ripple effect across our economy”

“Women earn less than men across our economy— and women of color often lose out the most.”

But describing an issue is a very different thing than describing a solution, and/or being willing to fight to see the solution implemented. Shouldn’t votes be earned on the basis of the latter, rather than the former?  What commitments are the candidates actually making about the priorities of their future administrations?

Women and persons of color should consider the fact that Clinton’s track record regarding the fight to actually raise the wage looks weak when compared to what Sanders has already accomplished.

Women and persons of color should also consider the fact that Sanders fight to increase the minimum wage is driven by his apparently sincere belief that full time workers should be given sufficient wages that will allow them to “live with dignity”.  And IMHO, all voters should consider the influence of Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr on Sanders, who appears to have internalized to a very high degree the goals, and even the language, of the great African American men who led the Civil Rights movement .

“We demand that there be an increase in the minimum wage so that men may live in dignity.” — Bayard Rustin, 1963

Please watch these clips from 2013, before Sanders was running for president, which show his efforts to improve the lives of low income workers.

“The Minimum Wage - Published on Jun 26, 2013

Senator Bernie Sanders discusses the middle wage at a Senate Health, Education, Labor, and Pensions Committee hearing.”

“Bernie Sanders Tells The Truth About The Minimum Wage - Published on Aug 7, 2013

Vermont Senator Bernie Sanders appeared on CNN's "The Situation Room" with the former director of the Congressional Budget Office and John McCain economic advisor Douglas Holtz-Eakin and told the truth about the minimum wage.”

Here we see Clinton in 2014, making supportive comments about the need to increase the minimum wage, but few specific details. She describes how increasing the wage will lift families out of poverty and also increase the number of jobs. IMHO, her emphasis seems to be focused more on the economy than on the plight of full time workers living in poverty.

“Hillary in Kentucky: HRC Tells the Truth about the Minimum Wage - Published on Oct 16, 2014”

In the clip below, Clinton explains why she is supporting a $12 minimum wage.  Notice that she does not at any point in this video discuss the plight of full time workers living in poverty.  Instead, she provides the  same answer we heard from the ThinkProgress interview with David Cooper: “It’s essentially returning the minimum wage to the same value it had in 1968 in relative terms.”  Why 1968? Because that is the year when the minimum wage historically had the greatest earning power in real terms.

Clinton’s answer sounds fairly reasonable. But there is a big problem with it, a problem that I’m going to let Elizabeth Warren describe in the next video.  But first, here is Clinton.

“Hillary Clinton Supports a Federal Minimum Wage of $12 - Published on Nov 3, 2015”

And now, Elizabeth Warren:

“Senator Elizabeth Warren on Minimum Wage Being $22 per Hour - Published on Mar 18, 2013”

“Elizabeth Warren: Minimum Wage Would Be $22 An Hour If It Had Kept Up With Productivity

Sen. Elizabeth Warren (D-Mass.) made a case for increasing the minimum wage last week during a Senate Committee on Health, Education, Labor and Pensions hearing, in which she cited a study that suggested the federal minimum wage would have stood at nearly $22 an hour today if it had kept up with increased rates in worker productivity.

"If we started in 1960 and we said that as productivity goes up, that is as workers are producing more, then the minimum wage is going to go up the same. And if that were the case then the minimum wage today would be about $22 an hour," she said, speaking to Dr. Arindrajit Dube, a University of Massachusetts Amherst professor who has studied the economic impacts of minimum wage. "So my question is Mr. Dube, with a minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, what happened to the other $14.75? It sure didn't go to the worker." ”

[all emphasis mine]

The point that Warren is making has to do with worker productivity: the average minimum wage worker today is accomplishing more, doing more, than a similar worker was accomplishing back in 1968. And because they are accomplishing more, doing more, the businesses who employ them have become increasingly more profitable. The argument Warren makes is that a portion of the increased profits generated by the increased productivity of the workers should be going to the workers.

Tying this back to Clinton’s recommendation of $12 an hour: setting the minimum wage to a value that is primarily just the inflation adjusted value of a high-water mark — that has not been seen in  FIFTY YEARS, OMG —  is ignoring the fact that today’s workers are accomplishing more, doing more, than similar workers did back in 1968. And so today’s workers deserve a higher wage that better reflects their increased role. Today’s workers deserve greater compensation because they are producing more results.

Please notice, though, that when Clinton explains why she advocates a $12 wage, she leaves out a huge, important, and awful issue: the plight of full time workers living in poverty. 

Now compare the rhetoric on Sanders’ website to the rhetoric on Clinton’s to see a key difference between their goals. Sanders uses language such as living wage, starvation pay, and living in poverty; his goal is to take action ensure that in the country of America, in the 21st century, full time workers are given enough pay  to escape poverty. 

Sanders:

Clinton’s language is noticeably different. Sanders’ words are full of fire and empathy; hers are almost clinically detached. Clinton doesn’t even acknowledge the issue that Sanders cares about deeply: full time workers being given miserly wages that force them to live in poverty. Sanders’ goal is focused on reducing poverty; Clinton’s goal is more narrowly focused on “raising the minimum wage;” the emphasis of each goal is both different and significant.

Clinton:

I have one last video to share with this reality-based community; the description for it reads:

“Hillary Clinton endorsed a $12 per hour minimum wage. We use MIT's living wage calculator [link] and look at some U.S. counties to show that $12 per hour is not a living wage in many cases. The conclusion? $15 should be the absolute minimum.”

I highly encourage you to watch this demonstration of MIT’s living wage calculator:

“Why Hillary Clinton's $12 Minimum Wage is Insufficient - Published on Nov 9, 2015”

- Nov 10, 2015  Check out this tweet sent out by Hillary Clinton AFTER SHE HAD ANNOUNCED  HER PLAN TO RAISE THE MINIMUM WAGE TO $12:

Fast-food, home care, child care workers: Your advocacy is changing our country for the better. #Fightfor15 -H

Why did Clinton write #Fightfor15 on her tweet, instead of #Fightfor12?  Why didn’t she tweet ‘Hey, good luck with $15, but my advice to you is #Fightfor12 instead because it is much more politically viable.”

And notice who the tweet is addressed to: fast-food, home care, and childcare workers. Keep in mind that fast-food workers were the folks who started the Fight for $15 movement way back in 2012. They are fighting for $15, not $12. In August, Clinton met with childcare workers, many of whom

“were strong and vocal advocates for raising the federal minimum wage to $15. Sitting squarely in front of the candidate were two women wearing bright red shirts that read, "Fight for $15" …

But Clinton did not endorse a $15 wage on Thursday and provided few specifics on where she would go on wages. After the event, Clinton took a few pictures — including one with people wearing "Fight for $15" T-shirts ...

‘I like Hillary," [one of the workers] said, "but hopefully by her meeting us today, she will change her mind. Come election time, I am going to support the person who supports my issues.’ “

Why did Clinton write #Fightfor15 on her tweet? Why did she do that?

I think I know the answer. I think her words give the typical layperson, someone who is not paying very close attention, maybe someone who doesn’t even have the time to pay close attention because they are too busy working very long hours at low paying job(s) in order to survive, the (mistaken) impression that she is on the same side as Fight for $15, and as president she will do what she can to fight for their cause.

Suppose for a moment that Clinton wins and becomes president. Is she going to take any significant action to help fast-food, home care, and childcare workers to get $15 an hour for their work. I am willing to bet big money that the answer is no. Why? Because she has literally not made that promise anywhere. Look again, closely, at the words on her website about the minimum wage:

”Hillary believes we are long overdue in raising the minimum wage. She has supported raising the federal minimum wage to $12, and believes that we should go further than the federal minimum through state and local efforts, and workers organizing and bargaining for higher wages, such as the Fight for 15 and recent efforts in Los Angeles and New York to raise their minimum wage to $15.”

”The current minimum wage isn’t enough for Americans to meet their basic needs. Because women represent nearly two-thirds of all minimum wage workers, many women are living that reality every day. A higher minimum wage will help close the gender pay gap, lift millions of women out of poverty, and have a ripple effect across our economy. While we work to raise the federal minimum wage, Hillary will also support state and local efforts to go above the federal floor.”

Look at the first item, “She has supported raising the federal minimum wage to $12.” What do these words even say? It really isn’t even a promise, it is more of a description of what she has (said? done?) in the past. These words literally say nothing about what she plans to do in the future. Why didn’t she write “She supports” instead of “she has supported”? 

What do we find next? Clinton “believes that we should go further ...” That part sounds good, huh?  And it is good, It is very nice that Clinton “believes” that state and local efforts “should” be made to increase state and local minimum wages that are higher than the federal one …  because that is how our American federal government already operates: power is shared between the “national” government and state/ local ones. “National” laws must be obeyed (as long as they are constitutional), but state and local governments already have the authority to pass additional laws that apply to their citizens alone (again, as long as they are constitutional).

In fact, the cities of Seattle, San Francisco, and Los Angeles have already taken this approach when they each passed appropriate legislation to raise their city wages to $15. Did President Obama play any kind of role in making that happen? No, he did not. The role of the President of the United States is at the “national” level alone. It is nice than Clinton “believes that we should go further than the federal minimum through state and local efforts,” but even if she believed otherwise, as president she would not have the power to actually do much about it (short of leading efforts to change the Constitution).

An equally valid way to restate the content on Clinton’s campaign website is this:

“She has supported raising the federal minimum wage to $12, and recommends that existing laws be followed at the state and local level if additional increases are desired by those voters.”

These words communicate more clearly and honestly what Clinton is actually saying. 

In general, I find the rhetoric about the minimum wage on Clinton’s website to be empty and misleading. The words, “and believes that we should go further than the federal minimum through state and local efforts” are akin to puffery, except for their highly misleading nature.

Politics is a craft where some are able to convey messages they do not actually say. In the end, an election is a popularity contest, a game that is played to determine which candidate is “liked” by more voters. Successful politicians understand two very important things:

Actions such as the tweet above enables Clinton to gain the trust of innocents who want need $15 as a minimum wage, but she has literally not made any promises to them about $15 at all; she’s only promising $12, in a weak tea kind of way, and then surrounding that promise with misleading fluff. Caveat emptor.

I must warn you, this last section is highly disturbing, but it is a matter of fact, and IMHO all progressive voters should be aware of it.

If you took my advice and watched Sen. Ted Kennedy in 2007 as he “goes off on Senate Republicans as they once again try to block the first minimum wage increase in 10 years,” you should have a sense of how passionate the man became when advocating for increases to help the working poor; to say he could be intense is an understatement.

Kennedy was aware of the basic cycle associated with the minimum wage — especially the part where “over time, the real value of any new minimum wage gradually erodes.” He knew that the only way to end the awful cycle is to both

To fully understand what transpired in 1998, one needs to remember that on August 20, 1996, Bill Clinton had signed the Small Business Job Protection Act, which raised the existing minimum wage of $4.25 ($6.25 in 2015) in two increments:

October 1, 1996 — from $4.25 to $4.75 ($7.19 in 2015)

September 1, 1997 — from $4.75 to $5.15 ($7.62 in 2015)

In 1998, Sen. Ted Kennedy tried to leverage from this success with a bill to increase the wage even further and then tie it to an inflation index. Dave Jamieson, the Huffington Post’s labor reporter, explains:

“This concept -- known as indexing -- is something of a holy grail for backers of a strong minimum wage, since it would eliminate the need to constantly re-legislate new increases to the wage floor.”

He adds that Kennedy’s efforts to champion this issue,

“appear to have failed at least in part because the economic team under President Bill Clinton didn't want Democrats to lose hold of a winning political issue.” 

Wait … what? … Did Jamieson really write that? He did indeed. In a piece called How The Clinton White House Played Politics With The Minimum Wage, Jamieson provides more details:

“In a January 1998 memo to Clinton [see page marked “5” (7th page in file)], Gene Sperling, then the director of the National Economic Council [the principal forum used by the President of the United States for considering economic policy matters], laid out all of the reasons why his team couldn't get behind Kennedy's indexing proposal.” 

The final reason presented — the one shown immediately before an area provided for the president to indicate how he wished to proceed — is this one:

“[S]ince the minimum wage would automatically rise each year, it would take away a good political issue for those who believe the minimum wage is an important tool to help low-income families."

Jamieson paraphrases these words:

“Here's another way to read that: Keeping the minimum wage somewhat low is helpful politically to Democrats [politicians, not voters] who say it should be higher.”

Sperling was advising Clinton that “[not getting] behind Kennedy's indexing proposal” might be a smart political choice because … hmmm, how exactly do I say this? …

if you are a politician who is supposed to be fighting for the 99%, and you

Sperling was instructing Clinton that it is in the best interest of politicians who are supposed to be fighting for the 99% to keep the minimum wage low, because that way the 99%  will remain  motivated to keep voting for politicians “who are willing to fight for them”.  In other industries this technique might be referred to as bait-and-switch.

Who are the politicians that are supposed to be fighting for the 99%?  Haven’t they historically been identified by a little D after their name? Bill Clinton, the 42nd President of the United States, was one of them.

IMHO, this memo is seriously damaging. It provides evidence that politicians do in fact at least  consider actions that would betray the very voters who elected them. The memo provides evidence that in 1998 — when the economy was booming, as some of us remember — Bill Clinton was advised by one of his top economic experts, that keeping the minimum wage un-indexed is essentially smart politics. We also know that Kennedy’s efforts to tie the minimum wage to an index failed — and the minimum wage is still not tied to one until this day.

Hillary Clinton advocates $12 instead of $15, that much we know. The big question is, why? Is it possible that somebody has advised her that if the minimum wage grows too large

“it would take away a good political issue for those who believe the minimum wage is an important tool to help low-income families."

Sanders has Elizabeth Warren, Robert Reich, the NYT Editorial Board, and 208 professional economists standing on his side when he advocates for $15. He appears to have internalized to a very high degree the goals, and even the language, of the Civil Rights movement. He is fighting to “ensure that no full-time worker lives in poverty.”

Clinton has Alan Kruegar, conservative arguments, and a set of fiercely loyal voters who seem to believe that being “pragmatic” is always the best way to achieve political goals. I have to wonder how many of these supporters are currently earning the minimum wage themselves.

Review:

A Table of Various Minimum Wage Values in 2015 and 1963

Words from Sen. Ted Kennedy:

In summary: who is better on the minimum wage issue? IMHO, Sanders because:

1) Sanders is fighting for $15, not $12

2) Sanders has a long track record of fighting for this issue, including a record of success.

“Rep. Bernie Sanders (I-VT) interrogates Alan Greenspan on economic policy” This video is interesting in several ways, but it begins with discussion about American workers earning poverty wages

3) The evidence that Clinton has provided to explain why the minimum wage should be $12 instead of $15 is unconvincing.

Part I - A Living Wage (Pay)

Increase federal minimum wage to $15

Overtime pay protection  

Labor, Economy, Women’s rights

Increase federal minimum wage to $12 

Overtime pay protection

Issue descriptions come directly from candidate websites; they may be trimmed for brevity

Establish equal pay for women

”We must also establish equal pay for women. It’s unconscionable that women earn less than men for performing the same work.”

”Fighting for pay equity by signing the Paycheck Fairness Act into law. It is an outrage that women earn just 78 cents for every dollar a man earns.”

Actions:

2009: One of 52 original co-sponsors of S.181 - Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, which became law on 01/29/2009.

2013: One of 42 co-sponsors of S.2199 - Paycheck Fairness Act. Status: Introduced

Actions:

2009: One of 52 original co-sponsors of S.181 - Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act of 2009, which became law on 01/29/2009.

2009: Sponsored/Introduced S.182 - Paycheck Fairness Act. Status: Introduced

Related Diaries/URLs: 

EPI: Women’s Economic Agenda — Creating an Economy That Works for Everyone

Daily Kos (Laura Clawson, 12/29/15): From bottom to top, women need the pay gap closed

Women's pay gap looks better because men's average pay has gotten worse

Related Tags: EqualPay, WageGap, FairWage 

Who is better on the equal pay wage issue? IMHO, both candidates are equal

Both candidates have essentially the same attitudes about this issue. They both voted in favor of Lilly Ledbetter. They both are in favor of the Paycheck Fairness Act.

If anything, I lean a little toward Sanders because of what I consider misleading and worrisome rhetoric on Clinton’s website:

As I said earlier, “describing an issue is a very different thing than describing a solution, and/or being willing to fight to see the solution implemented. Shouldn’t votes be earned on the basis of the latter, rather than the former?  What commitments are the candidates actually making about the priorities of their future administrations?”

Clinton’s remarks about “women of color often lose out the most” are completely true; however I don’t consider her to be a superior candidate simply for describing this truth on her website. I am more interested in her ideas and commitments to solving this problem, and find those to be limited. Furthermore, a key reason that women of color “often lose out the most” is related to the fact that they hold a disproportionately high number of lower-paying jobs. 

Increasing the minimum wage would be extremely beneficial to increase the average amount of pay earned by women of color; for reasons described elsewhere, Sanders is better than Clinton on the minimum wage issue, IMHO.

I also find Sanders ideas about childcare solutions to be better than those advocated by Clinton; those will be described in more detail in the next diary; I think Sanders ideas will do more to both

But in the end, since both candidates have essentially the same attitudes about this issue when thought of as a completely separate issue, I’m calling this one to be a tie.

Women of Color and the Gender Wage Gap

For women of color, the explained factors that contribute to the wage gap are often different that those of white women due to the fact that women of color frequently work in lower-paying jobs, work fewer hours, and experience more substantial caregiving burdens ...

Across the board, women of color are more likely than white women to be shunted into the lowest-earning occupations in the service sector and in sales and office jobs. This trend is particularly pronounced for Hispanic women …

While one could argue that women of color choose to work in lower-paying service-sector occupations, it is hard to discount the fact that women of color often enter the labor force with significant barriers to success. African American and Hispanic women are significantly less likely to graduate from high school or to get a bachelor’s degree than white women. This places African American and Hispanic women at a disadvantage from the moment they enter the workforce, creating major structural barriers to entering top-earning professional fields ...

Women of color are also more likely to be employed as involuntary part-time workers than their white counterparts. Involuntary part-time workers are available for full-time work but settle for part-time positions because their employers cannot give them enough hours or because they cannot find a full-time job …

[all emphasis mine]

Part I - A Living Wage (Pay)

Increase federal minimum wage to $15

Establish equal pay for women

Labor, Economy, Women’s rights

Increase federal minimum wage to $12 

Establish equal pay for women

Issue descriptions come directly from candidate websites; they may be trimmed for brevity

Overtime pay protection

Millions of American employees have been working 50 or 60 hours a week while receiving no overtime pay. That is why Bernie has been encouraging the Obama Administration to ensure that more workers receive overtime pay protection. The Administration’s new rule extending that protection to everyone making less than $947 a week is a step in the right direction. It is a win for our economy and for our workers.

Overtime pay protection

Strengthening overtime rules. Hillary ... also supports the Obama Administration’s expansion of overtime rules to millions more workers.

Related Diaries/URLs:  - Daily Kos (Laura Clawson, 3/11/2013): Meet the fastest growing job in America: 40% of its workers are on public assistance

- Daily Kos (Laura Clawson, 3/12/2014): Obama planning overtime pay expansion for millions of workers

- Daily Kos (Laura Clawson, 6/29/2015): Obama to make nearly 5 million more workers eligible for overtime pay

- Daily Kos (Hunter, 7/20/2015): Jeb Bush says preventing unpaid overtime abuses will hurt workers. What planet is this guy from?

- Daily Kos (Laura Clawson, 8/8/2015): This week in the war on workers: Who'll benefit from expanded overtime? By Laura Clawson

- Daily Kos (Laura Clawson, 8/24/2015): Appeals court says yes to minimum wage and overtime for home healthcare workers

Related Tags: overtime, OvertimePay

Who is better on the overtime page issue? IMHO, both candidates are equal

Part I - A Living Wage (Pay)

Increase federal minimum wage to $15 

Establish equal pay for women

Overtime pay protection  

← SANDERS

TIE

TIE

Labor, Economy, Women’s rights

Increase federal minimum wage to $12

Establish equal pay for women

Overtime pay protectio