[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 160 (2014), Part 3]
[House]
[Pages 3573-3577]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




           UAW NLRB ELECTION AT CHATTANOOGA VOLKSWAGEN PLANT

  The SPEAKER pro tempore. Under the Speaker's announced policy of 
January 3, 2013, the gentleman from Tennessee (Mr. Pocan) is recognized 
for 60 minutes as the designee of the minority leader.
  Mr. POCAN. Mr. Speaker, I rise today on behalf of the Progressive 
Caucus. The Progressive Caucus wants to discuss with the American 
public issues that are important, that are timely, and that should be 
happening in this current Congress.
  Tonight we are here to talk about a number of issues, one being the 
very important need to raise the minimum wage in this country.
  Before we start that dialogue, we also want to talk about another 
issue that has happened just recently in this country and that has a 
little bit to do with my background growing up.
  I grew up in Kenosha, Wisconsin. Kenosha, Wisconsin, was a company 
town. We had one very large employer, American Motors Company. We made 
Pacers and Gremlins and a bunch of cars that maybe were unique for 
their time and may be collectable now, but certainly stood out in 
history. But American Motors did something really amazing for the 
community I grew up in. We were able to grow up in a strong, middle 
class community. People had family-supporting wages. And the reason 
they had family-supporting wages is not only because of American Motors 
Company and later Renault and Chrysler, but also because of the United 
Autoworkers Union, a union that worked very collaboratively with the 
companies that were there in Kenosha and made sure that not only did 
people get a good, fair wage to support their families, but also they 
worked hard and they made sure those companies were profitable and 
delivered a very good quality product for the American people.
  So, that was my experience growing up. My neighbors, my family, my 
friends all wound up having someone in their family working with 
American Motors Company or a company that fed into that, and we had 
good wages and people had a good chance to grow up in a middle class 
environment.
  Unfortunately, all too often we see these attacks across the country 
on unions making it harder and harder for people who work for a company 
to have a voice in their company. What happened just 2 weeks ago was 
there was a union election at a Volkswagen plant in Chattanooga, 
Tennessee. They had an election that was conducted by the National 
Labor Relations Board where workers were deciding whether or not they 
were going to have a voice, collective voice in their workplace. They 
were deciding whether or not they were going to unionize and join the 
United Auto Workers.
  There were two extraordinary things about this election: First, the 
company was neutral. The company had made the decision to stay out of 
the choice because, after all, this was a decision to be made by the 
workers. We have seen time and time again how employers can easily 
interfere with this choice by workers. After all, they write your 
paycheck; they can decide whether or not you get that promotion; they 
can fire you. So an employer can wield an immense and powerful 
influence over the workers who are trying to make a decision whether or 
not they want to unionize, and they can wield that power lawfully and 
sometimes they wield it unlawfully. In this case, the employer of 
Volkswagen said: You know what? This is the workers' decision. Let's 
leave it up to them.
  That doesn't happen very often in this country. For that reason, the 
employer chose to embrace the notion that its employees had the freedom 
to choose. That happened in Chattanooga.
  There is a second extraordinary thing that happened in this election, 
and that is, despite the fact that the employer was neutral, a free and 
fair election was still rendered impossible because of interference and 
threats from outside parties. What we saw here was unprecedented, and 
the shameful actions by outside parties interfered in a private 
decision by some 1,300 workers on whether or not they would organize 
for a better life.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Will the gentleman from Wisconsin 
yield?
  Mr. POCAN. I yield, yes, absolutely, to Mr. Miller from California.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. Mr. Speaker, I want to thank the 
gentleman for yielding. I want to join you in your remarks in 
expressing outrage about the situation in Chattanooga.
  In this case, these outside parties included both well-funded 
interest groups and publicly elected figures dead set on stopping the 
workers from joining the union. It wasn't enough for these outside 
parties to say publicly that they did not like unions. It wasn't enough 
for them to say publicly to the autoworkers, hey, we know what is best 
for you and your family, vote against the union. It wasn't enough for 
them to say we don't want unions to get a toehold on the south. No. 
They were not going to let the workers decide for themselves. They were 
angry with Volkswagen, who was officially neutral. They were angry that 
Volkswagen had a long track record of successfully working with labor 
unions through joint work councils that innovate and reduce company 
costs. They were angry that a majority of the workers actually signed 
cards saying they wanted the UAW to represent them. They were afraid of 
what would happen if the NLRB election process was actually on the 
level.
  In the end, free and fair union elections became their biggest fear. 
Imagine that. In the end, a free and fair election became their biggest 
fear. So they decided they couldn't let that happen. If Volkswagen 
wouldn't scuttle this election, then these outside officials would. 
They laid in wait, and on the eve of the election, they then launched 
their assault: a barrage of untrue and inflammatory statements, the 
kind that we see from union busters all the time, the kind that are 
designed to coerce, to scare, to intimidate, to bully, and to bully, 
and to bully hardworking auto plant workers into rejecting the union.
  One of these third parties, an elected official, went to the press on 
the first day of the voting, the first day the workers had a chance to 
vote, and he said that he had been ``assured,'' if the workers vote 
against the union, Volkswagen would manufacture a new line of SUVs in 
Chattanooga. And lo and behold, what happened? This last-minute 
bombshell led to a press frenzy, banner headlines, a barrage of TV 
coverage, all reporting and repeating the threat that jobs in 
Chattanooga were now on the line with this vote. Never mind that the 
company denied it. Never mind that that elected official's claim wasn't 
true. As he said, he had been ``assured,'' the junior Senator from 
Tennessee said.
  Mr. POCAN. I thank my friend from California.

[[Page 3574]]

  What you said is worth repeating. Volkswagen put out a formal denial 
of the claim, making clear that there was absolutely no link between 
the vote and the placement of the SUV facility in Chattanooga, yet this 
elected official went out and did it again. He moved to discredit the 
company, astonishingly suggesting that the company was using old 
talking points, suggesting that he had the company's new secret talking 
points.
  What happened here wasn't someone just expressing their view. What 
happened here was someone communicating a promise of benefits if 
workers voted one way, backed up by some mystery assurance. What 
happened here was someone communicating a thinly veiled threat that 
jobs would be lost if the workers voted another way, again backed up by 
some mysterious assurance.
  The National Labor Relations Act is our Nation's premiere worker 
rights law. Like many of our civil rights laws, many heroic Americans 
in the last couple of generations gave their lives to secure the right 
to freely associate, to take considerate action to improve their lot 
collectively, to bargain collectively for better wages and better job 
security, for health care, for fair wages, and for a safe workplace.
  These workers were all brave, and they did not give in to thugs and 
battles. This National Labor Relations Act outlaws bribes and threats 
in the midst of union elections. It does so for a reason. Those acts 
are not speech; they are more than speech. They render a free and fair 
election impossible.
  In the case of UAW and Volkswagen in Chattanooga, since voting was 
already underway when the acts were committed, there was no opportunity 
to cure them. The votes were cast, and after 3 days the election was 
over. After an election, there are now three nonunionized Volkswagen 
plants in the world: one in Russia, one in China, and one in 
Chattanooga.
  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. On the last point the gentleman 
made, the reason these worker councils--why Volkswagen was neutral is 
that they had found these worker councils to help them lead this 
industry in innovation, to be one of the largest and most successful 
automobile companies in the world. And, in fact, they have used these 
worker councils in plants all around the world because that is the 
mechanism by which they have continued to be a leader and continued to 
have the growth that they have had and to have the products that they 
have had. And somehow--somehow--as you point out, in Russia and in 
China and now in Chattanooga, that motto is being rejected, not because 
Volkswagen rejected it, but because the election process was not 
allowed in China, it was not allowed in Russia, and was rigged and 
jimmied and obstructed by outside forces during that election in the 
United States.

                              {time}  1900

  Mr. GEORGE MILLER of California. I thank the gentleman for taking 
this time.
  Mr. POCAN. Thank you.
  While we definitely want to make sure we are talking about all the 
issues that are important to this country, and minimum wage is one that 
we want to also talk about tonight, we wanted to take this time just to 
highlight what happened, this travesty two weeks ago, and we hope that 
this will be cured.
  Outside officials, regardless of their perspective, shouldn't be 
involved in the election, but we want to make sure we are highlighting 
what happened, because that election was not fair.
  Thank you very much, gentleman from California, for all your many 
years of service on this.
  At this point, we would like to also discuss tonight something that 
is very important. The Democrats, this week, took on what sometimes is 
considered a very unique measure in this House, it is called a 
discharge petition, because we have been fighting for over a year to 
try to raise the minimum wage in this country.
  There is a bill introduced by the gentleman from California and 
Senator Harkin from Iowa that would raise the minimum wage to $10.10 
within 3 years.
  If we had kept up with inflation since 1968, the minimum wage right 
now would be something like $10.60.
  Instead, we are at $7.25, and people can't get by. You certainly 
can't be in the middle class on that wage, and certainly it makes it 
hard to aspire to be in the middle class on that minimum wage.
  We need to do everything we can to help lift that rising tide for 
everyone who gets that minimum wage because 16.5 million people will 
immediately get a pay increase, and another 8 million people will very 
likely get an increase because they are at that margin already and 
their wage will be lifted already.
  These aren't numbers coming from the Democrats. These are numbers 
coming from the Congressional Budget Office, our nonpartisan entity 
that provides us facts and figures.
  By giving the Nation a boost in the minimum wage, we help the 
economy, we help those who are in the middle class and aspiring to be 
in the middle class, and we can make this country a lot better for 
everyone trying to get by.
  At this point I would like to yield to one of my colleagues from the 
State of Pennsylvania (Mr. Cartwright), one of my freshman colleagues 
who has also been the president of our freshman class.
  Mr. CARTWRIGHT. Thank you, Mr. Pocan.
  I want to say, at the outset, that I was impressed with the colloquy 
that you had with our colleague from California (Mr. George Miller), 
and I wish to associate myself with those comments. They were very 
well-taken.
  I, for one, and I know I speak on behalf of the entire Congressional 
Progressive Caucus, but I, for one, hope that the National Labor 
Relations Board revisits what happened in Chattanooga, because what we 
believe here in America is free and fair elections, and that includes 
labor union elections as well.
  We are here to talk about raising the minimum wage, and it was only 
appropriate that Mr. Miller from California was here with us this 
evening because he is one of the coauthors of H.R. 1010, the bill to 
raise the minimum wage to $10.10, a modest proposal, I should add.
  But let me attempt to address this House. I know that there are those 
who think that everything that could be said about raising the minimum 
wage has already been said, but allow me to address this House as if 
nothing had been said about raising the minimum wage in this country to 
$10.10.
  It is simply a matter of arithmetic. You know, if you just take what 
people were making at a minimum wage in the late 1960s in this country 
and put it on a cost index, a consumer price index, any kind of measure 
of inflation that has gone on since 1968, you see that, as my colleague 
and good friend from Wisconsin mentioned, it is well over $10.10 an 
hour. It is something like $10.60 an hour.
  So this is indeed a modest proposal to turn the minimum wage up from 
the mid-sevens to $10.10 an hour, and there are good, solid reasons we 
have in this country for doing this.
  My fellow Members of the House, you have to remember what life is 
like for people who are making $7.25, $7.50, $7.75. People who are in 
that range are not bringing home enough money to make a living wage. 
They don't have enough money for the necessities of life.
  People who are working full time--you have heard the expression ``the 
working poor,'' that is who we are talking about. These are the working 
poor.
  Think about what our society has to do for the working poor. These 
are the people who have to take advantage of the Supplemental Nutrition 
Assistance Program, the SNAP benefits. They used to be called food 
stamps.
  These people don't make enough money, even though they work full 
time, to feed their families properly, so they resort to help from the 
SNAP program. Who pays for the SNAP program you might ask?
  All of us do. U.S. taxpayers, John Q. Public pays for the SNAP 
program, so it is John Q. Public, not the employers of these people 
making the $7 per hour,

[[Page 3575]]

not the employers paying for that, it is John Q. Taxpayer picking up 
the difference.
  It is the taxpayers paying for the SNAP benefits for the workers who, 
although they are working full time, their employers are not paying 
them enough so that they can feed their families, give them the very 
basic necessities.
  What else?
  These are people that live in section 8 housing, low-income housing. 
Everybody knows that, the projects. That is where they live, the people 
who make minimum wage right now and try to feed and clothe and shelter 
their families on minimum wage in this country.
  So who pays the supplemental amount to keep the section 8 housing 
program going?
  It is us. It is John Q. Public, John Q. Taxpayer. It is the American 
taxpayers picking up the difference because not enough is being paid to 
these workers so that they can sustain their families. But that is not 
all.
  What about Head Start?
  These are families that can't afford to send their kids to preschool 
because when they are making minimum wage, they can't pay the minimal 
fee to send your kid to preschool.
  So where do they go?
  They go to Head Start. Head Start, a federally funded program.
  Who pays for that?
  You already know the answer. You do. It is the American taxpayer. It 
is John Q. Public paying for Head Start because we have got working 
families that don't make enough even to send their little kids to 
preschool.
  What is the point of all of this?
  The point is that these employers paying the minimum wage to these 
workers are paying so little that the American taxpayers have to step 
in and improve the lives of these people to such a basic level that 
they can feed them and clothe them and shelter them and give them the 
basic elemental education.
  In other words, these employers are freeloaders. They are getting a 
free ride off of the American public because they are paying the 
minimum wage, which is in the sevens and it should be in the tens.
  Listening to this debate, the owner of a small business might say, 
well, wait a minute. That means I have to lay people off because I only 
have so much money to pay my employees, so if you up the minimum wage 
to $10.10, I don't have as much money to pay each person, so I have to 
lay somebody off so I can pay the remaining people the $10.10 an hour.
  That is a fallacy. It is a completely bogus argument, and let me tell 
you why: because that assumes that your business is a zero sum game. It 
is not.
  To prove that, we need go back a century to a great American 
businessman, a self-made man, Henry Ford out of Dearborn, Michigan. 
What did he do?
  He started one of the greatest auto companies in the world. A central 
tenet of his business principles was that he was going to pay his 
workers a living wage, and he did.
  They asked him, Mr. Ford, why are you paying your workers so much? 
You don't have to do this.
  The answer is: I want my workers to be able to afford the things that 
I am building. If these people can't afford what I am building, then I 
don't have a market.
  That is where the magic word comes in: customers. If you pay $10.10 
to your employees, it is not just your employees getting that increase 
in wages, it is everybody else's employees. Everybody in America, 
instead of making in the sevens, they get up to $10.10, and all of a 
sudden they have a few more coins jingling in their pockets, and they 
might show up in your place of business.
  You are making customers out of millions and millions and millions of 
Americans by paying them a working wage, a living wage, a wage that 
will enable them to become your customers.
  So don't write off this argument, and don't fall for the same old 
argument that has been used, trotted out time and time again for why we 
shouldn't raise the minimum wage. If we here in America had believed 
and followed that argument, the minimum wage would still be $2.25 
instead of what it is now.
  So think of the customers you will get. This is why raising the 
minimum wage just to what we would raise it to to account for inflation 
since 1968 makes sense.
  Mr. POCAN. Will the gentleman from Pennsylvania yield to a question?
  Mr. CARTWRIGHT. Certainly.
  Mr. POCAN. So what you just said, talking about the buying power, 
putting that much money back into the economy, you know, I look at it 
this way. If you are someone who is making minimum wage and you get 
your wage increased to about $10.10, that extra money is not going to 
go into a savings account for something in the future. You are probably 
going to be buying things right now. You are going to buy a sofa maybe.
  The average CEO now makes 354 times what the average worker makes. 
Back in the late eighties it was about a 40-1 ratio. Now it is 354 
times.
  When we put money into an average low-wage worker, that money goes 
immediately into the economy. They can buy a sofa.
  But when the gains that we have had in this country have gone, 
largely, to the top executives, the top 1 percent, the top 1 and 2 
percent, how many sofas can you buy at that rate? How does that affect 
the economy?
  Do you have any idea how many sofas you think you could buy if you 
are a CEO to try to keep up with and help stimulate the economy?
  Mr. CARTWRIGHT. If stacked end to end, how far into space would those 
sofas reach is the question.
  It is a great point, Mr. Pocan. Of course, you know the answer. The 
answer is this: when we put that extra money in the pockets of the 
people who are making the minimum wage in this country, they don't put 
that money in their brokerage accounts just to languish and not help 
others in the economy. They plug that money right back into the 
American economy, and it turns into growth and it turns into jobs.
  That is what we were doing in 1968 when our economy was humming along 
and we were the pride of the free world. That is what we need to do 
again.
  We need to think about stimulating our economy the old fashioned 
American way, by paying American workers a living wage.
  Mr. POCAN. Thank you very much again, gentleman. I appreciate it.
  I would also like to yield some time to another one of my colleagues, 
the gentleman from Minnesota (Mr. Nolan). He is a freshman, but a 
returning freshman from the State of Minnesota, my neighboring State, 
from the great iron ranges of Minnesota.
  Mr. NOLAN. I want to thank the gentleman from Wisconsin, and I want 
to associate myself with your remarks and those of the gentleman from 
California regarding what has happened at Volkswagen and the importance 
of the union movement in this country.
  If anyone wants to know where the economic success of the middle 
class in this country has come from, you just need to follow the union 
movement. As the union movement grew and strengthened, so did the 
middle class and jobs and opportunities, and as we have seen the 
decline in recent years, we have seen a similar decline in income and 
jobs and opportunities.
  If anyone thinks for one moment that elections don't have 
consequences, they need to take a look at their history.
  I come from the Iron Range. We have got a lot of mining and 
steelworkers up there. Back in 1948, if you will allow me to just do a 
little history here, and leading up to that, the steelworkers union 
proposed contracts that would allow them to negotiate pensions and 
health care benefits, and wouldn't you know, the NLRB, in 1947, said, 
no, you can't do that. That is not okay. That is off the table. That is 
not a subject for negotiation.
  Guess what?
  Not many people had pension benefits and health care at the time.
  Well, it became a big issue in the 1948 election, and Harry Truman, 
as we all know, won the election.

                              {time}  1915

  Well, guess what? He had the opportunity to appoint a number of 
people to

[[Page 3576]]

the NLRB, and that issue was brought before the NLRB again. And guess 
what? This time, the NLRB ruled that, no, it is appropriate for unions 
to negotiate for pensions, to negotiate for health care benefits; and 
that is a result of an election contest and the union movement, coming 
together, was a genesis of a generation that had prosperity and 
opportunities--perhaps unparalleled--anywhere in the history of this 
country.
  I have submitted, back when my generation entered into the employment 
market, if you were going to be a failure, you had to have a plan. 
There was just such an abundance of opportunities, and I am sometimes 
ashamed and embarrassed that my generation doesn't want to step up and 
do for this generation and the next generation what was done for us.
  So I commend you for what you are doing here today, and I also want 
to associate myself with the remarks of the gentleman from 
Pennsylvania. We could go on, and we could add more to the litany of 
the things that are causing the rest of us to subsidize the businesses 
in this country.
  And I know about business. I spent the last 32 years of my life in 
business. I am a business guy. It breaks my heart to see working men 
and women having to go to the food shelves to get food to feed their 
family.
  So I rise here tonight to talk about the minimum wage just briefly. 
You know, we hear about all these millions of new jobs that have been 
created in recent years. One of my constituents said to me the other 
day: You know, it is a darn good thing we have created millions of new 
jobs because a guy needs two or three of them to make a living.
  Well, that is, in fact, what is happening; and it is of small comfort 
to someone who is working these minimum wage jobs to know that, if they 
can put two or three of them together, they can provide for their 
family, make the rent payment, the mortgage payment, buy the groceries 
and clothing for the kids; but you put in two or three jobs, there is 
no time left for the family.
  A minimum wage increase is pro-family. It is pro-American. It is the 
foundation of what made this country the great country that it is.
  Mr. Speaker, I hear all the time in my district, as I travel and stop 
at the cafes and the filling stations and the convenience stores, about 
these people that are working two and three jobs just to make ends 
meet, all because our minimum wage is simply not enough to take care of 
our families.
  The lack of a decent and fair minimum wage is unfair to families. It 
is unfair to children. It is unfair to the elderly. It is unfair to the 
hardworking mothers and fathers, men and women in this country who go 
to work every day, providing the goods and services that we need so 
that we can continue on the path of the great Nation that we have been.
  Mr. Speaker, it is time that we raise this minimum wage. Where I come 
from, morality and ethics dictated. If someone is willing to go to work 
every day and every week and every month to provide essential goods and 
services for the rest of us and this Nation, they are entitled to a 
wage that would allow them to live with a modicum of comfort and 
dignity. That is what this is all about.
  So, Mr. Speaker, let us vote on this issue. You know what the outcome 
will be. We will increase the minimum wage if we are given an 
opportunity to vote on it here in this House. I know there are plenty 
of Republicans and Democrats who will vote to do that. Let's restore 
democracy to this institution.
  Let's allow this matter to be brought before the House. Let's have a 
vote on it. Let's give America a pay raise now. It is desperately 
needed.
  I thank the gentleman from Wisconsin (Mr. Pocan) and Members of the 
House.
  Mr. POCAN. Mr. Nolan, I think what you are referring to is exactly 
what the Democrats are doing this week. We are initiating a discharge 
petition. We need to get 218 Members of this House to sign that to 
force a vote.
  The House leadership has refused to let us have a vote on giving 
America a pay raise; and because of that, we are taking what is 
generally a pretty unusual motion--in other words, to discharge--to 
actually get enough people to sign and say: we want to vote on this, so 
we can pass it.
  And I completely agree with you, Mr. Nolan. If we put this on the 
floor, it will pass, unless the Republican leadership doesn't allow us 
to get this up here.
  So I thank you for all of your efforts, not only just to get people 
to sign the discharge petition, but for all of the middle class 
families of Iron Range, Minnesota.
  Mr. NOLAN. Thank you.
  Mr. POCAN. One of the things that we have talked about tonight is the 
value of why we want to increase the minimum wage, why it is going to 
put money into the economy right now. Again, this isn't the Democrats 
saying that. These are economic experts. These are some of the 
economists of the country.
  The Economic Policy Institute has said that, if we raise the minimum 
wage, we would actually create 85,000 new jobs, in their calculation, 
within 3 years and put a $22 billion boost to the economy; and that 
means $500 million alone to the State of Wisconsin--$500 million to my 
State and $22 billion to the overall economy.
  And what is more, you would lift 900,000 Americans out of poverty, 
according to the Congressional Budget Office. So we would lift people 
out of poverty, give people the ability to support their families and 
the ability to actually have a chance at living in the middle class.
  Right now, on the minimum wage, your monthly gross salary is about 
$1,250. Now, how many of you think you could live paying your rent or 
mortgage, paying for groceries, paying for your utilities, paying for 
gas or a bus or however it is you get around?
  Think about the bills you have. Could you live on $1,250 a month? And 
that is what the minimum wage is right now, less than the real value in 
current dollars that it was in 1968. It should be up to $10.74, I 
believe, if we kept up with inflation.
  There are a lot of myths out there. You are going to hear people on 
the other side of the aisle say: well, this is all for teenagers. Why 
are we going to lift the wage?
  The average person who receives minimum wage is 35 years old. What 
percentage of the people earning minimum wage are teenagers? Twelve 
percent. Again, that is not the Democrats saying that. The 
Congressional Budget Office, the nonpartisan agency we go to for 
numbers, says that.
  So if we raise the minimum wage, we will lift 900,000 people out of 
poverty, directly support 24.5 million workers, about two-thirds of 
those people directly with an increase in wage at the minimum wage 
level and another third who are at the $10 level, who will also see a 
ripple effect of a boost in wages.
  We will help the economy right now by putting that money into the 
economy in all the ways that were talked about tonight, and we know 
that this will not have a detrimental effect on the economy.
  Now, some will say that it is going to cost jobs. I will tell you, in 
my State of Wisconsin, I spent 14 years in the legislature before I 
came to Congress; and every time we raised the minimum wage, there was 
an increase in jobs available. More people went into the workforce 
because we were actually offering a greater wage and people are given 
an incentive to get into the workforce.
  There are studies that compare State by State, county by county, 
where one had a minimum wage increase and one didn't; and there has 
been no ill effect in the county that did versus didn't, based on 
raising the minimum wage.
  There are 600 economists, including seven Nobel economics prize 
winners, who agree that it will have no or negligible effect to the 
increase of jobs; but everyone agrees, it will help those people who 
are currently either living in poverty, working for minimum wage--two, 
three jobs to get by--or those who are just making above it and will 
see that ripple effect.
  So there is no question, we need to give the workers of this country 
a pay

[[Page 3577]]

raise. For all too long, we haven't done it. For all too long, we 
haven't kept up with inflation. You simply can't get by on roughly 
$15,000 a year. That $1,250 a month is impossible.
  We are not talking about teenagers. We are talking about the average 
person being 35 years old, heads of households who are working one, 
two, maybe three part-time jobs just to get by.
  So the Progressive Caucus is here tonight. And this is why we are 
talking not only about what happened at the union election in 
Chattanooga, but about raising the minimum wage.
  The Democrats in this House have initiated a discharge petition to 
force a vote. Let us vote, Mr. Speaker. Let us vote on raising the 
minimum wage because if you let us vote, I know there are enough fair-
minded Republicans that will join with the Democrats in this Chamber; 
and we will raise the minimum wage, but only if we are allowed to.
  We are making every effort, and the Progressive Caucus will continue 
to do this. We were the ones who went and asked the President to raise 
it for people who get Federal contracts, and the President made that 
order. We are very happy the President did that.
  But we are going to continue to push this in every way possible, so 
that people can live comfortably in the middle class and those who 
aspire to can get into the middle class.
  Mr. Speaker, with that, I thank you for allowing the Progressive 
Caucus to have this time this evening, and I yield back the balance of 
my time.

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