Posted on 01/12/2007 12:52:23 PM PST by GeorgiaDawg32
Video link on foxnews website, www.foxnews.com left side of the screen..
According to FoxNews, pelosi now says Samoa is INCLUDED..
Her trickle-up theory apparently won't go over very well with the people there, as their representative had this to say (pay attention to para 2) regarding the devastation of the Samoan economy if this goes through:
"In a statement in response today, Faleomavaega (American Samoa delegate) said "despite recent claims made by the Washington Post which suggest that American Samoa is exempt from the federal minimum wage process, I wish to set the record straight." He says since 1956, the Wage and Hour Division of the US Department of Labor has conducted Special Industry Committees every two years in American Samoa to determine minimum wage increases.
"While these Industry Committees have been phased out in other US Territories due to their more diversified economies, American Samoa continues to be a single industry economy. In fact, more than 80% of our private sector economy is dependent either directly, or indirectly, on two U.S. tuna processors, Chicken of the Sea and StarKist. As has been repeatedly stated at our Special Industry Committees, a decrease in production or departure of one or both of the two canneries in American Samoa could devastate the local economy resulting in massive layoffs and insurmountable financial difficulties," the Congressman says.
"For this very reason, I do not support efforts to apply mainland minimums to American Samoa at this time. The truth is the global tuna industry is so competitive that it is no longer possible for the federal government to demand mainland minimum wage rates for American Samoa without causing the collapse of our economy and making us welfare wards of the federal government."
I can say this based on personal experience: The last thing anybody would want is to face a bunch of angry Samoans. (And I don't mean the band.) Talofa to all my polynesian brothers.
I second that..
A very good cookie indeed!
Or Samoan women who have won their way on stage to The Price is Right.
LOfreakin'L to that.
LOL!!
I thought this was too funny to be true at first.
LOL!!
I thought this was too funny to be true at first.
Don't you have to actually *work* to collect the minimum wage?
Sorry, just couldn't resist that one...
I made it to 3 posts.
I'm coining the phrase "Lame Duck Speaker".
$.25 via paypal every time its used.
This is probably covered somewhere else, but any explanation that American Samoa was covered by the Marianas Island chain reference is simply wrong. There are not in the same island chain and nowhere near each other.
mmmmmmm...Samoas....drool...
You're correct. Since Starkist Tuna in Samoa parent company Del Monte Corp is based in San Francisco.
The bill is already passed, right? How do they correct an oversight? Pass a 2nd bill?
The bill is already passed, right? How do they correct an oversight? Pass a 2nd bill, retracting the first?
Of course.
ping to do some research.
Yep. Leave a good thing alone.
You beat me to it.
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