1. - Wumpus - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 9:29 am:

   So I have gotten “poorer” as a result of their economic meddling! Perhaps they should fight for all of us to get raises, not just people in minimum wage jobs and themselves.




2. - Leroy - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 9:32 am:

   An idea that is long overdue.

   How are the minimum wage earners going to be afford all the tax increases Illinois (and up here in Cook County and Chicago) is putting on them?

   It’s nice to know the lawmakers don’t want the poor to be forced between paying property tax increases or food; between paying cigarette taxes or paying for education; paying increases in gas taxes and car registration fees or buying medicine for their sick children; increases in tolls, electricity and sales taxes, or buying clothes.

   After all…if the underclass can’t pay these taxes, what is going to happen to revenue in Illinois?!?

   Besides, it will be swallowed up with the income tax goes from 3% to 6%. Illinois is undertaxed, you know.




3. - I can't believe we did it again - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 9:33 am:

   I think it is a fair and solid plan. And I am not a democrat.




4. - Pat Hickey - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 9:50 am:

   I think that its a great start. I am bothered by ’social activists’ who continue to sneer at ‘minimum wage’ in and of itself. No matter how many dollars are added to the base it wil always be the base. Right now SEIU is gearing up their propagnada organs for some loud blowing.

   Entry level employees - the unskilled and resume deficient ( No GED) - need a boost in a living wage. More importantly, responsible voices need to be heard and not just the old-line Commies who dialogue with megaphones.

   Remember, the skilled trades are the unions that fought for the American standard of living = SEIU was hatched when the leftists took over the old Janitors Locals and opened the fence to the unskilled skilledand semi-skilled work force.

   Look for the UNION label.




5. - Snark - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 9:57 am:

   The cost of necessities will rise with inflation over each of the next four years, why shouldn’t the lowest available wage rise at the same rate so that people can continue to pay for clothes and groceries. Eliminating the indexing for inflation is a mistake.

   Every year at Christmas Lexus runs these commercials to try and encourage people to buy a luxury car as a Christmas present, the message being “this is how rich people are supposed to celebrate Christmas”. Yet the issue that the business community is fighting back against the hardest this Christmas season is a bill that would index the minimum wage to inflation. It comes off as pure unadulterated greed.




6. - VanillaMan - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 10:06 am:

   OH Please!
   Lets pretend it is 2006 and finally understand that government wage meddling is for last century policy makers. Minimum wage? That horse died somewhere around 1980. Stop giving it mouth-to-mouth and bury it!

   If you really care about the working poor, up the EITC. Everyone with a college degree since 1995 knows that this is more effective than some silly 1920 minimum wage artifact.

   Go back to college and take some government classes. Get up to date. Minimum wage proposals are from geezer minds. It does no good.

   So this idea is a waste of time. It will have little to absolutely NO benefits, but will drive more businesses from the state. DUH!




7. - Grocery Guy - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 10:23 am:

   By continuing the discriminatory youth wage, this legislation encourages business to employ 16 year olds for 2 years and then send them out the door. In addition, it sends a strong message to our youth that they are not worth as much — even though they sometimes do the job better especially in the area of electronic devices. After all, who programs Grandpa and Grandma’s dvd player and cell phones?




8. - Niles Township - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 10:39 am:

   This is a good compromise, but the real answer on the minimum wage is on the federal level so that IL is not put at any disadvantage.




9. - Wumpus - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 10:50 am:

   SHould the minimum wage, if imposed at a fed level be adjusted for cost of living? Since we are playing economic god, should Chicago have the same minimum wage as Little Rock, AR?




10. - Snark - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 10:57 am:

    Shorter Vanilla Man: Insult, insult, insult, Chamber of Commerce talking point, insult.

    From Think Progress:

    But a March 2006 report by the Fiscal Policy Institute found that increasing the minimum wage actually helps job growth:

    [T]his report examined recent state-by-state trends for small businesses employing fewer than 50 workers and found that employment and payrolls in small businesses grew faster in the states with minimum wages above the federal level than in the remaining states where the $5.15 an hour federal minimum wage prevailed.

    This report also found that total job growth was faster in the higher minimum wage states. Faster job growth also occurred in the retail trade sector, the sector of the economy employing the most workers at low wages, in the higher minimum wage states.




11. - Levois - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 10:59 am:

    Sounds like a good plan. It attempts to address the idea that raising the minimum wage might cause employers to be unwilling to hire people.




12. - ZC - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 11:05 am:

    Works for me.




13. - Calypso - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 11:10 am:

    In my part of the state, it’s difficult to find a starting wage that is less than $7-8.00 per hour already, so I have a hard time believing that there would be that much of an impact. My apologies if this is not so further downstate. I also don’t think that a .50 differential would be discriminatory and should not stand–isn’t it bad enough that women’s wages still don’t meet men’s for the same work? And now we want to add ageism to this equation?




14. - Anon - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 11:20 am:

    I think the minimum wage should track the General Assembly Index…each time they vote a pay raise for themselves, we get matching dollars.

    Anyone ever worked out the hourly rate for a Rep or Senator based upon session? Now that’s a living wage!




15. - small biz owner - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 12:34 pm:

    I can tell you that as a small biz owner I can’t afford to pay 15 people a minimum wage of $8.25 an hour. My simple solution is to cut 5 of those jobs. Not one of my employees making minimum wage is above the age of 18.




16. - Buck Flagojevich - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 3:13 pm:

    The Fiscal Policy Institute report’s numbers are like eggs, you can cook them anyway you want. It is the same with all statistics. The largest job growth states with a higher minimum wage are traditional states that would rebound with an uptick in the economy. Traditional manufacturing states, states with established work forces. I don’t see a Mississippi or Alabama as states benefiting from a higher minimum wage.




17. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 3:28 pm:

    If you actually were a small biz owner, you would know that the $8.25 minimum wage doesn’t apply to workers under 18, and that increase doesn’t go into effect until 2010.

    Assuming they’re working 20 hours a week, right now 15 teenagers making $6 an hour cost you about $93,600 in wages. In 2010, they’ll cost you $120,900.

    You have three choices as a business owner: come up with a business plan to earn $28K more in four years, eliminate three of those jobs and increase productivity, or find a job that you are better at.




18. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 3:32 pm:

    Buck is right, if we really want to turn are economy around, we need to roll back the minimum wage, abolish the 40 hour work week and overtime pay, and repeal workplace safety requirments. While we’re at it, let’s end social security and public fire departments. Hoover for President!




19. - Yellow Dog Democrat - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 3:34 pm:

    Anon 11:20 — I have a better idea. Let’s index public official’s salaries to the median income. They don’t get a pay raise until we do.




20. - cermak_rd - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 4:20 pm:

    I’m sorry to see the indexing go. It was the most appealing side to the whole thing to me. For one thing, raising it then becomes a biannual fight we have to have and if we don’t have that fight and let it slide for a while then we have a shock effect on the economy when we do adjust (it seems that 5 years of raising it by 3-5% would be a lot less of an upset than raising it by 15-25% every 3 - 5 years.)




21. - Concerned Voter - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 5:56 pm:

    So, now that they voted themselves a pay raise, and voted to increase the minimum wage through 2010, what will be their excuse to not give raises during the next round of contract talks with state employees?




22. - So-Called "Austin Mayor" - Wednesday, Nov 29, 06 @ 9:31 pm:

    Small Biz: You may be a business owner, but — if you can’t profitably pay your employees a reasonable minimum wage — you are not a businessman.




23. - beowulf - Thursday, Nov 30, 06 @ 7:36 am:

    Blatant age discrimination towards those under 18 years of age. It is wrong.




24. - Brian McDaniel - Thursday, Nov 30, 06 @ 8:00 am:

    I guess it’s not greedy when you take the income earned by one citizen and re-distributed it to a member of the Illinois General Assembly.




25. - Truthful James - Thursday, Nov 30, 06 @ 8:06 am:

    S-CAM

    If you were competing with Small Biz from a store down the street, you’d go belly up rather quickly.

    “Reasonable minimum wage” — is unreasonable as long as you get to define reason.

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