In an event in South Carolina last Tuesday, Jeb Bush was asked whether he thought the minimum wage should be raised. His answer is in the graphic above. He doesn't think the federal government should even have a minimum wage. He would be fine with letting the private sector pay whatever tiny wage it wanted to pay.
That was a terrible answer. It shows that Bush has never had to work full-time and try to support a family on the federal minimum wage ($7.25 an hour, or about $15,080 a year). If he had, he would know that $7.25 an hour is not a livable wage for even a single person -- and it doesn't even begin to be enough to support a family.
He gave that answer because he was born into a rich family, and had everything handed to him on a silver platter all his life -- and he has no understanding of how hard it is for the millions of low wage workers in America (or the fact that those low-wage workers will soon make up a quarter of this country's workforce).
The minimum wage must be raised to at least $10.10 an hour (and $15.00 an hour would be even better) -- and it should be tied to the rate of inflation, so it doesn't instantly start losing its buying power again. Our current minimum wage has slightly more than 30% less buying power than the minimum wage in 1968 had. That is outrageous -- but the Republicans don't care. They only care about letting corporations squeeze every dime out of workers that they can, so they can fatten already record-breaking profits.
Jeb Bush should never be elected president, because he doesn't understand what life is like for the poor or even the middle class -- and he doesn't seem to care.
