Look, I get the concern that raising the minimum wage might hurt small businesses. But here's the thing - we've seen time and again that when people earn more, they spend more. That money goes right back into local economies. It's not charity, it's economics.
A fair minimum wage isn't just about individual workers. It's about national stability. When you have millions of people working full-time and still living in poverty, that creates social friction. It costs us more in welfare programs, healthcare subsidies, and lost tax revenue than any wage increase ever would.
Other developed countries manage this just fine. We're not talking about some radical experiment - we're talking about catching up to what works.
08:20 PM