Honestly, I thought a vote would be close. $15/hr might have been just a tad too much; a bridge just slightly too far, for the majority of Seattle residents.
I am very glad to see that I am wrong. Way wrong.
If minimum-wage opponents weren't already shitting bricks, they're in for an awfully uncomfortable bowel movement: A new poll finds a stunning 68 percent of Seattle voters support a straight-up hike in the city's minimum wage to $15 an hour. No exemptions, no phase-ins, no strings attached.
The news for opponents only gets worse the further you delve into the details: 35 percent of voters "strongly support" the proposal, compared to only 14 percent who "strongly oppose," while support holds fast throughout the city and in every demographic subgroup except Republicans.
Was this some kind of push poll? Or was the poll done by some firm nobody's heard of that came from, shall we say, left field? Doesn't look that way.
And in case opponents were hoping to console themselves with the thought that this is just some shoddy pro-labor propaganda (the poll was funded by a coalition that includes Working Washington, UFCW 21, Nick Hanauer, SEIU Healthcare 1199NW, the Teamsters, and the MLK County Labor Council), well, no luck there. The survey of 805 likely Seattle voters—an unusually large and robust sample—was conducted January 14 through January 22 by the reputable polling firm EMC Research, with a margin of error of ± 3.5 percentage points.
Perhaps the facts are finally percolating through the right-wing rhetoric. The likes of McDonald's and Walmart ARE being subsidized by our tax dollars to pay their employees shit wages. Everyone DOES deserve a living wage.
As the article concludes
That is the sound of bricks hitting porcelain in executive washrooms citywide.
Now it's time to put up, Seattle City Council. And light the fire across the country.