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In their reporting of Seattle’s unanimous vote Monday to raise the minimum wage within Seattle to $15 per hour, USA Today began their article with an interview of a $9.47/hour, economically-uneducated McDonald’s employee: “Martina Phelps says the Seattle City Council's vote today on a historic plan to raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour could change her life.” Well, yes, it could, Martina, but probably not in the way you were hoping. The city council of Seattle, composed of the kind of politicians who learned everything they know about economics from studying celebrity gossip and attending union meetings, believes...

Should San Diego match Seattle's $15 per hour minimum wage? Poll here

At the start of the year, the Seattle suburb of SeaTac raised the area’s minimum wage to $15, and the consequences are now starting to be felt. And it’s not just the unions who championed the effort, or those who still have jobs, that are feeling them. Over the last few months, a few things have happened: Managers have taken more responsibilities on themselves, instead of hiring more workers. Businesses have laid off workers, or eliminated their plans to hire more. Area parking now comes with an added “living-wage surcharge.” Hotels have cut employee benefits, free food, and overtime. Shocking:...

Last January, SeaTac implemented a $15 per hour minimum wage for hospitality and transportation workers. The consequences to the drastic hike in wages are just beginning to be realized—and it’s not pretty. A writer for NW Asian Weekly recently blogged about her experience attending an event at a SeaTac hotel. She asked employees if they were “happy with the $15 wage.” The ensuingconversations, “It sounds good, but it’s not good,” the woman said. “Why?” I asked. “I lost my 401k, health insurance, paid holiday, and vacation,” she responded. “No more free food,” she added. “The hotel used to feed her. Now, she...

Last week, Michigan became the latest of a handful of states to officially raise its minimum wage this year, with a gradual four-year phase-in that will take its floor from $7.40 up to $9.25 an hour — but over in the city of Seattle, things just got real. Say hello to what will soon become the highest minimum wage in the nation, via the AP: The issue has dominated politics in the liberal municipality for months. Mayor Ed Murray, who was elected last year, had promised in his campaign to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour. A newly...

The Seattle City Council voted unanimously Monday to raise the minimum wage to $15 an hour, equaling the highest minimum wage in the nation. The law will phase in the higher wages over a three- to seven-year window, depending on the size of a company. Corporations that employ more than 500 workers will have to pay $15 an hour by 2017 if their employees don’t receive company-paid health care. Smaller businesses can wait until 2019 to reach the higher rate. All workers will receive the highest wage by 2021. “The people who work for a living have basically seen no...

**SNIP** "If stimulating the economy were just as easy as taking from Jim and giving to Joe, don't you think communism would've worked out? Thanks progressive lefties, I'm sure this is making businesses feel secure about moving into Seattle. "Silliness," Shapiro concluded. Boze wondered why Seattle didn't just force the $15 wage immediately, if 70 percent of voters like it. In fact, Thursday's committee compromise is a disaster for the $15 Now group, which is pushing a ballot initiative for November that would enact the $15 wage on Jan. 1, 2015. "They're not interested in income equality," Boze said. "They're...

Well that’s determined by all sorts of variables – how much the person seeking the job is willing to take, how much the person wanting the job done is willing to pay, the scarcity or abundance of labor, etc.. And so in a free market, when a job is open it is up to the person seeking to have the work done and the person seeking a job to decide what it is worth to each of them. If they can reach agreement, then the job is offered to the person seeking the job. If agreement can’t be reached, then...

An ordinance that gradually increases the minimum wage in Seattle to $15 an hour was approved Thursday by a City Council committee, setting up a full council vote next week. In a boisterous meeting, City Council members approved a delay to the implementation of the ordinance, from Jan. 1, 2015 to April 1, 2015.

More than 100 officers from the Seattle Police Department are suing the city and the Justice Department, claiming their department's new use-of-force policies put them in danger and violate their constitutional rights. In 2012 Seattle officials agreed to an independent monitor and court oversight of the city's police department as part of a deal with the Justice Department following a report that found officers routinely used excessive force. The civil suit, which was filed Wednesday, names Attorney General Eric Holder, the City of Seattle, Mayor Ed Murray, City Attorney Pete Holmes, and federal monitor Merrick Bob. In the suit, the...

Seattle broke its record for rainfall from February through July last Sunday — with more than two months to spare, according to the National Weather Service. As of Sunday, 22.87 inches of rain had fallen at Seattle-Tacoma International Airport since Feb. 1, surpassing the record set in 1972 when 22.81 inches of rain fell from Feb. 1 to July 31, weather-service meteorologist Josh Smith said Tuesday. Fifteen inches is the average rainfall from February through July at the airport, which is where Seattle’s official weather data are recorded. “Basically, we are well ahead of normal rainfall for February to July,” Smith...

<p>NEW YORK (AP) — Chipotle is asking customers not to bring firearms into its stores after it says gun rights advocates brought military-style assault rifles into one of its restaurants in Texas.</p> <p>The Denver-based company notes that it has traditionally complied with local laws regarding open and concealed firearms.</p>

By Dan SpringerPublished May 08, 2014FoxNews.comFacebook476 Twitter508 Gplus0 At 57 feet in diameter, it's touted as the world's biggest tunneling machine. It was even given a name, Bertha. But now, after digging just over 1,000 feet, Bertha is broken down and stuck underneath Seattle's downtown waterfront. And fixing the massive mess could cost taxpayers millions. The tunneling machine is the key workhorse in a $3.1 billion tunnel project aimed at replacing the Alaska Way Viaduct, a double-decker elevated highway that was damaged in the 2001 Nisqually earthquake. Bertha's meltdown, though, has put the project in jeopardy of being the West...

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...

Last November, Seattle elected a straight-up socialist to their City Council who, among other economic/social-justice aspirations, included the already popular idea of a minimum wage hike to $15/hour in her campaign platform. Evidently, the fact that that is now very likely going to happen in a gradual phase-in over the next few years isn’t quite good enough for her, via the NYT: Mayor Ed Murray presented on Thursday what he described as an imperfect but workable plan to increase the city’s minimum wage to $15 an hour, more than twice the federal minimum wage and one of the highest anywhere...

Mayor Ed Murray delivered a major May Day victory for Seattle’s low-wage workers on Thursday, with a plan that will move big business and small business to a $15-an-hour minimum wage, over a sliding scale of three to seven years. “In seven years, the minimum-wage worker in Seattle will earn $6,200 more than a minimum-wage worker elsewhere in Washington, assuming a 30-hour week,” Murray said. He described unveiling of the plan as an “historic moment for Seattle.” A social gospel Catholic, Murray quoted Pope Francis on social justice and income inequality. He was followed shortly to the podium by ultra...

Editor’s Note: Kshama Sawant is a Seattle councilwoman. And a Socialist. She was elected last fall on a $15-an-hour minimum wage platform. That wage, which is 62 percent higher than this year’s inflation indexed state minimum wage of $9.32, already the highest in the nation, comes from what researchers at the University of Washington have calculated as the wage it takes to be self-sufficient in the area. The Seattle suburb of SeaTac, home of Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, narrowly approved a $15 minimum wage ballot initiative last fall, but as we recently explored, most airport workers have yet to see a...

SEATTLE — Seattle Mayor Ed Murray has scheduled a news conference for Thursday to announce a plan to raise the city’s minimum wage to $15 an hour. **SNIP** Committee members representing business and labor could not agree on issues like crediting tips and benefits against the $15 minimum. And council member Kshama Sawant revealed another hurdle -- she said there has been little talk of automatically increasing the minimum wage with inflation. “If going forward the new minimum wage does not have a cost of living increase attached to it every year of the phase in it's not going to...

The Planned Parenthood abortion business in Seattle, Washington is taking a page out o the religious bigotry book in order to raise funds for itself. Tomorrow night, the abortion corporation will stage “Bar Nun Bingo” at and, two days later, with hold another “Bar Nun Bingo” — fundraising events that, as Bill Donohue of the Catholic League tells LifeNews in an email, are aimed squarely at Catholics: barnunbingoBoth fund-raising events will bash nuns, and will be led by the demonstrably anti-Catholic gay group, Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence. Pictures of previous “Bar Nun Bingo” affairs show how sick it is. Planned...

A property rights fight near Seattle's waterfront will continue, despite the death of the property owner. Late last year, the Seattle City Council voted to used its powers of eminent domain to take the parking lot owned by a 103-year-old Spokane woman named Myrtle Woldson. The city asked her to sell. She refused. So the city council simply voted to condemn the property and take it.