Sherrod Brown: “Absolutely. One of our friends from the other side of the aisle said this whole idea of raising the minimum wage is a…”

“Absolutely. One of our friends from the other side of the aisle said this whole idea of raising the minimum wage is a less than honest effort to help working families. I am nonplussed by that. Senator Kennedy uses the term ``hostility'' toward workers. We are seeing more productivity and lower wages, except higher salaries for a relatively small number of people. That is not the American way. It is not the way we were taught in this country to honor work. It is not the way we were taught--to work hard and play by the rules. Then, on top of that, we are now building more and more tax systems that give the greatest tax benefits to the wealthiest, that 20 percent squeezed out of that 1 percent who are absolutely doing the best, and we do no significant tax relief for working families, no significant tax relief for minimum wage workers. We are not willing to address the earned income tax credit, we are not willing to address helping those middle-class workers who are playing by the rules.”