Increasing wealth and income inequality in the United States is the great moral and economic issue of our time

 What Bernie Sanders said about the minimum wage?

Did you see the email below from Sen. Bernie Sanders? More than 50,000 DFA members have already signed his petition to raise the federal minimum wage, and that number is growing by the minute.

Sen. Sanders is working hard in Congress to force a vote on raising the minimum wage, but he needs your help to overcome Tea Party obstructionism. If you want to give tens of millions of Americans a raise, don't miss this chance to speak out. Sign our petition and tell Congress to raise the minimum wage to $10.10 today.

http://act.democracyforamerica.com/go/3830?t=2&akid=4462.2264341.DKut35

Thanks for fighting the good fight.

- Jim

Jim Dean, Chair
Democracy for America

 

 

Increasing wealth and income inequality in the United States is the great moral and economic issue of our time.  It speaks to whether we will be a nation with a vibrant and growing middle class, or an oligarchic form of society in which a handful of incredibly wealthy families control our economic and political life.

In America today, the top 1% owns 38% of our country's financial wealth. The bottom 60% owns all of 2.3%. In the last several years, 95% of all new income has gone to the top 1%. Sadly, we recently learned that in 2012 the top 40 hedge fund managers in the country earned $16.7 billion dollars, as much as 300,000 public school teachers combined -- almost a third of all high school teachers in America. How's that for national priorities!

In recent months, world leaders from the president to the pope have been speaking out on this long ignored, but critical issue. Several months ago a number of us in the Senate and House urged President Obama to issue an executive order to raise the minimum wage for federal contract workers from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour. Recently, the president did just that. I applaud him for taking this important step forward.  But much more needs to be done.

Within the next several weeks Democrats in the Senate will be bringing forth legislation to raise the national minimum wage from $7.25 to $10.10 an hour. If this effort succeeds, 30 million Americans will be getting a long overdue pay raise. And, just last week, House Democrats indicated that they are preparing to undertake what is known as a discharge petition which would force a vote on the minimum wage in the Republican controlled House of Representatives.

Momentum is on our side. Now is the time for Congress to act!

Please join me and Democracy for America in calling on Congress to increase the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour.

http://act.democracyforamerica.com/go/3830?t=5&akid=4462.2264341.DKut35

Currently, powerful forces in the Republican Party, under the influence of the Koch brothers and other billionaire families, continue to call for major cuts in programs desperately needed by working families. While the rich become richer and the poor become poorer, these billionaires are waging a relentless fight to cut nutrition programs, education, health care and more.

Incredibly, instead of supporting an increase in the federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour, they want to end the concept of the minimum wage -- and create a situation where workers in high-unemployment areas could be forced to work for $3 or $4 an hour. For them, "freedom" means that desperate people are "free" to work for starvation wages.

Working together, our job is to create an economy and a government that works for working families and the most vulnerable Americans, and not just Wall Street and multi-national corporations. And Congress should begin by raising the minimum wage!

Please stand with me and Democracy for America today in demanding that Congress increase the federal minimum wage to $10.10 an hour!

http://act.democracyforamerica.com/go/3830?t=7&akid=4462.2264341.DKut35

Thank you for all that you do.

Sincerely,







U.S. Senator Bernie Sanders

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Paid for by Democracy for America, http://www.democracyforamerica.com/?t=8&akid=4462.2264341.DKut35 and not authorized by any candidate. Contributions to Democracy for America are not deductible for federal income tax 

As the Congress hostage negotiations rage on, we must consider our options

Time once again to stand up and be counted, life is too short to watch someone else commit economic and political terrorism in the US. If you see the light, please share this!

Here is a recent well founded video rant on National TV you should view (subtext: I'm mad as hell and I'm not going to take it anymore!)

http://daily.represent.us/news-anchor-completely-loses-it-on-camera-because-of-everything-thats-wrong-with-america/

And if the references to banking and repatriation of funds escape you,  here is the backstory highlights:

The Institute of Policy Standards produced a detailed report entitled "Corporate Pirates of the Caribbean" which exposes the hidden Conservative agenda when it comes to their push for Territorial Tax Reform. Territorial Tax Reform is a trifecta of greed that aims to: 
1. Lower corporate tax rates which are already low (reducing flow of money into the US tax base; 
2. Make offshore tax havens standard for select corporations (reducing flow of money into the US tax base); 
3. Create austerity measures that will not promote jobs, health care, infrastructure, or the consumer confidence and flowing economy that comes with consumer confidence. 

Here is a good synopsis (with source links) of the smoke and mirrors game being played by the Power Right, taken from The Huffington Post: 

"A new study by three researchers at the University of Massachusetts found major arithmetic errors in the widely cited paper by Carmen Reinhart and Ken Rogoff, "Growth in a Time of Debt," that purports to show high levels of government debt sharply slow growth. This study has been widely cited by political figures demanding deficit reduction, in spite of the fact that the unemployment rate remains high and interest rates are at extraordinarily low levels.

When the errors in the Reinhart and Rogoff study are corrected, the strong relationship between high debt levels and slower growth disappears. In other words, there is little obvious reason that we need fear higher debt levels. We can have the government make investments in infrastructure and education that will boost growth, create jobs, and increase future productivity...... A country such as the United States borrows in its own currency so it literally can never go bankrupt as long as it knows how to print dollar bills. And, unlike an individual, the government has the obligation to support the economy when private sector demand collapses as it did after the housing bubble burst....... For those who own lots of stock and are at the top of the income ladder, times are good. These people may see efforts to lower unemployment as posing a risk. With lower unemployment workers may be able to get a larger share of productivity growth. This may be good for most of the country and mean increased economic growth, but it would mean less for the one percent." 

 
Googling this subject might overload your browser, attesting to the implications this has, but here are a few succinct and notable sites to view:





This agenda is all a Right Wing concoction designed to further cushion the already overluxed 1%, and is pushed by that Good Ol' Boy GOP mentality, brandished proudly by Conservative stalwarts such as Alan Simpson, Erskine Bowles, and a cadre of huge corporations such as GE, Honeywell, etc, etc...