Political Quotes

“I thank the gentleman for his observations. He, I think, told a partial story of the CBO study and some other studies. Of course, he mentioned the city of Baltimore. The problem with the city of Baltimore, as the mayor who vetoed it indicated, was that next door, the minimum wage was lower. Had the minimum wage been the same, there would not have been the same transfer, I suggest to the gentleman. That aside, he mentions the CBO report on the impact of gradually raising the minimum wage to $15 an hour. The minimum wage was last raised in 2007. It then incrementally raised over 3 years to the present $7.25. It has not been raised in a decade. The poorest workers in America have not had a raise in 10 years. We don't think that is right, as we see this extraordinary disparity of income, where presidents of corporations now are making 1,500 times what their average worker makes. Very frankly, we are a consumer-based economy. Seventy percent of our GDP is based upon consumers. If we raise their salaries, they are going to spend more, grow the economy, and, I suggest, grow jobs, not shrink jobs. Let's look at the CBO study. The CBO study had a number of different averages that were perceived, three of which were zero loss of jobs. 3.7 million was the maximum, not the average, the maximum loss. I am not surprised that opponents of raising the minimum wage would point to that as if it were the figure. It is a maximum, the worst-case scenario. We have a growing economy.…”