Put up the price of beans, dammit
Bravo. It's a winner everywhere. It'll get out the "right " vote -- in fact the idea is so hot out in Arnie land that the walnut man has tried a pre-emption -- after straight arming two earlier legislative moves to raise the state rate.
He's now doing a Disraeli end run by proposing a minimum raise of his own and, according to the LA Times,
" ... California business owners...facing a ballot initiative that would increase the minimum wage to $8.75 an hour and require cost-of-living increases after that.... [and] internal polling showing widespread public support... are inclined to support the Governor's plan."Did you catch the why-for?
<Begin X-ray of Wal-Mart's brain>
First and foremost
we gotta
keep those f...ing hordes of raise seekers and goo goos away
from the off-election polling booths.
<End X-ray>
Yup -- this hot number needs a cool jerk-down from the masthead.
But also notice, besides a heftier raise, the intiative includes indexing to the CPI. This indexing is the real deal here with indexing at the fed level, well ... that's dynamite. The latest nine years without a change follows an earlier 8 year or so de facto "freeze," both of them clearly a matter of quiet bipartisan consensus. Indexation would find few sincere friends on either side of the aisle.
Actually, if I was running the Cal ballot operation I'd welcome the Gub's law, and use it to call for an indexation amendment -- then wait for his scramble to settle down into a signature.
<Begin Terminator voice>
"I'll be back... to you... on
zat."
<End Terminator voice>