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Vote Yourself a Raise. [1]

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Date: 2022-09-06

I have been talking with mostly young voters who work at places likely to pay less than $15 per hour and getting a positive response. My approach to them is to inquire about their company’s starting wage for new hires and then what they are making. I then inform them that there is an extremely simple way to increase their wages to $15 per hour by voting for candidates for the Senate and the House who will raise the minimum wage. They all express surprise that they have the power in their hands to determine their wage.

I then ask the worker how a raise to $15 per hour would impact them. Once they accept the challenge to vote themselves a raise, the next step is to show how they can maximize the power of their vote by getting their co-workers to also vote themselves a raise. Their co-workers are likely to be in the same boat and by agreeing to support each other’s raises together they make their vote much more powerful. Most voters are employed. Raising the minimum wage presents the perfect opportunity to organize voters where they can be reached. They are a captive audience with mutual interests. Our goal should be to get a worker at every business to organize the vote for higher wages.

I explain that this campaign belongs to them because their wage is on the ballot. If they want to win their campaign for a raise, they need to get everyone that they know to support them. In addition to their co-workers, I ask the worker to seek support from their family, friends, neighbors, classmates and members of organizations that they belong to. They also need to recruit other workers they encounter when they shop. This is what I call creating a voting tree. Everyone who agrees to support the worker is then asked to create their own voting tree. This method of organizing does not cost one cent. It does not rely on the pseudo science of public opinion polling. It empowers all of us to take ownership of political campaigns and our own destiny.

I educate the worker about the Raise the Wage Act that has already passed the House. I explain how increases in the minimum wage are phased in until the minimum wage reaches $15 per hour, but will then continue to rise every year after based on median wage growth. I also explain that the current minimum wage for tipped workers at $2.13 per hour, the youth wage minimum of $4.25 per hour, and the disabled worker minimum wage are phased out so that all workers are treated equally.

When the minimum wage increases, it puts pressure on employers to raise the wages for employees who are making more than the minimum wage. Besides giving their employees a raise, employers need to realize that they are giving a huge number of their customers raises as well. Their customers will have more money to spend, which will help the company’s bottom line.

Please join me by telling every worker that you can reach, that they have the power to vote themselves a raise. If you are at a bar, eating out at a restaurant or getting a ride in an Uber, please inform the tipped workers that they have the power to vote themselves the same minimum wage as any other worker and ask them to get their co-workers to join them.

The Raise the Wage Act will guarantee a raise in the minimum wage every year the worker is employed. The announcement of the size of the annual increase in the minimum wage is a perfect opportunity to remind workers which political party voted to give them the increase in wages and which political party voted to deny them an increase in their wages. When you retire, the size of your Social Security check will be determined by the amount of your earnings. A worker’s economic security for the rest of their life is on the ballot this November.

I close by telling the worker that when I cast my vote this November, I will be voting to give them a raise.

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[1] Url: https://www.dailykos.com/stories/2022/9/6/2101123/-Vote-Yourself-a-Raise

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