Although
the issue he’s getting all worked up over is NOT the one he thought he was
going to have to address back when he was a mere gubernatorial candidate with
dreams of someday being the “top dog” of Illinois state government.
BACK
DURING THE gubernatorial debates, Rauner kept trying to get Quinn to promise
not to push for a permanent extension of the income tax increase that is
supposed to wither away come Jan. 1.
Quinn,
to his credit, would commit to no such thing – particularly since he had always
made it clear he wanted to keep the additional revenue generated by the
temporary increase. Nobody would have believed him if he had agreed to Rauner’s
demands.
Now,
Quinn has no intention of touching the issue. The state still is going to
experience a severe financial shortfall this fiscal year. But since Quinn is
history come Jan. 9, it’s now Rauner who will have to resolve this problem.
In
fact, the one thing that Quinn promised to get done during the Legislature’s
fall session beginning in a couple of weeks is to approve an increase in the
state’s minimum wage. Illinois already has a wage higher than the federal
minimum, but the cost of living is rising at a faster rate.
QUINN
WOULD PROBABLY love it if he could be the guy who gets credit for putting the
minimum wage higher than $10 an hour.
The
idea also is popular amongst the electorate.
In
a year when the conservative ideologues are going to want to believe that their
views predominated on Election Day, Illinois voters gave a 2-1 margin of
support to a referendum question that asked if the state’s minimum wage rate
ought to be increased.
There
may be those who will screech and scream loudly and shrilly about how paying
unskilled labor more money is the death of our economy. Rauner appears to be
amongst them.
BECAUSE
IN PRESENTING his “transition team” earlier this week (including one-time
gubernatorial dreamer William Daley and one-time nominee Glenn Poshard), Rauner
also made it clear he wants nothing done by the General Assembly until he gets
to be a full-fledged governor.
Considering
that he’s already trying to create the impression that it’s the Democratic
Party-dominated General Assembly that’s refusing to listen to his orders, it
seems he wants to be the “chief” who barks orders and has them blindly
followed.
Including
the minimum wage, where he now says he’s willing to consider some hike
(although not as big as the $13/hour total that Mayor Rahm Emanuel has hinted
at) but ONLY if it is combined with alleged business reforms.
Some
of which strike people as being just a step or two removed from making Illinois
into a “right to work” state – like one of those places in the South that goes
out of its way to inhibit organized labor and the concerns of working people. Definitely not something that will please anybody whose concern is boosting the pay people receive for their work.
I’M
NOT ABOUT to predict with any certainty what will happen. But considering that
there is resentment arising from the perception that Rauner tried to create on
Election Night that he reached out to the legislative leaders (when it seems he
really didn’t), I won’t be surprised to see something happen on the minimum
wage issue -- just as a way of telling the incoming governor where he can "stuff" his partisan ideals.
Would
our Legislature, at the urging of Gov. Pat Quinn, be willing to back a boost in
the minimum salary a person could be paid for their work – purely out of spite?
I’m
sure the employees who wound up with a little more money from their paychecks
wouldn’t object. I was even amongst the roughly 2.2 million voters who said “yes”
to a minimum wage hike.
But
public policy set by spite? Sad to say, it sounds way too much like the “Illinois
way” of doing government!
-30-
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