Comments

1
You just got your ballot fight, Mr. Mayor.
2
Pathetic. 499 employees is a small business?

This will cover, what, 5% of current minimum-wage employees in the city?
3
I can't watch the video from work, but I gather that this is essentially the weak, extended phase-in version that was floated last week? Three years for big corporations, seven years for almost everyone, no indexing until the phase-in is complete? So basically it's a $13.50 minimum at best?
4
@3 Ayup. Weak sauce.
5
If so, the way forward is clear. Vote for this proposal to lock in the compromise, and then push for a real $15 wage in the ballot measure.
6
So underwhelmed, Mr Murray, so very underwhelmed.
7
sad sack ...
8
If you're going to define small businesses so large, why even bother with two phase-ins? Might as well do seven years for everyone and make enforcement somewhat less of a pain in the ass.
9
Well, the best way to ensure 15Now's Charter Amendment 20 passes is to offer a steaming turd as an alternative.

Thanks for the raise, Droopy.
10
My initial thoughts on the situation make me consider what I have to do in order to support low paid workers. I guess I will have to switch from shopping at small business, which I do now, to the large businesses that will be forced to pay closer to living wages at a sooner date. Three years from now, when large business has to pay $15/ hour but small business doesn’t, how could I support a company that pays below the average to its workers? So my future is Petco over All the Best Pet Care or Mud Bay, Starbucks over Victrola or Herkimer, Azteca over La Carta de Oaxaca? Makes me sad and maybe a little nauseated to think that I will feel bad about shifting my dollars from what I now feel good about. I have always been willing to pay a little more to shop at locally owned small business. With this new proposal by the mayor, in order to support workers, I will be forced out of supporting small business. Who wins with this? Looks like big business again.
11
@10:

Keep in mind, it's possible some small businesses might push up their base wages before the mandated deadlines of their own accord. So, it might not hurt to at least ask the people working at those small businesses first, before making the decision to withhold your patronage.
12
Fucking pathetic.
13
This is not a joke? How is this not a joke?
14
BTW, I used to try to defend this fucking asswipe. This is literally not doing a damn thing for low wag earners. Ed Murray just said fuck you to the working poor of Seattle. But then, most of the wealthy gays in Seattle feel the same way, so in that regard you are like your peers in gaydom.

And you've proven useless with police reform. Maybe this years May Day protests will reflect the will of the people but no doubt, you won't listen. You haven't yet because you are just part of the 1%.

RECALL MURRAY!!!
15
You know--this is the politics of the possible. That's something I'm not a big fan of but if you all want something stronger and more immediate it will require more action in the streets. How many of you snarkers have come to a public rally?
Hundreds of people have come out to public demonstrations for $15 but the only way we would see $15 in the literal now is if there were tens of thousands of low-wage workers in the streets and going on general strike. Until that happens you can poo-poo the legislation all you want--what are YOU doing to get something better?
16
"I can't watch the video from work,"

And yet you think you're worth $15/hr....
17
@15 I've been at five of the local demonstrations and have donated to the 15 now campaign. So fuck you and your snarky generalizations. You're part of the problem, not the solution
18
@17: I wasn't addressing you personally, but fuck you too I guess. How am I a part of the problem?
19
@17 - to be fair, a vast majority of the "job creator" [read: racist] class are against this; gay and straight alike. The mayor may also be gay, but you'd probably be just as correct to lump him in with other silver haired people, or blue eyed people, or people with birthmarks on their necks, or something.

Point is, singling out his gayness as some sort of reason for his decision reflects more on what you're focusing on than some type of objective reality.
20
@11 "Excuse me manager of Tacotime, which of the 4 trauches do your employees fall under, and if I tip them does that reduce their effective wage? I see you take a health care credit, do you provide decent coverage or do most of your workers refuse to waste money on it? Oh you pay $12.23, so is that above or at minimum wage, let me pull outmy handy chart, just a second I have to unfold it, okay, it looks like you are required to pay $11.50 as it is the year 2018. I guess taco bell having to pay $15.36 pushed your base wages up $0.73, so I will eat here, after holding up the line for 10 minutes.
21
And yes, I'm assuming Future TacoTime has a tip bucket, because why not, it lowers your labor.
22
Brain-dead troll @16, I work in a shared office environment with a computer that does not support the current standards for playing videos posted online, thanks to company policy. And I make $40/hour.
23
@22 then you're one of them. To the pyre you go!
24
The fact is, the corporate screwing of workers goes way up the income chain. In my case, I work (and have 17 years experience) in an industry that outsources jobs like mine to contract agencies that don't provide benefits that used to be taken as granted for the middle class: health care and paid time off. And I remember working for $3.85 minimum wage at my first job. It's repugnant that we ask anyone to work for a penny less than what's needed to cover basic living expenses. $15/hour really isn't enough, but it's within spitting difference of enough for a first take. And it pushes a lot more people a bit above that level into a truly liveable wage. It's the right thing for this city and will in the end benefit nearly everyone, including most business owners.

This compromise is better than nothing, and it only exists because workers forced this lame-ass mayor into doing something. But it's still an insult to workers.
25
They keep referring to Saul Alinksy in Murray's announcement for some reason. Is it because Alinksy famously wrote, "A reformation means that masses of our people have reached the point of let's waiting another 11 years"?
26
@25 Do they really? Saul Alinsky is a right wing buzz word, not such a big name in left-lib circles (not that is shouldn't be). He recently talked about the need to avoid "class warfare". Honestly, I think his speech writer is a right winger, throwing out a lot of dog whistles, and also believes we do worship consciously at the alter of Saul Alinsky.

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