Mo Money, Mo Money, Mo Money
By on Jun 29th, 2005 at 5:10 am
Mo Money, Mo Money, Mo Money
The House of Representatives voted yesterday to give themselves a cost-of-living raise. Congratulations, lawmakers! Next year you’ll be making $3,100 more than you did this year.
Unfortunately, Congress doesn’t want to share the wealth. This makes the eighth time Congress has voted to increase its own pay since 1997; they, however, have voted down every attempt to give minimum wage earners a cost of living raise since 1997. Today, the real value of the minimum wage is $3.50 below what it was in 1968. Working full time for minimum wage today will rake in a whopping $10,700 a year, or about $5,000 below the poverty level for a family of three
Hope your conscience doesn’t bother you so much that you can’t enjoy that extra $3,100, Congress.
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I THINK A PETITION IS CALLED FOR–UNTIL THEY RAISE MINIMUM WAGE AND PAY FOR THEIR OWN HEALTHCARE–THEN THEY ROLL BACK THEIR PAY RAISE AS WELL AS START WORKING ON AN HOURLY BASIS. they do not work but about 7 months out of a year–we pay them, we can stop paying them. this is just disgusting–they are cutting medicaid but giving themselves raises…this should be on the front page of every newspaper and the lead story on every tv show. the public is unaware,,,so we have to make them aware.
June 29th, 2005 at 5:50 amKarin raises a good point, but I question whether Congress actually “works” a full seven months. Karin is being far to charitable.
It won’t be on the front page of most newspapers — and even if it were, who reads newspapers? TV, meanwhile, is too busy covering the urgent issues of the day, such as shark attacks and the case of the missing person now known only as an Alabama honors student missing in Aruba.
June 29th, 2005 at 8:14 amWe need to start enforcing the law that docks pay from congresspeople with unexcused absences.
June 29th, 2005 at 9:29 amI agree with that. It seems this country is ruled by a group of out right crooks. My question is why does America put up with it? Aren’t we the ones supposed to be putting them in office? I guess we need to be bigger crooks than they are.
June 29th, 2005 at 10:35 amWhen these members of Congress e-mail you asking for your support tell them that they will get it when the get off their butts and do something for the American people.
June 29th, 2005 at 11:22 amDo not sign their petitions or donate money, just send them a note or e-mail. Let them know that you cannot afford to waste your time on their agenda’s until yours are being addressed.
Remember this if this country ends up in a depression!
June 29th, 2005 at 11:45 amI agree with Susan 100%. One way perhaps to get the point across to these knuckleheads is to no longer fund any of their campaigns with our hard worked dollars. I can’t wait until the next solicitation from a Congressman (which could be any day now) so that I can raise this point with them!
June 29th, 2005 at 12:24 pmThis is a disgrace. My adult son is developmentally disabled and works extremely hard at his part-time minimum wage job, and he never has anything to show for it. It just breaks my heart. Shame on them.
June 29th, 2005 at 1:03 pmI agree completely, but i’d like to point out on thing.
It seems odd to me that a family of 3 that makes $16,000 isn’t considered impoverished. That’s ~$1,300 a month or ~$450 per person per month. Wow! Living the high life.
The CEO’s of the top 500 companies get a total of 5.1 billion in 2005 or as much as 300,000 families of 3 at the poverty line. I’m sure they would have a lot of business without cashiers, assembly line workers, etc.
June 29th, 2005 at 1:15 pmI propose that their salaries be incentive based. Each senator or representative’s salary should be based on the average salary of the people he or she represents. How do we get that law enacted?
June 29th, 2005 at 3:02 pmi want to know if anyone voted against the pay raise.
June 29th, 2005 at 3:23 pmRaising the minimum wage is not the same thing as getting a pay raise. It does no good for anyone.
June 29th, 2005 at 3:46 pmCongress should not get a raise, I agree. But imposing the false standard of a minimum wage by threat of law is not going to help anyone either. It raises the cost of business and the cost of everything else by artificially awarding an ammount that a worker may not be worth and an employer can not afford. It’s a violation of workers’ rights and employers’ rights to dictate what must be paid as a wage.
June 29th, 2005 at 3:53 pmJoe, you’re repeating THE BIG LIE about the minimum wage. It has no connection whatsoever with raising “the cost of business or the cost of everything else”. Take a look at your local gas pump prices. Do you honestly believe that those prices have anything to do with the convenience store clerks’ being paid minimum wage? Go do some grocery shopping and you might find that the cost of groceries has gone up despite the fact the national minimum wage hasn’t budged upwards since 1997.
June 29th, 2005 at 5:21 pmBig business has paid their top executives hundreds of millions of dollars over the past 8 years while screaming that raising the national minimum wage even a paltry dollar will bankrupt them. That’s bull.
It would be lovely if businesses would realize there is something more than just the “bottom line” when it comes to their employees, and didn’t have to be forced to guarantee FULL-TIME workers a mere $5.15 an hour. Unfortunately, the business lobby seems to feel that only the CEOs and shareholders should be guaranteed money (and usually for doing absolutely nothing to EARN it).
Let’s not forget about all the money these people make “under the table” from various lobbyists and Corporations.
June 29th, 2005 at 6:42 pmThe greater shame is that Congress gets an annual cost of living raise every year AUTOMATICALLY.
UNLESS (feel free to insert appropriate sarcasm or gestures in the following):
UNLESS, of course, they vote to REFUSE the raise. But then, one mustn’t look greedy, must one? So they have the vote to refuse (voting yes means you DON’T want the automatic raise) … oh golly, imagine that! It didn’t pass!And we were so close this time!
Those who voted no (which (pay attention here!) means they WANT the automatic raise) still have to face their voters back home.
So they have the “well those other greedy guys actually wanted to get an increase instead of JUST the PUNY 3.16% that will be the automatic raise. So I voted no to stop them. Well, yes, we will get the PUNY 3.16% automatic raise. But that’s not our fault! It was implemented in 1989 so we wouldn’t have to accept those nasty big fees for speaking.”
The ones who voted yes (we DON’T want the nasty raise forced on us by the bill passed in 1989) can go home, halo tilted rakishly over one eye and proclaim: “Gosh we tried! It was those greedy (insert name of other party here) fault.”
Yeah – I always hated it when management announced that everybody would be getting a 4% cost of living raise(COLA). Big applause, smiles, hi-fives. But I make $20,000 a year, my boss makes $200,000 and the big shots make $2,000,000 a year. If we all get the same % each year, within 3-4 years, my boss will have gotten more in just the COLA amounts than I make in annual salary. Ditto for the big shots and my boss. And with my luck, I will find myself in the same tax bracket as my boss (it actually happened one year).
Somebody posted the suggestion awhile back: Tie the rise in minimum wage to the Congressional raise. If they get 3%, the minimum wage goes up 3%. It’s STILL chicken feed to the guy at the bottom, but at least you can pretend your head’s above water.
And to Joe, everybody who shows up on time every day, and does the job assigned, is worth at LEAST minimum wage. If, as you say, he’s not worth it, that’s the fault of management. They need to assign tasks differently, do some training or whatever. They have the employee — it’s their job to use that employee wisely.
The only thing it does do, is give some employers more wiggle room. They post a job at $5.00/hour when the going rate is $6.50. Nobody takes it, or they don’t stay long.
The employer says: “Gee I can’t find anyone willing to do this job. So I need to be able to hire an illegal alien (or documented worker, guest worker, what ever name you want to give). And if they play it right, they get government money for being such a good sport. And that worker can’t make it either. But he’s stuck in a 2-br apartment with 5 other people, so they can get by.
June 30th, 2005 at 1:12 amThe bottom line is simple. Congress, along with our(idiot)president have to be brought back to reality. But before that can happen the people of this country must be reminded that these people work for us not the other way around. And this seems to be the core of the problem, or at least part of it. It seems that people just want to be lead around like an obediant dog. They don’t want to look at the real issues. I see this every day when I have conversations, regarding these issues. Whatever you do, don’t face it and maybe it will go away. Alot of my friends and co-workers have been and some still are Bush supporters, but when you confront them with facts they just start mumbling and get confused and say something like, well there isn’t anthing I can do about it. Sheep, thats what a big portion of this country have become. You think we live in the greatest country in the world? Not even close. We have one of the most corupt governments in the world, but, nobody wants to see it. No way would our politicians do the things you are saying, no way. Well people you better open your eyes and get wise because you’re getting screwed. Its time to stop congress. Its time to take back the pay raises. Its time that the people that make up the taxes that we Americans pay, also pay. Thats got to be one of the dumbest tricks ever pulled. They don’t pay taxes on there income they earn in office, yet our soldiers do. They give themselves pay raises without the peoples approval, which is criminal, while they let big biz out source your job. Its only going to get worse from here if we don’t stand up and put an end to all this nonsense. This has got be the worst administration, ever. They are very embolden about everything they do, and why not, nobody is stopping them. So whats next?
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July 22nd, 2005 at 2:54 pma quick way to fix social security. take the cap off, i think it is about 80,000. after you make that amount you are finished paying social security for the year. example, bill gates is finished paying three secounds after the start of the year.
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January 1st, 2006 at 12:57 pmI think the people from each State needs to vote on what salary their,Congress people,Senator’s,Etc should earn.
February 10th, 2006 at 1:15 pmAnd pay raises only given if the people vote and think that person as earned it.
Not much on my mind recently. Basically nothing seems important. So it goes. Today was a complete loss.
February 12th, 2007 at 12:41 pm