The Daily Caller published an interesting article this week entitled “Bernie’s $12 Interns, And 8 Other Egregious Examples Of Fight For 15 Hypocrisy,” in which it lists the various hypocrisies of the people and groups involved in this Fight for $15 battle.
One aspect of the article, however, is really interesting. Here is an excerpt from the piece:
“Democratic presidential hopeful and self-described socialist Bernie Sanders has been one of the more vocal lawmakers in support of the living wage. He has even introduced a bill to raise the federal minimum wage to $15 per hour. This despite the fact he only pays his own interns $12 per hour.
“Similarly, a 2014 analysis from the Employment Policies Institute (EPI) showed 96 percent of the House and Senate sponsors of the Fair Minimum Wage Act of 2013 do not pay their interns at all.”
Sanders has pretty much based the last few years of his career on raising the federal minimum wage. However, instead of actually being consistent in his beliefs, he has actually become hypocritical on the entire matter. He wants businesses to pay employees $15 per hour, but his interns earn just $12 per hour. And we all know how internships are on the list for the next “victim-hood” fight.
The Vermont Senator, who is breaking ground with Hillary Clinton, has railed against capitalism and free markets for so long and complained about low wages. It seems this is just another case of “do as I say, not as I do.” As the campaign unfolds, Sanders will turn out to be as much a hypocrite as Clinton.
So you’re calling him a hypocritic for not paying them $15/hr, even though he already pays well over minimum wage, and most don’t pay them at all. Sounds to me like he’s probably breaking the bank paying as much as he can afford. He also doesn’t want to go directly to $15. He wants to do it in stages until it reaches $15 by 2020. $12 is still higher than it will be after the first few increases.
Clearly you are out of touch with poor america. $12/hr is not a low wage.
$12/hour? Shoooot, I’d KILL for an internship that paid $12 an hour which is still nearly *double* the federal minimum wage of $7.25/hr — which I interned for last year, and it sucked. This year, I’m interning for $10.50/hr, and already I feel like I can actually participate in the economy rather than just making enough to pay my bills (if that).
Why no comment on the fact that Hillary only started paying her interns — at all — this year? Nope, let’s just attack the one man trying to do right by his employees.
Typical for yellow journalism.
The purpose of the article is to showcase hypocrisy. If someone says and truly believes people “need $15 an hour to live” then you should be doing that with your employees from the gate because when you don’t you become easily discredited. That’s how I see it and perceive it, because if he honestly believed what he was saying: he’d do it now. Not gradually or eventually, because if you want to prove something can be accomplished tomorrow then demonstrate it today.