Progress or Mere Politics?I've found myself following the issue on living wage legislation going on currently in Chicago. The city council there just voted 35 to 14 in favor of a requirement for "big-box" retailers (stores with 90,000 sq ft or more of space) to pay employees a minimum of $10/hr plus $3/hour in benefits.
For the purposes of this post I'm going to ignore the political in-fighting going on, including the battles against Mayor Daley, and how much of the push for this veto-proof vote (34 votes was what was needed to protect it from a veto, and they managed 25) was prompted simply by an opportunity to thumb their noses at a weakened Daley.
Even if this stands (a court challenge is inevitable) it won't take effect until 2010 -- by which time such rates will be even less adequate than they would be today -- but if I can take this at face value it's a nice step. With a better administration we might have seen this at the national level, but it has to start somewhere.
Those against it are either pushing the Fear button as hard and as many times as they can or responding to such pushes. The warnings range from the threat that Wal-Mart, Target, etc. won't open stores within the city limits, to fears that what is imposed on 90,000 + sq ft businesses today will be applied to smaller stores tomorrow, and that this will crush the opportunity for jobs. An almost suspiciously well-organized and supplied group of protestors is seen here, though I like the touch of the big, handwritten sign.This is one of those issues I've done a 180 on over the years, curiously not in the direction most presume. Back during the years when I was working in retail and making miserable wages often at or not much above minimum, I believed it was right -- oh, sure, I would've loved more, but I bought into the unfettered free market idea and believed more fully in the by thy bootstraps, hard work is the rags to riches path and all that. Well after I left those jobs and their wages behind (hopefully forever) I came to realize how close to slavery those wages, combined with the increasingly moth-eaten social safety net, are.
I still believe that a single-payer (federal government) HMO style system, where we all have medical and prescription coverage independent of our jobs remains the #1 social need in this country, but a living wage is likely running a close second to that.
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Still, I believe in the stand Chicago's city council is making, but it can only work if they can get more cities - large and small - to do the same.
I haven't looked into the math (the average square footage of a Wal-Mart or Target) and I've seen that while Wal-Mart tends to build new stores (fresh construction) larger I've also seen them adapt their floorplan to fit a smaller, existing structure. It seems that quite a lot could be fit into a 299 ft x 299 ft area, though I suspect it would put a strong hurt on their business model-essential, one-stop shopping angle trying to cram in a wide enough array of items if (as I suspect) the overall size would include office and stockroom space -- basically going to the lease/sale agreement or design documents for the official, total square footage.
For now, while the individual councilpersons' motives may be less than pure, the legal standing of such a rule potentially on shifting sands and the economic strength of the battle in favor of the other side, I support the stated intent.
Would prices surge up correspondingly as the increased overhead costs rippled through the system? It seems logical they would. But I don't know. Economics is very complex. In competitive areas, there is usually room for various different providers to try and compete with each other by cutting their profit margins slightly.
It's the small businesses that would, ultimately, fold up like cheap cardboard if they were suddenly forced to give everyone on their payroll such a proportionally large raise. Yet, on the other hand, I'd think that small businesses, especially family businesses, should be able to ask their employees to reinvest in the business... I don't know. I can see dodges.
However, those same dodges probably wouldn't work for the big chains that operate on a slender profit margin and maintain it by paying their thousands of workers next to nothing. Those guys will go out of business if they are suddenly required to increase wages dramatically.
It seems to me such legislation needs to be coupled with an attack from the other end. I've always felt that the kind of profits some corporations make, and that some CEOs pocket, are simply obscene. Put some kind of cap on just how much cream ownership/management is allowed to skim, and require a greater percentage to be put back into the company in the form of mandatory profit sharing for each employee, and you may well eliminate the need for any kind of minimum wage laws.
But of course, that will be even less popular with our masters than the other thing.
A truly central part that you hit on is the concept of the modern corporation.
When they were initially introduced corporations were intended to be of limited duration, relatively narrow of focus, and to have some socially redeeming concern. The modern corporation, in contrast, has become an immortal glutton. At first this was excused by saying the socially redeeming concern was the jobs they produced, but even that's had to give way to more abstract measures as many jobs are shifted to cheaper climates.
The central twist is that the charter of a modern corporation demands that the officers of the corporation extract the highest profits per quarter possible, which means that prefectly civil, even deeply well-intentioned humanitarians, upon becoming a member of the board or worse, CEO/COO/etc., is contractually mandated to squeeze for profits and make all other considerations secondary at best. The contract of incorporation becomes a purely self-interested dictator, with the well-being of the shareholders' shares becoming the paramount concern for the people in charge. The corporation instills its own rules, serving them up as a new set of ethics. Don't think harshly of the board, as they're only following orders...
The rise of the 401K has muddied the waters farther, theoretically making millions of people into (extremely minor) shareholders, which in turn creates a whacko, bizarro economic well-being meter of the stock market indices. People are ultimately told it's a good thing that thousands of factorry jobs were relocated to some third world country because the parent corporation's profitability increased and it helped edge The Market higher. Never mind that along with the reduction in outlay on worker pay the corporation's bottom line also improved massively because they had to pay so much less in taxes by moving out of the U.S. -- after all, it isn't as if federal spending is really tied to anything, and we're spending less of it on social services anyway. It becomes like that joke about a new age economist getting giddy when Bill Gates walks into the bar because he's raised the average income in the room by thousands of percentage points.
But... at the same time I am totally against the government subsidizing businesses as well. So I figure that if a business gets a tax break, or other financial deal form the government, then they should be subject to the rules government sets down.
Paying a decent, living wage should be the order of the day; I hate the idea that we have to actually make laws or ordinances about this stuff.
Because when you get down to it, when the government "gets money" for poor people, the only party in the equation that is truly empowered is the government itself.
For now (and, really, much of this has always been the case) - especially with the crew in control in Washington - this has to start at a more local level. FDR's spirit is as welcome in the Bush White House as Martin Luther King's would be at a KKK rally.
Getting back to the situation in Chicago, and setting aside the considerable historical inaccuracies in the film, I'm reminded of that 1950s chestnut The Ten Commandments, and how some of the Israelites were momentarily swayed by the thought that slavery in Egypt maybe wasn't so bad compared to uncertainty.
To have some of what would otherwise have become stock dividends instead become pay increases for workers is a good thing. Our current system has rules that tell us that money invested in business is more important than the lives people sell by the hour into jobs. A look at income tax vs. capital gains taxes demonstrates that. If we're going to have government and laws they should be for the benefit of all, or - failing that - the benefit of the largest possible majority.
While Libertarians may encourage "every man for himself" at least they aren't into the "everyone for ME" crap that's ingrained in our government.
I have seen too much, been to the capital of this country (and my state) too many times, and talked to too many politicians to believe anything else than what these guys are all about it the accumulation and retention of power.
And I've seen this on both sides. There are some individuals that are decent, but the system -- I could go on and on.
The only way out, if you ask me, is get the government the hell out of our lives as best we can and start over. Maybe Jefferson was right; a revolution sounds pretty good to me at the moment.
As I've said, the Libertarians ultimately struck me as too extreme in their non-interference position. I mainly wish them strength and success because they're more likely to grow at the expense of the GOP than anyone else; many are still voting for Republican candidates on the strength of what Ronald Reagan presented as the Republican approach to government. It's amazing that people could look at the ruin the Bush Administration has been creating and still believe that's the message, but as 2008 approaches and Dubya becomes increasingly marginalized we'll hear more of the ficsal responsibility in governemt B.S. from the central plank of the GOP.
The Greens have a social justice plank I liked, but as I metaphorically wandered through their vast tent it became clear that (like the other parties) they're tailoring their message for sub-groups within their audience, and there's not likely to be anywhere near enough pie to go around if their various reparations planks (for African Americans and Native Americans/Indians in particular) were to be realized. The Greens, essentially, are a collection of fringe groups who feel long-abandoned by the Democrats, much as the Libertarians are mostly those who felt the Republicans let them down by engaging in taxation and other meddling commerce and generally trying to do more than deliver the mail and defend our borders.
I happen to believe that the government should do much more than deliver the mail and defend its borders while letting bullies rule the roost inside the sea to shining sea schoolyard. So, the Libertarian aims are not mine.
Meanwhile, the reparations angles and the push towards every person voting on every issue down to the community level (core elements of the Greens) are backwards-looking and almost unimaginably oppressive, respectively, so the Greens don't draw much favor from me... though I do believe they're trying to head in a general direction I can get behind.
Goverment should serve the people, and it's ridiculous to believe that anyone who has had large levels of financial success has done so in a vacuum. It's not, solely, their money. Estate taxes, when one's seriously talking about millions of dollars and more (and not some family farm) are, are perfectly valid and should be reinstituted. There should be a single-payer system to provide every U.S. citizen with an HMO-like plan including prescription coverage.
Years ago I eschewed the political makeup of many other countries with their parliamentary system and plethora of active parties. I mistook a broad, more fully-representative form of goverment for a lack of focus and, overall, weakness. Sadly, instead of the U.S. learning from the example of other narions (such as Canada) and seeing a proliferation of successful parties and a more representative government, the politics of fear and testosterone have seen increasingly polarized and lopsided regimes in our neighbors while our own two party system has often become more like deciding between twins with slightly different moods and appetites.
As many have pointed out it's difficult to imagine what would truly move this nation to revolution so long as enough of us have the modern equivalents of bread and circuses. Then again, as most people on the fringe with political agendas know, the American Revolution wasn't set in motion by popular sentiment most had to be dragged or tricked into it, because most had things comfortable enough that they could adapt to the rest, and in any event rolling with matters was easier than doing something.
Back to the third parties, though, it remains nearly impossible for me to find one I can really sidle up strongly to. The Greens and Libertarians remain for me, at best, protest votes. As I wish the Libertarians success because it can only weaken the GOP, I wish the Greens success because they bring economic, social justice and environmental issues to the fore and might remind the Democrats that they're failing their constituents by persisting at being GOP Lite.