Learning from the victory in Seattle

On the heels of workers’ winning a historic victory for a $15/hour minimum wage in Seattle, twenty-one Chicago aldermen co-sponsored legislation for $15 in the third largest city in the nation.

The bill includes a two-year phase-in for big business, and a five-year phase-in for businesses whose annual revenue is under $50 million. Despite the unnecessary phase-in for big business, if enacted the proposal would be a major step forward. According to the Center for Popular Democracy, in partnership with Raise Chicago, $15/hour would transform the lives of 229,000 low-wage workers, nearly one quarter of Chicago’s workforce. Studies show it would pump $665 million into the local economy and create 5,350 desperately needed jobs (Center for Popular Democracy, 5/28/14). This measure appears to have widespread support in Chicago, as a non-binding referendum for $15/hour passed this year by an overwhelming 85%.

The fight for a $15/hour minimum wage has been gaining momentum ever since the fast food strikes in New York City two years ago. May 15, 2014, saw a historic flood of service workers’ strikes. In 150 cities scattered across every continent of this planet, service workers swelled the movement for living wages to new heights. Seattle raised the bar even further becoming the first major US city on track for $15, the highest minimum wage in the country. Passing such legislation in a city the size of Chicago would usher in a new phase for a Fight for $15, one that could inspire workers worldwide.

Why Now?

On May 20, 2014, Mayor Emanuel announced the creation of a “minimum wage working group,” and gave it 45 days to produce a “fair and balanced” proposal to raise Chicago’s minimum wage to an unspecified amount. Despite the inclusion of a few labor leaders, like SEIU’s Matt Brandon and Chicago Federation of Labor Secretary Bob Reiter, the committee is dominated by Chicago’s business and political elite. Big business is represented by the Illinois Restaurant Association, Illinois Retail Merchants Association, and Chicagoland Chamber of Commerce CEO Theresa Mintle, who used to be Mr. Emanuel’s chief of staff. In short, it’s a who’s who of Chicago’s political establishment.

On May 28, the Progressive Caucus of Aldermen, backed by community organizations like Raise Chicago and low-wage workers, introduced a separate proposal for $15/hour. Raise Chicago has direct ties to SEIU, whose president currently sits on the Mayor’s Minimum Wage Working Group. The initiative of the union leaders and Alderman for $15 should be welcomed and signal the launch of an all-out mass struggle to win. Like Seattle, the $15 movement in Chicago has an opportunity to mobilize mass pressure from below to compel the Mayor’s Committee – and through them big business and the political establishment as a whole – to concede $15.

Winning a $15/hour minimum wage in Chicago – a city governed by “Mayor 1% Rahm Emanuel” – will require a major mobilization and a class struggle approach to strategy and tactics. The experience of Socialist Alternative and 15 Now in Seattle, whose socialist strategy is widely recognized as the crucial factor in the victory, offers important lessons for Chicago activists.

Rely on the movement, not the politicians

Clearly the next 45 days will be crucial. However, the key lesson from Seattle is that countering the pressure of big business is not possible without an independent movement prepared to publicly expose and challenge the Democratic Party leadership and their ties to big business. Socialist Alternative and 15 Now won in Seattle by building an independent, democratic, bottom-up movement for $15 that campaigns for an immediate $15 for big business and aggressively exposes the lies and profit-driven interests behind corporate scare tactics. While supporting $15 in words, the Democratic Party establishment – and even the liberals on the city council – worked behind the scenes to appease the demands of big business and water down the legislation. Unfortunately, the alderman and union leaders behind the $15 proposal in Chicago have not, so far, indicated plans to organize a serious bottom-up, independent struggle.

Even though the non-binding referendum for $15/hour passed by a landslide, big business will not go down quietly. Before the battle has even started, some Aldermen have expressed willingness to compromise. Rest assured, low-wage workers, none of whom has been appointed to the Mayor’s committee, will be sacrificed first at the bargaining table. In Chicago, the Democratic Party has presided over vicious attacks on working class people: cuts to pensions and social programs, 50 public school closures, attacks on teachers, and privatization schemes giving hundreds of millions to politically connected charter school operators, contractors, and developers. There’s no reason to think this will go down any differently.

As long as the process is left up to the Democrats closed-door meetings, workers will be at a disadvantage. To combat big business influence, we need to take this fight into the streets, the union halls, and our communities. In Seattle, some labor leaders preferred close-door negotiations to actually mobilizing, and the result was numerous big-business concessions in the final legislation. Last year’s Chicago Teachers’ Union strike offers a glimpse of what’s possible when unions seriously mobilize communities against a corporate agenda. Unions can play a similar role in this struggle, organizing mass demonstrations outside city hall around clear, specific demands to show “Mayor 1%” and the rest of the political establishment that we won’t allow them to sneak in corporate loopholes.

No phase-in for big business

Big business will inevitably attempt to water down whatever workers demand. Building a winning movement means popularizing clear demands. First and foremost, corporations like Walmart and McDonalds don’t need two years to start paying a living wage. Since there is no sympathy for delaying $15 for big business, large corporations will hide behind small businesses to mobilize public sentiment against $15/hour. In Seattle, the CEO of Starbucks said that his corporation could pay $15/hour, but that he opposed $15/hour because it might hurt small businesses – as if Starbucks has ever been worried about small coffee shops!

The movement needs to reach out to genuinely small businesses who are also being crushed by big corporations and, where necessary, offer policies like subsidies or tax breaks paid for by the rich that ensure their workers get a living wage without forcing mom-and-pop shops out of business. It will also be necessary for the movement to popularize the demands against training wages, tip credits, or other forms of so-called “total compensation,” which we should label wage theft.

Political Independence

The 21 Aldermen and women who co-sponsored the bill took an important step by challenging Mayor Emanuel, but they have not offered a clear alternative to big-business politics in Chicago. The strongest challenge to Rahm’s electoral machine would be to build a genuine independent grass roots campaign for a $15 minimum wage. Not only are the Aldermen not proposing this, their ties to the Democratic Party machine prevent them from doing so. The Chicago Socialist Campaign, with its candidate Jorge Mujica, basing itself in working class movements, provides an example of what is needed. Unions should be prepared to support campaigns like this, or run candidates of their own. For example, Tim Meegan, a CTU teacher activist, is running for alderman of the 33rd could mobilize some of Chicago’s poorest neighborhoods into the fight for $15, while offering a concrete challenge to big business and its representatives in city hall.

In Seattle, Kshama Sawant’s election was critical to winning $15/hour. She ran a bold Socialist campaign that galvanized mass support without accepting a dime of corporate money. Once elected, she used her office to mobilize a movement in the streets by building 15 Now action committees in every neighborhood, providing a voice in city hall for Seattle’s poorest workers. We need a similar mobilization in Chicago!