Posted on 06/03/2014 2:43:58 AM PDT by 2ndDivisionVet
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 elected socialist City Council member had pushed the idea as well.
“This legislation sends a message heard around the world: Seattle wants to stop the race to the bottom in wages and that we deplore the growth in income inequality and the widening gap between the rich and the poor,” Councilmember Tom Rasmussen said...
(Excerpt) Read more at hotair.com ...
I was actually going to take and excursion to Seattle this summer as part of a work-vacation, but this minimum wage increase has just put my costs out of reach. I guess I will have to find some other place to visit. Does anyone have any suggestions near Portland?
Watch for a slew of businesses to open right on the outskirts of Seattle.
Sounds like it will be like that in Seattle for anyone who wants to buy a Happy Meal or a bucket of chicken.
A vacation to Seattle just doubled in price. I guess only the rich and famous will be able to visit.
I don’t know the layout of Seattle, but I would expect a very large growth spurt of businesses in the ‘burbs where the minimum wage is less than $15/hr. If there are suburban cities built right to the border with Seattle, I expect the building of dozens of fast food restaurants on roads bordering Seattle. This does not bode well for Seattle’s future, a down town core with high rise office buildings and nothing else, a hollowed out core like Detroit...
In five years, these idiots will be whining because $15 isn’t a livable wage and demanding $30, $40 and $50/hr and that $347 they managed to save will be worth a buck fifty. Just wait until their retired fixed income parents have to move back in with them because their pensions won’t cut it anymore.
Alberta is the same way. You may notice the same thing in TX, depending on US laws, but in Calgary, when you go to almost any Tim Horton’s (think ‘Dunkin’ Donuts’ or ‘Second Cup’), you will hardly find a Caucasian working there. Instead, there are many Indians and Orientals, all on special work visas, allowing them to be paid less than the going rate in Alberta. At one point, during the early part of the boom, Tim Horton’s was offering $14/hr and could not get employees, so they pushed Ottawa to allow immigrants under special visas.
In my neighbourhood, there is a van bearing the logo ‘CanMex Employment Services’. The house is apparently where a number of Mexican immigrants live and they perform the jobs Canadians won’t do. And Alberta still pays over $3 billion annually in ‘equalization payments’ to Quebec, so they can continue with their their profligate socialist governments.
Nope - the next step is to disallow employers from firing/not hiring.
wait until they close all the Starbucks then all hell will break loose
Without Starbucks, Seattle would sleep 22.75 hours per day, probably...
Does Seattle have suburbs?
Haha...hope the libs I know there get their lesson in economics NOW.
They could not get locals at $14 an hour? What gives? Do all young people have wealthy families or something in Calgary? Incidentally, the wife and I spent three or four days in the Calgary area three years ago. In fact, across the street from our hotel was a Tim Horton’s. Can’t remember who was working inside.
About five years ago, a local News outlet interviewed two teenagers, perhaps 16 or 17 years old, in an upper middle class neighbourhood in Calgary. They both said that if the couldn’t get jobs at $20/hr, they’d just stay at home and play video games. If they were my kids, they would have gotten their butts paddled!
The economy has changed as we now are approaching 1.2 million people in Calgary, and the ‘boom’ is not as big as it was, but the economy is still the best in the country. Even now, many high school kids go straight to the oil patch, some not even completing high school. An 18 year old can make $25/hour doing construction in Fort McMoney, live in a camp and come to Calgary or Edmonton and blow his earnings. That is attractive to some. If they pursue a trade, the can make even more, especially in the North.
If you don't bother with name changes, very much so. To the extent of tens of miles outside the city limits, in every direction but west it's continuous city.
Grew up there.
How many of those cities have open socialists on their city councils? They’ve only got “Democrats”.
With a 15 dollar per hour minimum wage, it is easy to say the jobs will move to the suburbs, but I didn’t know if Seattle had any.
I stayed in downtown Seattle a few years ago at the Mayflower Hotel. I had to walk 6 blocks to get a cup of coffee at 6:00 am. The fact that it was 9:00 am on the east coast and this was my first morning on the west coast didn't help my attitude at the time...
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