Progressive Caucus Hour
Floor Speech
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Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. Today, low-wage workers across the country rallied in small towns and big cities. Their request is very simple: a livable wage and the right to organize.
This isn't rocket science. These folks turn on the news and see reports on stock market gains on Wall Street. They see companies reporting record profits. They see the prices for bread and a carton of milk rising every month. Then they open their paychecks and see the same amount that they have seen for the past 10 years.
This is a crisis that my colleagues across the aisle keep trying to brush under a political rug. That may have worked in the past, but it is just getting too big to be hidden.
According to UC Berkeley economist Emmanuel Saez, the Nation's 100 richest families have as much wealth as the 80 million families that make up the bottom 50 percent in wealth. Meanwhile, Republicans keep trying to peddle the same, tired ``work hard and get ahead'' rhetoric.
Madam Speaker, American workers are doing just that. They are stringing together 40-hour weeks whenever they can. In many cases, they are not given the opportunity to even do that, but they are being paid wages that cobble together to just over $15,000 a year.
Even when McDonald's raises wages for the fraction of its workers behind the counters of their corporate stores, they will only get a raise of $5,000. $5,000 will make a huge difference for those families, but at $20,000, they have gone from drowning to just barely keeping their heads above water.
That is not enough to pay for a college education or to buy a home. That is not enough to save for retirement. That is not enough to pay for medical bills. Madam Speaker, that is not enough to achieve the American Dream.
My Progressive Caucus colleagues and I are here on the floor tonight to stand with workers in the fight for $15, that is $15 an hour and the right to form unions.
It is time to support working families, and it is time to make it possible to work hard and get ahead.
It is now my pleasure to yield to the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Ellison), one of the chairs of our caucus.
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Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. I thank the gentleman for the fine points that he has made. I can speak from a personal perspective. I am one of four siblings, and my father was the bread earner and my mother was the woman who was taking care of our family. And he, indeed, did provide a good and wholesome living for his family.
Madam Speaker, right now, tens of thousands of American workers in fast food and child care and home care and airport services, and even in professional positions in higher education, are not being paid enough to survive. And what that means, and I believe that my colleague did mention it, it becomes a drag on the economy.
Our economy does rely on consumers buying products. They want not just products that they need. Spending is what gives companies, big and small, the revenue to expand and hire more workers. Ideally, it is also what gives companies the revenue to increase wages.
But if you ask the workers who are fighting for $15 an hour, they will tell you that a wage increase has been nowhere in sight.
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Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. I thank the gentlewoman from California for sharing her insights with us and the very important points that have been made.
As I stated a moment ago, our economy relies upon consumers buying products that they want, not just products that they need. But $15 an hour is what we are trying to fight for, and even with that, that will barely provide the needs of these families.
They can barely cover their rent or keep food on the table. They can't buy new cars and support the American auto industry. They can't afford new clothes, supporting American retailers, and they can't buy computers or smart phones, supporting Silicon Valley.
Six out of the ten largest corporations with median wages of less than $15 also rank among the most occupations projected to add the most jobs in the coming years. And as the low-wage workforce grows, the declining purchasing power of Americans means that there is less demand for goods and services in the economy.
If we want to grow our economy, if we are focused on creating jobs, we need to support the people that do just that.
I would like now to yield to my colleague from the great State of Texas, who stands up for working-class families every single solitary day and has even introduced legislation to secure a living wage for the families in our country.
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Mrs. WATSON COLEMAN. Mr. Speaker, I want to follow up on something that my colleague had alluded to, and that is the impact of low wages and the government's need to subsidize. I think that he sort of spoke to it in a generalized way, but I would like to just share with you what I think happens with an individual and a family that has a $15,000 income.
Since it is not enough to keep food on the table, those Americans have to turn to food stamps. Since the jobs don't come with health care, we have got to rely on Medicaid. Because $15,000 a year doesn't pay for the rent in most cities, those Americans rely on low-income housing or subsidized housing through Section 8 vouchers, or they are homeless and living in shelters.
These workers' children are enrolled in children's health insurance programs, and these families are getting support through Temporary Assistance to Needy Families, the TANF program.
Fifty-two percent of fast-food workers rely on public assistance programs; 46 percent of childcare workers rely on public assistance; 48 percent of home care workers rely on public assistance; and, Mr. Speaker, 25 percent of part-time college faculty--highly educated adjunct professors--rely on public assistance.
According to a Berkeley report, the Federal Government spent $127.8 billion on working families in these programs. California spent almost $3.7 billion because of low-wage workers; New York, $3.3 billion; Texas, $2.1 billion; and Illinois and Florida both spent a little more than a billion.
This isn't funding for Americans that are uncharacteristically down on their luck or temporarily out of work or in some other moment of crisis. This money is spent on full-time, hard-working Americans who simply are working for corporations who maximize the CEO's benefits at the expense of the workers' salaries.
Mr. Speaker, if my Republican colleagues are so adamant about reducing government spending, shouldn't we be worried about why these folks are trying to work full-time but still need food stamps to make ends meet?
We have also spent a lot of time in this Congress debating tax breaks for the wealthy and for corporations. In fact, earlier this afternoon, we argued about whether or not the 5,000 or so wealthiest families in this country, the only people who have enough money in their estates to qualify for the estate tax, should get a $2.5 million tax break.
Every year, we let corporations deduct unlimited amounts of bonus pay for executives, regardless of whether or not the companies' workers get pay raises or not, unlike that one special CEO who sees life differently and believes that to whom much is given much is required.
Corporations have written off $66 billion between 2007 and 2010 while letting the low-wage workers who make up the rank and file of their companies struggle.
My colleague, Chris Van Hollen, has a solution for this, requiring companies to raise wages for their workers if they want to keep qualifying for that tax break. It is a simple solution that wouldn't mean companies suddenly have to raise pay for their workers; they just need to stop expecting the government to cover the exorbitant salaries of their executives if they can't pay the rest of their employees a liveable wage.
Mr. Speaker, my colleagues and I stand with the millions of workers fighting for 15. Lifting pay for low-wage workers will boost their purchasing power, pumping more money into our economy and giving businesses the revenue to create more jobs.
Lifting pay for low-wage workers will reduce government spending. Lifting pay for low-wage workers will open the doors to the American Dream for the millions who have already demonstrated that they are ready and willing to work and to work hard for it.
By standing together and fighting for the $15, these workers have already made their voices heard in the living rooms, the boardrooms, and the statehouses all across this country. It is time for D.C. to lend an ear as well.
It is my privilege and my honor to stand with those who are simply seeking a fair wage for the work that they do.
Mr. Speaker, I yield back the balance of my time.
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