SENATE BILL: Long-term Unemployment Relief Act (Law'd)

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

I don't like those current rates, to be honest; a $7.00 minimum wage in 2015 seems, well, low to me....

I'm going to unilaterally vote against this amendment, and along with my VP Cinci, we will offer our own rates and pray to Zeus that you all accept them.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

I don't like those current rates, to be honest; a $7.00 minimum wage in 2015 seems, well, low to me....

I'm going to unilaterally vote against this amendment, and along with my VP Cinci, we will offer our own rates and pray to Zeus that you all accept them.

I'm willing to work with you on this, but recognize that this is still an increase in the minimum wage for tipped employees by more than a dollar per year for the rest of the decade.

We are well aware this needs to be addressed, and we fully intend to address it. Cinci and I will discuss where to go with this behind closed doors and then, like the Vatican, reveal our plan amidst the white smoke when we formulate it. Rest assured, I think we both want the same end goal here.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

The way I had this structured, at least how I thought it was structured, was that you could do 1 of 2 things. First, you could opt in for a tipped position and then make a lower base wage, but be able to receive tips. Or, you could opt out of being tipped and make a higher base wage. The opt out was designed to bridge the gap until we did away with tipped positions entirely, but it may not be wise to do that in retrospect. To make up for this, I allowed restaurants to charge a "service fee" to make up the difference because they cannot afford to pay $12+ an hour to servers. The service industry isn't known for their high profit margins, and we'd put a lot of places out of business if we forced them to pay that much without allowing a service charge (basically a mandatory tip).

I would be interested in keeping the opt out program around if at all feasible, it may too confusing though, but I do agree that the tipped position rates need to be lower than they apparently are. It makes no sense for them to make the same rate as those who are not tipped while also being able to make extra money on top of that. I didn't think that was how we structured it, but if we did, that is my mistake.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

Right. I'm fine with doing away with tipping entirely if we want to move to a european type system, but tipping seems to be ingrained in the American psyche, and people in many cases make more money off of tipped jobs. I know I made much more money working for a golf course where I was tipped versus my legal internships.

At any rate, yeah, companies cannot afford to pay tipped positions a higher minimum wage absent some type of service fee system. Instead of allowing the employee to opt out, I suppose the employer could to avoid confusion, because really, how does the customer know if they need to tip or not, and wouldn't it be confusing if X server did accept tips but Y server didn't... but that is a battle for another amendment.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

What does this bill do for our minimum wage? Are the minimum wage changes dead?

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

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4. Section 1, clauses 3-6 of the Fair Labor Standards Act of 2013 are repealed with the remaining clauses renumbered accordingly.

5. It shall be the policy of the Atlasian Federal Government and all its agencies that any gap(s) in an applicant's employment shall not in itself be considered a basis for disqualification or nonconsideration for employment or contract

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x Duke

Time to right an oversight I made during my first term, at least partially. We can revisit the minimum wage hikes each year rather than setting a $18/hour limit in just 4 years.

[Fmr. Pres. Duke]

I think I stated before that I overlooked the minimum wage hike to $18/hour back when I signed the bill. I absolutely favored the rest of the reforms in the bill. You have to understand that raising the minimum wage from $12.50 to $18 in 4 years will put more working class people out of work as opposed to making them better off. The Senate can revisit it in the future to see if it can be sustainable.

Ultimately, I am here to put people back to work, not out of work. That has always been my goal since taking office, and together, all of us, we boast pretty strong results. I am fine being crucified now, go ahead, stone me in the public square, call me names, it gets me off like an attractive girl, I promise you, but this repeal will be good for job creation. I'd rather someone be making $12.50 and have a job instead of $0 because companies won't hire them due to inflated minimum wage.