Burgess Owens: “America needs a raise; most of America needs a raise. Really, the CEO's are doing very well in America. The stockholders…”

“America needs a raise; most of America needs a raise. Really, the CEO's are doing very well in America. The stockholders are doing very well. This is a time of prosperity and a great deal of growth. it is time to share the wealth, however. American workers are stagnated and some are faced with decline in incomes. Here is a small step that we can take. I wish that we could have both Republicans and Democrats resolve between now and the end of this session, at least we will do no more harm to workers than has been done already this year. The tiny steps that we can take is to move from $4.25 an hour to the first step in this two-step raise which will be 45 cents a year over a 2-year period, just 90 cents, to move from $4.25 to $5.15. What all the economist say, if you factor in inflation and you look at the way that the cost of living has been raised over the last 20 years, we are way behind. To really stay level with the cost of living, this minimum wage increase should go to something like $6.30 an hour. So even after we give the two-step increase over a 2-year period, 90 cents to bring it up to $5.15 an hour, we will still be way behind what we really had 20 years ago with the minimum wage. This is the least we can do. The war that has been declared on workers this year, starting with the November victory in 1994 of the Republican majority, is an unprecedented war.…”