Senator, presidential candidate, and self-described socialist Bernie Sanders (I-VT) today introduced a bill that would raise the federal minimum wage to $15 an hour. In his press release, Sanders said:
“It is a national disgrace that millions of full-time workers are living in poverty and millions more are forced to work two or three jobs just to pay their bills,” Sanders said at the outdoor rally near the Capitol. “In the year 2015, a job must lift workers out of poverty, not keep them in it. The current federal minimum wage of $7.25 an hour is a starvation wage and must be raised to a living wage.”
Sanders' release also pointed to a number of factors which, in his opinion, illustrate the need for a higher minimum wage:
"The federal minimum wage has not been raised since 2009. Increasing the minimum wage would directly benefit 62 million workers who currently make less than $15 an hour, including over half of African-American workers and close to 60 percent of Latino workers. If the minimum wage had kept up with productivity and inflation since 1968, it would be more than $26 an hour today."
Included in the 62 million workers making under $15 hour are members of Bernie Sanders' own staff. According to the senators' website, Interns are paid only $12 an hour:
In the bill's summary, the first bullet point reads, "No one working full time should be in poverty. It is time to pay workers a living wage of at least $15 an hour."
Apparently, though, Bernie Sanders' interns are excluded from that assessment.
Editor's Insight: Just as Sanders is free to pay $15 an hour without being forced to by law, so, too, are liberals who claim taxes are too low free to give the IRS as much money as they want. They won't say, "No." Honest.