{"id":2210,"date":"2014-11-14T12:02:54","date_gmt":"2014-11-14T12:02:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=2210"},"modified":"2014-11-17T13:02:48","modified_gmt":"2014-11-17T13:02:48","slug":"living-wage-dream-come-true","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=2210","title":{"rendered":"Living Wage dream come true"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Considering millions of workers across the country earn well below what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s needed to live a decent life \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a veritable scandal in the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sixth richest country \u00e2\u20ac\u201c achieving the Living Wage for all can sometimes seem like a distant dream.
\nBut dreams can become reality, if, that is, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re willing to fight for them.
\nJust ask Kshama Sawant, the Seattle councillor who took on her city\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s big businesses — and won.
\nRaising the city\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s statutory minimum wage to $15 (\u00c2\u014110) an hour was the cornerstone of her campaign during Seattle city council elections in 2013. Early the following year, the mayor announced that the city would implement the much higher minimum wage, making it the highest minimum wage level in the country.
\nOnce the new wage is implemented starting next year, 100,000 Seattle workers will be lifted out of poverty and \u00c2\u01413bn in profits will be transferred from businesses to the workers who keep these businesses running.
\nSawant explains that she took on the challenge to raise the minimum wage to a living wage when she witnessed the New York City\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s fast food worker strikes in 2012 spreading like wildfire.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015b2012 was the year fast food workers in New York walked out demanding $15 an hour and union recognition,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she says. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bSo we had a sense that the issue of raising the minimum wage had the potential to galvanise young workers in a big way.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\nSawant says that instrumental to the minimum wage campaign\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s success was working together with grassroots campaigners and across political parties in a concerted, coordinated way against big businesses.
\nEven though Sawant is a member of the Socialist Alternative party, she said her campaign deliberately sought to bring in anyone who cared deeply about raising workers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 living standards, including those who identified with the more conservative Democratic party.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t alienate anyone,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she explains. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe instead unified together by realising who our common enemy was \u00e2\u20ac\u201c big corporations.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\nSawant said the backlash from Seattle\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s big business \u00e2\u20ac\u201c though expected \u00e2\u20ac\u201c was massive.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThere was a backlash from the corporate media, too. At first they just ignored us, and then they scoffed at us. One of the candidates running for mayor last year said it was presumptuous of workers to demand $15 an hour, that they didn\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t deserve it.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThat vitriolic experience with our opponents really helped to crystalise in people\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s minds that, really, the bosses are not on my side and I have to fight for myself, and I can do that by organizing with other workers,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she added.
\nOne argument that\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s often peddled by the business community against higher wages is affordability. As UniteLive reported<\/a>, the Confederation of British Industry\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s director made this very argument earlier this week, when he said, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bYou can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t mandate wage increases.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\nSawant said this was exactly the line of thinking her campaign was up against, but she emphasised that the affordability argument was almost exclusively coming from big corporations who could more than afford to increase their workers\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 wages.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThese big corporations and the chambers of commerce that represent them mounted their campaign in a very clever way, where they were not at the forefront,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThe face of the opposition then becomes your so-called \u00e2\u20ac\u0098good ol\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 mom and pop\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 small business. And the idea that they try to shove down your throat is that it\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s going to be damaging to the smallest businesses.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\nAgain, Sawant and her campaign fought this big business tactic through considered inclusiveness.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe argued that small businesses get destroyed every single day because this system does not support small businesses,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bEvery day small businesses are thrown out of existence not because their workers are being paid decent wages but because they can\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t compete with big businesses.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bSmall business need capital investment, they need to pay high rents just like households pay, so they take out high interest loans,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bSo we pointed out that small businesses are also getting the short end of the stick under the current system. And so we encouraged them to join us instead of opposing us \u00e2\u20ac\u201c and we were very successful with that.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\nSawant insists that Seattle\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s success can be replicated elsewhere, using the same basic strategies and ideas. And she believes one victory, however small, often serves as a catalyst for the next.
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bI don\u00e2\u20ac\u2122t think $15 an hour is enough by any means,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 she said. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bHowever, the experience of fighting for a striking demand like $15 an hour itself transforms people and transforms their consciousness, their understanding of class struggle, and it lifts their confidence.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\n\u00e2\u20ac\u015bThrough our campaign, working people lost the fears they normally had which enabled them to get up and fight,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 Sawant added. \u00e2\u20ac\u015bIt made us realise \u00e2\u20ac\u201c in reality, there is no limit to what we can win.\u00e2\u20ac\u0165
\nTo find out more about Unite\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s own campaign to raise the UK\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s minimum wage immediately, see the union\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s evidence submitted to the Low Pay Commission<\/a>, the body which recommends minimum wage levels to the government.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Considering millions of workers across the country earn well below what\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s needed to live a decent life \u00e2\u20ac\u201c a veritable scandal in the world\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s sixth richest country \u00e2\u20ac\u201c achieving the Living Wage for all can sometimes seem like a distant dream. But dreams can become reality, if, that is, we\u00e2\u20ac\u2122re willing to fight for them. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":2215,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[17],"tags":[23],"wps_subtitle":"UNITElive speaks with the councillor behind Seattle\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s successful minimum wage hike","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2210"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2210"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2210\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2229,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2210\/revisions\/2229"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/2215"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2210"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2210"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2210"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}