While some states and cities have raised the minimum wage, it's still lagging far behind what it takes to live in safe housing, afford nutritional food, and see a doctor when you're sick.
In the early 60s, the minimum wage was set so that a family of four could live on one income. It meant renting instead of buying, driving a second hand car, and eating chuck instead of sirloin, but it was above the poverty line.
Now a full day's work hasn't led to a full day's pay for almost 50 years because a bunch of rich guys screamed that wages were inflationary, no matter that they're a lagging indicator that indicates inflation has already happened.
That's what will fix it--unskew the labor market. Money at the bottom adds labor and value as it circulates through the economy, it's called the multiplier effect. Money at the top causes the asset inflation we've seen since the 90s, with a couple of relatively short breaks in the feediung frenzy.
Other benefits of raising wages include increased contributions to Medicare and Social Security (rich men hate that) and increased tax revenue to the IRS, so maybe we can have a few nice things along with a bloated military.
It's not a panacea, but it's a place to start if they want to reduce the free floating anxiety that demagogues are tapping into and give more people a direct stake in this country.
Throwing money at the rich hasn't done anything for anyone, not even the rich because it's all numbers after they get jaded by all the stuff they own. It's unsustainable and it's time to try something that will work for more of us.
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