Campaign to Significantly Raise the Minimum Wage and Pass an Earned Sick Time Benefit

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1 Campaign to Significantly Raise the Minimum Wage and Pass an Earned Sick Time Benefit The Raise Up Massachusetts Coalition of community groups and labor unions is working to create dignity and opportunity and to say no one is dispensable by putting these 2 measures on the ballot for a binding vote in Raise the minimum wage significantly from $8 an hour up to $10.50 an hour this would help 500,000 low wage earners. The minimum wage was last raised on January 1, 2008 and everyone knows how high the cost of living has gone up since then. 2. Enact an earned sick benefit for the almost 1 million workers who do not have the right to this.the proposal would give those who work for companies of 11+, the ability to get 5 paid sick days a year and for those working for smaller companies, 5 unpaid sick days. What s Next to get this done: 1. Legislation The Senate passed a strong Minimum Wage bill to raise it to $11 an hour, index it to inflation, raise tipped wages from 30% of minimum wage plus tips to 60% plus tips. The House has not acted yet, but indications are that it will probably not pass as strong a bill. BUT, if they don t pass something good, we can get this done by Referendum Referendum Since we collected 282,000 signatures of voters last fall, we took a huge step toward qualifying both Raising the Minimum Wage and Earned Sick Days for the ballot. We have to collect another 60,000 signatures between May 10 and June 15. If we do and if the Legislature has not passed a strong bill by July 2, then we d qualify these 2 referendum for a binding vote of the voters this fall. Raise Up Massachusetts Coalition is made up of over 100 community and religious organizations and labor unions Contact Lew Finfer at MA Communities Action Network (MCAN) LewFinfer@gmail.com (617) or Carl Nilsson carlitoness@gmail.com (617)

2 Raise Up Massachusetts Talking Points on Earned Sick Time and Raising the Minimum Wage General: Ensuring that working families earn fair wages and care for themselves and family members when they are sick is essential for Massachusetts workers. When workers and their families can t afford the basics, they aren t able to spend money in their communities to keep the economy growing There are currently bills before the legislature that would increase minimum wage and allow workers to earn sick time. We urge the legislature to enact these bills, but we are prepared to go directly to the voters if the bills are not passed. Earned Sick Time: It is inevitable that every person becomes ill and needs to take a day off from work providing earned sick time provides job security for when they are ill Nearly 1 million hard working people in Massachusetts almost one-third of our workers are at risk of losing their jobs and the wages their families need if they have to stay home to care for themselves or for a sick child Providing earned sick time for all workers in Massachusetts is enormously popular among MA voters and has growing support across the nation because the people of Massachusetts fundamentally believe that the ability to care and provide for themselves and family members is a right, not a privilege now is the time to pass it Earned sick time gives worker the time to get preventative care such as doctor s appointments, eye exams, yearly physical all important routines to maintaining good health and controlling health care costs Earned sick time is good for businesses it reduces employee turnover, contagion and lost productivity, and helps their bottom line States and municipalities that have implemented earned sick time have seen job growth, and most employers report no negative impact on their profitability By collaborating with our business partners, we ve created a bill that is easy to implement for small business owners and provides special protections for momand-pop stores and start-up businesses

3 Economists say that job retention policies like earned sick time help reduce unemployment and strengthen the economy (according to the Center for Economic and Policy Research) Minimum Wage: The minimum wage in Massachusetts has not been raised since George Bush was president, yet costs keep rising we are long overdue for an increase in the minimum wage The minimum wage keeps pace with the rising cost of living so that workers are able to support themselves and their families Raising the minimum wage helps not just individuals and families, but local communities and our entire economy Raising a family on minimum wage is nearly impossible yet nearly 180,000 children in MA have at least one working parent who earns less than $11/hour Paychecks need to be able to keep up with prices so that minimum wage workers don t have to struggle to afford the basic necessities to support themselves and their families Low wage workers cannot afford to keep losing value in purchasing power when the cost of living rises, but their income does not An increase in the minimum wage would impact nearly 580,000 workers throughout the state and will give them great financial stability to provide for their families It is not feasible for a parent to support themselves and their children on the current minimum wage, yet one of every five low wage workers is a parent Workers who earn a good wage are able to spend that money at local businesses, helping grow our economy

4 Dear Friends, Thanks for your interest to help gather signatures for these two campaigns to help the low wage earners you share. We will get you the referendum petition forms to be signed in mid-september. If you can set a numerical goal for signatures you can gather during the period of collection from September 18 to November 20 based on some percentage of those who come to your office each day actually signing when it s mentioned to them, that would help. The two proposals are: a) Raising the Minimum Wage in Massachusetts in two increments from $8 an hour up to $10.50 an hour to help over 600,000 low wage earners gain around $1 billion in new wages. b) To create an Earned Sick Time benefit for almost 1 million employees so they can take care of themselves and their families. These new wages would be spent back in our economy to create jobs instead of mostly going to national corporations and their too well paid CEO's. The minimum wage was last raised on January 1, 2008 and you know how much the cost of living has increased since then. A coalition of community groups, unions, and social service agencies called Raise Up Massachusetts is organizing this campaign. Our US Senators, Elizabeth Warren and Ed Markey, are amongst the 15 original signers from community, labor, religious, and business to put these measures on the ballot. This is about our values. Both our American value of decent pay for hard work and a piece of the American Dream and about our religious values. God envisioned a world where "no longer will people toil in vain" as said the prophet Isaiah in Chapter 65:20. No one who works hard should earn wages that keep them and their family in or near poverty. Martin Luther King was in Memphis in 1968, when he was assassinated, to stand with the Memphis garbage workers/sanitation workers trying to get decent pay. The key to winning on these issues is collecting the signatures of 100,000 registered voters on each of the two referendum petitions to put them on the 2014 ballot.

5 Unlike regular legislation whose fate is ultimately solely decided by the legislative leadership, if we get the signatures it enables these measures to go forward: 1. By May 6, 2014 the Legislature must pass a bill on these two issues OR If they don't or pass one seen as too weak, we can then place these referendum on the ballot for a binding vote of the voters. Remember that the key to the passage of the 2006 health care bill that extended health insurance to 400,000 uninsured people was getting the 100,000 signa-tures which then moved the legislative leadership to move to pass a good bill. **The key to winning these issues to help all these people is getting the signatures and they must be gathered between September 18 and November 20. ***We hope you can join us by your organization, agency, congregation, or union setting a signature gathering goal and implementing it by engaging your staff, board, members, volunteers, people who uses your services to not only sign the petitions but also take them and collect their own signatures. Our campaign is organizing opportunities to collect more signatures in front of stores and other public places and asking voters to sign as they leave their voting places at the Primary Election and on Election Day November 5. Please contact us about a) getting referendum petitions to gathering the signatures, b) making a plan to get the signatures, c) connecting your volunteers to public events where they can help gather signatures. Remember too that 501 c 3 non-profit organizations and religious congregations CAN take positions in support of ballot issues and CAN gather signatures for them as it's considered like legislation which is not considered a partisan activity like supporting a candidate would be.

6 Community Groups and Labor Unions stand in solidarity with 1 million Massachusetts workers who make low wages and/or have no sick days!! Raise Up Massachusetts is a coalition of community groups and labor unions working together.. --We can raise the minimum wage to $ We can make sure each worker has 5 sick days to care for themselves and their family. I support this campaign. I can collect signatures between 9/18 and 11/20 I can collect signatures or I can let you know our number soon. ***Tear off and hand in or contact the campaign c/o Carl Nilsson carlitoness@gmail.com (617) or Lew Finfer LewFinfer@gmail.com (617) or Tomas Gonzalez (617) I support this campaign. - I can collect signatures between 9/18 and 11/20 - I can collect signatures or I can let you know our number soon. - Your name: Organization Phone Number and

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