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two party system is a scam
(lemmy.ca)
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this post was submitted on 23 Feb 2024
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Democrats keep trying to increase minimum wage, read a fucking News source.
The problem is, we need caps on profit margins on necessities, and to stop the making of things we need for basic survival investment opportunities.
But that would be difficult to get done. So they go for the low hanging fruit of wages, which never permanently solve anything because they’ll just keep raising prices under this scamflation cycle we’ve been in since COVID.
Every service that is necessary for human survival should have a not-for-profit vendor.
Sure they do. Keep believing, any day now...
My home state of Oregon mandates a minimum wage of $13.20 in rural areas and $15.45 in the Portland metro area, and it adjusts to inflation. Oregon has been governed by Democrats for years. Thanks to these and other laws, I can go down to a McDonald's and get a job that pays $16-17 an hour to start in my city. TriMet in Portland is always advertising a $28 starting wage for bus drivers (no CDL) up to $37 after three years. Rent in my city is $800-900 for a one-bedroom flat with excellent free public transit and fair bikeability. Fuel prices are reasonable. We have strong protections for tenants against abusive landlords. Strong anti-discrimination laws. Everyone has paid sick days. No regressive sales tax. Working-class people can afford a roof over their heads and decent food on the table.
Check out the neighbouring state minimum wages.
But yeah, keep harping on about how both parties are the same and that Democrats don't do more to help the working man.
I was part of that! I was on a team that made a web site that visualized the effect on poverty levels on a county-by-county basis when the minimum wage was at different levels. It made the need for a split minimum wage obvious, since the minimum wage that is necessary for metro areas is inappropriate for rural areas. Rumor has it that the legislature used it in the decision making to some degree.
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I think that's why it's important to encourage participation in the primary process. There are the neoliberals mixed in with the social democrats and actual socialists. We should be voting for and supporting the latter in the primaries if we want to influence the party in a leftward direction.
That's actually better than I thought. People in other states are so used to the dysfunction that they literally don't believe these things are possible.
Good news doesn't spread as quickly as bad news and rage bait. "McDonald's Workers Can Afford Flat on 1/3 of Income" isn't a good headline but "Families Increasingly Priced Out By Red-Hot Housing Market" does.
"Look at how well the democrats allow the capitalists to treat me as they ensure they can continue to exploit my labour for their own profit uninterrupted!!11"
(seriously - start by looking at those companies profit margins for a tip of the iceberg idea of just how much they are making off of your labour before you do a happy dance over a couple of dollars more they're willing to throw your way to keep you from demanding actual freedom)
But yeah, keep harping on about how represented you are in the sham they call electoral politics..
I think OP is just saying that democrats are better than Republicans. We have multiple parties in my country but people vote for tree ones that support capitalism and rich people. We also have people that support a politician that was found guilty of fraud.
Rich people have power so they can do what they want.
You use the word "liberal" like it is supposed to be an insult
What you've said is that someone who agrees with you 50-80% of the time is as bad as someone who thinks you are the devil incarnate and doesn't agree with you at all.
Arguments against electoral democracy by so-called socialists always boil down to "it's not perfect so why bother".
Okay, so keep complaining. Your vision of a better tomorrow isn't going to magically come true if you complain hard enough. You can help make it come true only by participating in the political system we have today. Even if you think it doesn't work, you have no choice but to participate anyway and hope you are wrong.
This is how I got banned from Hexbear. I told someone "You can either participate in the current system or plot to overthrow it. Are you working with the next Lenin or Mao, or merely fantasizing about it?"
So what about you? What are you doing to build the future you want?
Isn't California full of homeless people?
Have you ever been to California actually? Yes the situation is bad but not everywhere is California is like that.
That's waaaay more complicated than just minimum wage. $16 isn't even a living wage here in L.A. where we've got lots of homelessness.
We ought to employ Land Value Taxation to fund the basic necessities for survival, and the remainder should go towards a UBI.
For what it's worth, the minimum wage in LA will rise to $17.28 in July of this year. I get that's still not very high by LA standards, but I stress that progress is better than stagnation.
Yes, and that's because the progressive and left-wing of the Democratic Party is losing a power struggle against the centrists and neoliberals. If you want to change that, be sure to vote in the party primary elections and to encourage everyone you know to do the same.
Register to vote
There's an $18 minimum wage in Denver, for instance. Republicans sure as hell didn't vote for that.
Lmfao, no you -
https://www.counterpunch.org/2020/10/14/liberalism-and-fascism-partners-in-crime/
https://truthout.org/articles/fascism-is-possible-not-in-spite-of-liberal-capitalism-but-because-of-it/
https://web.archive.org/web/20230803021951/https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2022/08/22/american-democracy-was-never-designed-to-be-democratic
https://libcom.org/article/capitalist-democracy-illusion-choice
Having fun in fantasyland?
When all it takes to stop them is the nonbinding opinion of an unelected advisor, are they really trying, though?
Have you tried voting harder this midterm?
Maybe if Democratic legislators vote harder, the Republicans won't be able to stop them!
The parliamentarian's word is law, baby.
If only people could eat Democrats' excuses, no one would ever go hungry.
Or a single House speaker that refuses to even bring it up for a vote. Or or a dipshit that brings it up for vote, then filibusters their own bill (coughMcConnellCough)
The obvious fact that Republicans are much worse doesn't make it ok for the Democrats to not fight for the things the overwhelming majority of their voters want.
They just repealed right to work in Michigan, and Meijer employees presumably used that leverage to significantly improve wages and benefits.
Right to work is another BS right wing policy that needs to die. I put in less than two weeks notice, I'm an asshole; company drops me in an instant, business as usual.
Minimum wage is not the same thing as a living wage. The minimum wage should be a living wage, but it isn't.
See: NY. We just got our minimum wage increase and it's 15-16/hr depending on where you are in NY... That's what we were fighting for more than ten goddamn years ago. $15-$16/hr is an absolute joke on Long Island and NYC. I finally managed to claw my way up to 60k/year and as a single guy the thought of homeownership on long Island is as fantastical and far-fetched as a unicorn, forget about 15/hr... You can't even rent most illegal apartments at that income alone.
The conversation needs to be about what constitutes a living wage and how to calculate it at a given time for each area not just blanket minimum wage increases to specific numbers that sound nice to chant like "fight for fifteen."
Lol getting down voted out of pure tribalism. The complete unwillingness of their base to seriously criticize Democrats is such a massive fucking turn off to voting for them.
Achieving a living wage starts by raising the minimum wage.