Chris Haulmark​ shares why he believes a cost-of-living-inflation-indexed national minimum wage starting at $15 an hour is so important for America's economy today.

[Video Description: Chris Haulmark, a caucasian male with short brown hair and trimmed beard, wearing a black t-shirt over a darker black long-sleeved shirt, is sitting at a desk with book shelves in the background.]

Hello everyone!

This is Chris Haulmark, running for US House of Representatives in Kansas's Third Congressional District.

Today, we’ll discuss on what makes important impacts on our lives.

For example, hmm… the necessity of earning money.

Yes, that’s one.

Another, hmm… I would like to provide a little bit of background and reflect on the MANY incidents in our American economy.

Okay, here we go.

A ways back, yes, some people earned money through minimum wage employment, which was just fine for them.

The younger workers could move out of their parents’ home after gaining employment for the first time.

They could afford to stay out and live on their own, or with a new family they started with a spouse.

And they could afford to raise children in that family while rising in their careers, often specializing in one vocation.

That’s what happened so long ago, when the minimum wage floor provided affordability to the cost of living standards that were based on different components, yeah.

Now, when I became 18 years old, I was able to move out WITH the minimum wage standard, yes.

I was able to afford food.

I was able to afford paying bills.

I was even able to afford monthly car payments.

Even the monthly insurance coverage, too.

I paid taxes!

I was able to make a living, spending all that while on a minimum wage job.

After a while, pay increases would build upon that minimum wage floor.

Now…

When I returned from my travels abroad, seeking to settle down in the States, I went to an apartment open for rent.

As I entered the management office, I told the manager: I wanted to rent a new apartment.

Naturally, I assumed that my salary was high enough, but no….

The rental price for a one-bedroom cost only so much, but their policy required an income triple the rental amount!

That was a sudden shock for me, as my income was barely below that limit.

So they declined, saying no…

That wasn’t good.

Then I went to another apartment property, since I believed that this apartment policy was exclusive only to the first property.

But, no! The second property had the same restrictive income policy.

Again and again, this oppression materialized at property after property all across the area.

I was increasingly frustrated, as that was my first time trying to get an apartment for a LONG time.

Now I realize this frustrating roadblock is the same for all of us.

For many people who struggle to… actually BE alive and independent, the minimum wage is far, far too low here in America.

And, I was shocked at the idea that… how to say this?

It is necessary to raise the minimum wage to $15 per hour.

Recall my earlier story about how it was long ago, when knowing that you’d have to know inflation for dependent living standards back then?

Okay, during that time way back then while minimum wage was set, if you also indexed it to inflation, you would see that minimum wage was being higher than it is today.

Yes, absolutely!

So, there we have it-

It’s time to support a movement for raising the America's current minimum wage to be $15 per hour.

I DO see the potential of how it would greatly improve America’s economy, because today many people who move out from their parent’s homes are barely getting by financially.

They’re not really spending their earnings back into the economy, in support of America’s commerce, its businesses, and so forth.

So, I predict a $15 per hour minimum wage increase will improve our domestic economic spending while simultaneously supporting many small businesses which will grow and expand, too.

Yes, I do know that some small business owners would think: “Not a great idea if I have to hire someone at $15 an hour, it would hurt my business.”

Y’know, that’s really just a perception. That’s all.

Remember, long ago, when CEOs, executives, and so on were employed, they did not have such a LARGE wage gap from their companies' worker base.

It wasn’t such massive inequality, no.

Yet, today, we have MILLION-DOLLAR differences in that wage gap.

So that wage gap applies to the reason why raising the minimum wage is so very important, supporting a standard cost-of-living-inflation indexed increase, starting at $15 an hour.

Chris Haulmark for improving America’s minimum wage standards!

[Video fades into a black background with a logo of a cartoonish Chris Haulmark signing “Believe” with white text of “Yes, We Can Believe” below the logo. There is the text of www.HaulmarkForCongress.com at the bottom]

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   signhand Reply

   7 years ago

   ReplyTo:   ChrisHaulmark